Doc Savage: Glare of the Gorgon (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage Book 19) (33 page)

“No!” shrieked the snake-haired one. “Do not fire.”

But the command came too late. One nervous gunman, seeing only a weird helmeted head, squeezed off a shot. The passage quaked, became filled with the gory flicker of gun lightning.

Doc Savage had already faded back around the corner when the slug from a heavy caliber automatic struck a leaning timber, spraying the vicinity with splinters mixed with needles of hot lead created when lead struck a steel spike.

Results were disastrous.

The ancient, dried-out timber had several punky spots, and the bullet had gouged out one of those. Under the considerable strain of supporting the ceiling, the old wood crackled and broke.

Dust, debris, cries of horror, suddenly filled the tunnel passageway.

Doc Savage understood old mines. They were nothing to fool with, especially when they became unstable.

Having no choice in the matter, he pitched backward, using great speed, but taking every precaution as he retreated.

Behind him, there was a stampede. Yells, curses—much of it profane.

And above those complaints, the voice of the Medusa shrieked, “Keep your heads! Keep your heads!”

Then, with a resounding cracking of timbers and rock, the mine began sundering.

Doc Savage redoubled his speed. Throwing caution aside, he abandoned his infra-red helmet lantern. Behind his weirdly flashing form, a cloud of dust and grit coughed out, and began chasing him the length of the ancient tunnel.

Chapter XXXII

REVERSALS

AT THE MOUTH of the old coal mine, Monk Mayfair and Long Tom Roberts were debating the relative merits of their weapons.

Monk was saying, “I’ve got a drum full of slugs loaded with bee venom. Bein’ hit by a mess of ’em is like bein’ stung by a swarm of yellowjacket wasps. What do you say to that?”

“Sounds goofy,” Long Tom retorted. “I’ll take Doc’s special anesthetic anytime. But my hypodermic bullets do the job much quicker than mercy slugs.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it with my own eyes,” grunted the hairy chemist.

The argument was quite muscular, but carried on in low tones. Neither man wished to draw attention to himself.

“How do you think Doc is doin’ in there?” Monk wondered aloud.

“Why ask me?” returned Long Tom peevishly. “Do I look like I’m toting a crystal ball?”

“Well, you don’t have to be wrathy about it,” said Monk indignantly. “I’m just makin’ conversation.”

“Make sense instead,” snapped the slender electrical expert. “Your goofy bullets and your fool notions go together, if you ask me.”

“Nobody asked you,” said Monk in an injured tone. The homely chemist was normally not so thin-skinned, but he was inordinately proud of his new ammunition.

Monk and Long Tom lapsed into silence, their ears striving to capture any sounds emanating from the old mine. But nothing came.

“Spooky hole,” muttered Monk.

“I don’t much cotton to mines,” agreed Long Tom. “They give me the heebie-jeebies.”

“Someone who also gives me the creeps is that Malcolm McLean,” said Monk thoughtfully. “The guy looks like someone dug him up a month after his own funeral. I wonder why the Grogan gang glommed him.”

Now it was Long Tom’s turn to grunt, “For a dead man, he sure gets around. First, he steals an automobile that thinks it’s a submarine, then he gets killed over at the science exposition, and now he pops up in this joint.”

Monk shrugged. “Maybe he’s triplets.”

“Bushwa,” snapped Long Tom. “There could be only one such guy. So that’s out.”

They paused again to listen, knowing that it was all but impossible to hear Doc Savage when he was on the warpath, as he was now. Although a veritable giant, Doc Savage combined the tracking skill of a Cherokee brave with the jungle cunning of a hunting tiger.

Their first indication of trouble brewing was a deep rumble.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” muttered Monk.

The rumble swelled until it grew into a throaty roar like the teeth of some monster clashing together, grinding and pulverizing great boulders.

Instinctively, the hairy chemist and the pale electrical wizard faded away from the portal, knowing that something was about to erupt from the shadowy mouth.

Something did. But it was not what was expected.

Like a streak of blue-steel lightning, Doc Savage flashed into view, all but invisible, except for his metallic helmet.

Close on his heels, a terrible cloud of blackness that smelled of must and coal dust and more noxious things.

