Doc Savage: Glare of the Gorgon (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage Book 19) (39 page)

“Be that as it may,” he said heavily, “it is my bounden duty as a physician to attempt to revive any victim brought to me at this hospital. And I stand ready to do exactly that,” he finished firmly.

“If this threat letter the papers received is genuine,” suggested Doc, “the bodies may accumulate faster than you can deal with them.”

“If it comes to that,” assured Dr. Rockwell, “you may be certain that I will be sharing my procedure with you and other doctors so that we can manage the tidal wave of potential victims. But until that time, I must return to my studies. My process was something I stumbled upon, and now I must consider how to refine it in order to deal with more extreme cases than Malcolm McLean.”

No one spoke for almost a minute. The ticking of the clock in the office was the only sound. Afternoon traffic outside the hospital window was an intermittent hum. The clanging of streetcars was raucous in the extreme. Not far away, a train rumbled along the elevated tracks, and the building shook a little in sympathy.

Dr. Rockwell seemed lost in his reverie, his face troubled. All through this, his eyes never appeared to blink. Not even once.

Suddenly, he looked up and inquired, “Is there anything else, gentlemen?”

“You might,” requested Doc Savage, “ring up Malcolm McLean and ask if we might drop in on him.”

“Of course. I will do that.”

Picking up his desk telephone handset, Dr. Rockwell put in the call to the hospital switchboard and listened to the connection ring and ring.

Finally, he hung up, saying, “McLean does not answer. He may not wish to. No doubt he is being besieged by reporters. He may even have left the city.”

“What makes you say that?”

“He had planned to give a lecture at the scientific exposition today but, after his ordeal, the presentation has been ruined.”

Rockwell suddenly looked at his wristwatch and said, “Our mutual friend, Marvin Lucian Linden, is giving a talk in half an hour. I had been planning to attend. I don’t know that I dare spare the time now.”

Doc Savage said, “Perhaps we might all go over. It is always possible that McLean has changed his mind and is in attendance as well.”

Rockwell seemed to give that considerable thought, and at last he said, “I believe some fresh air and diversion will do me some good. Yes, let us go over to the scientific exposition.”

WHEN they entered the great auditorium, the crowds were as large as they had been the day before.

Seeing this, Monk grunted, “I guess havin’ a guy keel over dead in the middle of everything didn’t hurt attendance any.”

Long Tom growled, “Some of these birds may be hoping to see a repeat performance.”

Ham declined to comment, feeling it beneath his dignity. But his sharp eyes skated about the room, already in search of the missing Malcolm McLean.

Once more the ticket takers were sufficiently awestruck by Doc Savage that they passed him through without incident. Monk and Long Tom were also recognized, but Ham Brooks was stopped and asked if he held a ticket.

Flustered, the dapper attorney turned beet red and expostulated. “But I am with Doc Savage.”

The ticket taker looked to the bronze man, who had already passed through the turnstile. Doc gave him a firm nod.

The ticket taker relented. “O.K., you can go in. As long as you’re with Doc Savage.”

“That is what I told you!” snapped Ham.

Monk took that opportunity to launch a dig, saying, “This soirée is for scientists, which you are not. Bein’ merely an ambulance-chasing wart on the face of common humanity.”

Ham lifted his sword cane as if to thrash the hairy chemist about the head, but he was distracted after Dr. Warner Rockwell stepped through the turnstile behind him.

Chicagoans began noticing him. This was remarkable. Doc Savage towered over everyone and all eyes would typically go to the giant man of bronze. But this did not happen.

Rockwell emerged from the turnstile. The crowd, which had begun to press in the direction of Doc Savage’s men, shifted suddenly, and surged instead toward the steady-eyed physician.

“Dr. Rockwell!” a man said enthusiastically. “You are the hero of the hour!”

Another chimed in, saying, “That was incredible what you accomplished with that poor fellow, McLean.”

Another asked, “When will you reveal your restorative process?”

Dr. Rockwell lifted pleading hands and said, “I am still working to refine the process by which I reanimated Malcolm McLean. I have yet to repeat the feat, so I must, in all modesty, decline to answer your questions. Rest assured, I am endeavoring to guarantee that if any others are struck down by this hideous power, their period of catalepsy will be brief and they will be restored to their families. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

Rockwell moved forward, and joined up with Doc Savage and his men, his eyes as unblinking as opals.

“That was a nice speech,” said Ham Brooks sincerely.

“Thank you,” returned Rockwell crisply.

“You’re getting to be as famous as Doc Savage,” muttered Monk in a tone that was not necessarily complimentary. The homely chemist was extremely loyal to his bronze chief.

Rockwell said nothing to that, but took the lead, suggesting, “Please follow me. I will take you to Marvin Linden. We may be able to catch him before his speech.”

Knowing that Linden was an electro-mechanical magician like himself, Long Tom asked, “What invention is he demonstrating today?”

“I do not wish to spoil the surprise,” said Rockwell. “But I have seen it in operation, and it is a marvel.”

Looking around, and seeing booth after booth of ultra-modern scientific devices, Monk Mayfair said, “The whole joint is full of marvels. Linden will have to work some to beat them.”

“This device of Linden’s is a world beater,” promised Rockwell, his unnervingly steady regard going to Long Tom for some reason.

That statement impressed those hearing it, and they followed Rockwell in a single file through the milling crowds until they came to the section given over to electrical and mechanical inventions.

At the far end auditorium, the stage was being readied, while Marvin Lucian Linden held forth at an exhibition booth, fussing with a device that he was endeavoring to remove from a wooden crate. A small crowbar lay to one side. Linden was carefully giving his invention a final going over until he was ready to make his demonstration.

As the electrical expert plucked excelsior off the complicated apparatus, Dr. Rockwell lifted his voice and said, “Marvin, Doc Savage and his men are here with me.”

A startled expression roosted on the inventor’s round features, but when he took in the sight of Doc Savage, his placid face became wreathed in pleased smiles, as his natural effusiveness came to the fore.

“Doc Savage! As I live and breathe! Have you come to observe my demonstration? I am flattered, if that is the case.”

“We are very interested in your demonstration,” Doc informed him, “but what concerns us here is the question of Malcolm McLean’s present whereabouts.”

“McLean! I have not seen him since the unfortunate events of the other day. But he is well, I take it?”

“He was healthy when he left the hospital last night,” supplied Rockwell solemnly.

Linden evinced a short laugh, then assayed a rather lame jest. “Well, you say? But not in the pink? You wouldn’t say
that
, now would you?”

Marvin Lucian Linden began tittering like a small child, amused by his own attempt at humor.

Eyes unblinking, Dr. Rockwell enjoined, “No, I would not call McLean in the pink. The poor man has not had a healthy complexion in a good many years.”

Doc Savage interrupted, “It was our hope that McLean would put in an appearance, for he was not at his home earlier.”

“I would like to congratulate him on his escape from death,” said Linden more seriously. Turning to Dr. Rockwell, he added, “And I would also like to offer my heartiest congratulations to you, Warner, for having aided in his escape. Well done, sir. Well done indeed.”

As Linden rattled along, Long Tom Roberts was watching him fiddle with the complicated apparatus from the packing crate.

When his eyes rested upon the thing, the puny electrical wizard’s orbs narrowed and he snapped, “Let me see that!”

The vehemence of Long Tom’s expostulation caused Linden to momentarily recoil, and his demeanor shifted entirely.

“See here! I must ask you not to take such a sharp tone with me. This is my device, and you may not touch it without my permission.”

“I don’t want to touch it. I want to know what it is.”

“That,” returned Linden in a better humor, “is a surprise that I am about to unveil.”

There was a buzzing in the immediate vicinity and everyone noticed, including Long Tom.

“That is not a mechanical noise,” he said suspiciously.

“Far be it for me to disabuse you of your opinion,” said Linden, smiling mischievously. “But I will admit my device has not been turned on as yet.”

Keeping a respectful distance, Long Tom shifted about while studying the contraption, suspicious eyes growing even narrower.

The mechanism had a homemade quality about it. A great deal of it consisted of electrical antennae. The thing positively bristled with steel quills.

It brought to mind a metallic porcupine built around a transformer.

“Is something wrong?” asked Doc Savage.