“Hold your breath!” Doc rapped out.

“What?” yelled back Monk.

“If you have gas masks, don them,” urged Doc.

The crashing urgency of the bronze man’s voice seized them by their throats.

Pocketing their weapons, Monk and Long Tom dug into their clothing, and extracted simple gas masks consisting of nose and mouth pieces, and an oxygen canister hanging by a flexible hose.

As they put on the contrivances, their eyes took in Doc Savage. He whipped off his flexible helmet, dug into his pocketed vest. It did not contain an elaborate gas mask, but he did produce a device that consisted of a spring clip that clamped his nostrils shut and a separate but connected chemical filter which he clapped over his mouth.

Once that was in place, the bronze giant seized Monk and Long Tom by their coats, and began sprinting, driving them ahead of him.

Long Tom wanted to know, “What’s the big deal? That’s only coal dust, isn’t it?”

Doc Savage did not reply. Instead, he redoubled his efforts. The elemental power of the bronze colossus was never more evident. Neither Monk nor Long Tom were slouches in the running department. But their feet struggled to keep up with the urgent velocity imparted by the bronze man’s shoving arms. Similar to being pushed along by a locomotive, the fear of being swallowed under the cow catcher was alarming.

Finally, Doc conveyed them to the sheltered spot where Ham Brooks had been guarding Janet Falcon. Ham had heard the commotion, and his face was stiff with white shock. For the elegant barrister had not moved, mindful of Doc Savage’s instructions.

“Run, Ham!” Doc Savage called ahead. “Hold your breath. Keep running.”

Ham did not have need of further explanation. Seizing Janet Falcon by one arm, he sprinted hard.

They all dashed as far from the coal works as possible.

Ham looked back once, and spied a black cloud coming out of the mine, and he thought the worst.

“Did someone touch off some old dynamite?”

“No,” said Doc. “If you have a gas mask, put it on.”

Ham did.

“What about me?” screeched Janet Falcon.

“We have no spares,” said Doc. The bronze man eyed her steadily, awaiting her reaction.

“She can have mine,” said Ham.

Janet Falcon surprised them all. She said, “No, I shan’t. I—I will take my chances—whatever they are.”

Removing his contrivance, Doc offered it to the woman. She pushed it away stubbornly.

There was no time to argue about it, only time to keep running. So they ran, but Janet Falcon finally accepted the protective device. Doc Savage possessed the remarkable ability to hold his breath for an astonishing period of time. Compressing his lips, he applied a spare spring clamp to his nostrils, effectively sealing them.

When, winded, they reached a point where they felt they had put sufficient distance between them and the collapsing coal mine, they stopped for breath.

As a group, they turned around and tried to make out what they could in the absence of moonlight.

The uproar had caused roosting birds to fling themselves up out of the trees, and any bushes where they might be.

Birds were circling around, fluttering and twittering. An unsettling thing began happening then.

Many of the birds started dropping from the sky. They fell in groups; others, seeing the uncanny fate that befell their fellows, took wing for distant parts.

Soon, there were no birds visible in the sky.

Monk muttered, “There musta been some poisonous stuff like chokedamp or firedamp in that old mine.”

“No,” said Janet Falcon slowly. “It was not poison gas. Not in the way you imagine.”

They all looked at her.

Doc Savage asked quietly, “Do you know something you wish to share with us?”

Janet Falcon shook her head numbly. “No. Not at this time.”

“Is it your opinion that anyone trapped in that mine could not possibly survive?”

“Yes, that is my firm opinion. There would be no survivors.”

Her voice was dull, and all the light seemed to have drained out of her.

“That was the last of the Grogan gang, wasn’t it?” she asked.

“All but the ones left in the coal-washing plant,” said Doc. “And they were likely overcome, as well.”

Janet Falcon stared out into the night, as if measuring distances.

“My guess is that the fumes would have reached the plant. If so, there could be no survivors there, either.”

THEY waited an hour before Doc Savage investigated.

The gas masks of the others had already run empty of their supply of oxygen. Doc Savage’s simple device worked to filter out chemical substances, for he breathed through his mouth only via the sponge filter. He had reclaimed this from Janet Falcon.