“If there is,” Long Tom said querulously, “I’m going to wring someone’s neck before the day is out.”

Everyone looked at Long Tom quizzically.

“That buzzing,” he said, as if it explained everything, “sounds like bees.”

Marvin Lucian Linden’s mischievous smile quirked slightly but did not become any less mischievous.

“All will be revealed to you shortly.”

“It won’t work,” Long Tom said suddenly.

“I beg your pardon?” returned Marvin Lucian Linden. “Are you referring to me or my device?”

“It will not work,” Long Tom repeated. “Except at short ranges.”

Marvin Lucian Linden’s mischievous smile did not know what to do with itself. It quirked, retreated, quirked anew.

“Assuming that we are speaking on the same subject,” he said graciously, “this early model is not designed to work at any distance greater than the compactness the mechanism allows. It is my hope and expectation to increase its effective range, as I refine the mechanism.”

“That’s the rub,” clucked Long Tom. “My own experiments haven’t solved that problem.”

Now Marvin Lucian Linden’s smile collapsed totally. He became flustered. “Are you intimating that you have been working along the same lines as I?”

“I’m not intimating any such thing,” snorted Long Tom. “I’m saying it straight out. You can’t increase the range without building a completely different mechanism. The rays won’t travel far enough with the lethal force necessary to accomplish the job.”

Marvin Lucian Linden possessed a rather peaked complexion, but now it paled alarmingly.

His voice became cold, but there was a tremor in it when he spoke next.

“If you gentlemen will excuse me,” he quavered. “I must ready my invention for its first public demonstration.”

With that, he carefully placed the device back in the packing crate, set the wooden lid back in place, smothering the peculiar buzzing. Taking the thing under one arm, the wild-haired inventor walked in the direction of the auditorium stage.

After he had gone, Monk and Ham got in front of the slender electrical expert and demanded, “What gives?” This from Monk.

“I’ll bet my hat,” Long Tom gritted, “that’s an insect eliminator modeled along identical lines to the device I’ve been working on these last few years.”

“Your bug killer?” Monk said.

“No, my bug
aggravator.
So far I’ve only got it to work at short distances. It will kill insects that fly close to it, but it only chases away others. Once they wander into the area of its electrical field, the rays disturb them and they go flying off.”

Ham commented dryly, “Rather sounds like it works to me.”

“Sure, if you want to kill bugs that fly in through your windows. But if you need to clear a swamp of mosquitoes, or an infestation of cockroaches or other vermin, my insect killer is a bust.”

“A qualified bust,” corrected Ham.

Long Tom shook his head vehemently. “No. It’s a dud. Until I get it working right, it’s a bust. And it looks like that Marvin Lucian Linden has produced a similar one. I can tell by how its wired up. His contraption won’t do anything more than mine.”

“Perhaps we should observe the demonstration, gentlemen,” suggested Dr. Rockwell patiently.

Doc Savage returned, saying, “It might be interesting, at that.”

After a substantial introduction, Marvin Lucian Linden took the stage, placed his device on a plain deal table, and lifted a glass bottle containing nothing that could be clearly seen.

His demeanor was that of a professional illusionist, preparing to perform a trick. He had a showy manner about him, which was evident in his lavish hand gestures. His wild shock of crispy hair made his round head resemble a fantastic dandelion seed head.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Linden began, “in my right hand I hold up a glass jar containing several bees from a local apiary. These bees, as you can hear when I hold the microphone up to the jar, are hale and hearty despite being out of season.”

Linden waved the bottle before the microphone stand, and the sound of bees buzzing about was magnified throughout the auditorium.

Linden’s voice swelled. “This device on the table is one that will prove to be of great value to humanity. Farmers will sing its praises. Households will display one in every home. Larger versions, installed in tropical climates, will eradicate disease-carrying mosquitoes and other pestiferous enemies of mankind.”

A buzz went racing around the gathered audience.

“I call this machine my Insecto-eradicato. Any six or even eight-legged creature flying or crawling into the zone created by its deadly rays will perish in a matter of seconds. Insects on the edge of the zone of influence will be driven away, and remain at a respectful distance as long as the exciter is operating.”