The bronze man considered whether to enter the coal-washing plant for some time before he drifted down in that direction. He had great confidence in his filter, but once again he was facing an unknown danger.

Doc reached the two men who had been put to sleep by his anesthetic gas balls, and they were not breathing.

Taking a scalpel from one pocket, he inserted the implement into one nostril and then the other of both men. This produced a gritty sound that he had come to know well.

Next, Doc went to the machine gunner who had stood guard before Janet Falcon’s makeshift cell. Doc did not need to use a scalpel to ascertain the man had died as a result of his brain petrifying. The lack of respiration and strangely-sunken eyes told him all he needed to know.

Doc Savage made a thorough search of the coal plant, and found no other bodies. Only the gangster hat that landed on the roof. The outrush of violently expelled air had blown it to the ground.

Next, he moved toward the mine, and shone an ordinary flashlight into the portal. The powerful beam did not penetrate very far, but there was no sound, not of digging or cries for help or anything. All was still. Deathly still.

Doc worked his way around the face of the mine, looking for other means of egress, but the air was so cloudy with grit, his eyes struggled. The special goggles were only useful with the infra-red lantern, which was now lost. So they did not help.

Finally, Doc Savage rejoined the others, saying, “It appears that there were no survivors.”

Monk offered, “So the Grogan outfit has been snuffed out.”

“No great loss,” commented Long Tom.

Ham’s brow furrowed. “Is this then the end of the brain-petrifying menace we have been investigating?”

Once again, all gazes turned toward Janet Falcon.

“I confess that I do not know,” she said wearily. “I would like to go home now.”

“You will have to make a full statement about what you do know,” advised Doc.

Janet Falcon nodded. “I understand that. But not here. I am very tired.”

That seemed to be final, so they made their way back to the big bronze speed plane that Monk had left parked on the approach road to the mine.

As they trudged back to the waiting aircraft, they saw police lights flashing red.

Reaching the roadway, they saw that the way was blocked. A police roadblock had been established on either side of the shelter belt of trees behind which rested the big bronze-skinned bird.

“Looks like the local cops found our bus,” remarked Monk.

“Let us hope they did not discover Joe Shine and his mob inside,” murmured Ham.

The police had. For they had forced open the hatch door, something that took special tools and a great deal of patience, for Doc’s planes were armored against bullets and burglary both.

There was a police sergeant in charge of the detail, and Doc Savage approached him. There was no issue of the bronze giant’s identity, even fantastically armored as he was. His metallic features and close-fitting hair so remindful of a skullcap identified him instantly.

“Is this your plane, Mr. Savage?” the sergeant asked.

“It is,” admitted the bronze man.

“We found Joe Shine and his mob sleeping inside. What can you tell me about that?”

Doc said, “I have full authority from the Superintendent of Chicago police to make arrests.”

“What are the charges?”

“Attempted murder, kidnapping and several others.”

That seemed to satisfy the sergeant. “Well, we’ll take them off your hands now. You might explain it all to the superintendent when he wakes up in the morning.”

Dawn had yet to creep as far west as Illinois, but it was not far beyond the horizon.

Doc Savage said nothing. He did not wish to turn Joe Shine and his boys over to the police, but there was no getting around it now.

Doc told the officer, “There was a cave-in at the mine yonder. Inside were some of Duke Grogan’s men, but it appears that they perished in the cave-in. There is no hope for them.”

The sergeant beamed. “That’s a hell of a good night’s work, Mr. Savage. You bagged the Joe Shine mob and put a period to the reign of Duke Grogan. The state owes you a debt of gratitude.”

Doc said, “Thank you. It has been a long night. We would like to take possession of our plane and return to the city.”

“Be my guest. Go catch up on your sleep. We can sort this out later today.”

Joe Shine’s sleeping mob were loaded into the backs of assorted squad cars. There was not enough room or sufficient seats, so the police flung some of them into the trunks of their machines, rudely slamming down the lids. They appeared to be quite pleased about the matter.

Doc Savage had neglected to mention that the woman accompanying him was the missing Janet Falcon. He did not wish her to fall into police custody just yet.