The Man of Bronze (12 page)

These men were slightly larger in stature, more brute-like, of a thickness of shoulder and chest advertising powerful muscles. They wore a short mantle over the shoulders, a network of leather which had projecting ends rather like modern epaulets. They wore broad girdles of a dark blue, the ends of these forming aprons to the front and rear. Each man wore leggings not unlike football shin guards, and sandals which had extremely high backs.

They carried spears and short clubs of wood into which vicious-looking, razor-edged flakes of stone were fitted in the manner of saw teeth. In addition, each had a knife with an obsidian blade, and a hilt of wound leather.

Every one of these men also had his linger tips dyed scarlet for an inch of their length! None of the other tribesmen seemed to have the red fingers.

Suddenly the man who led this group halted. Turning, he lifted his hands above his head and harangued his followers in a voice of vast emotion and volume. This man was more stocky than the others. Indeed, he had Monk’s anthropoid build without Monk’s gigantic size. His face was dark and evil.

Doc listened with interest to the Mayan dialect as shouted by the speaker.

“That fellow is Morning Breeze, and the gang he is talking to are the sect of warriors, his followers!” Doc translated for his men, giving his own accurate deductions rather than the gist of Morning Breeze’s speech.

“He looks more like an alley wind at midnight to me!” Monk muttered. “What’s he ribbin’ ‘em up to do, Doc?”

Angry little lights danced in Doc Savage’s golden eyes. “He is telling them the blue plane is a holy bird.”

“That’s what we wanted them to think!” said Renny. “So it’s all right if—”

“It’s not as right as you think,” Doc interposed. “Morning Breeze is telling his warriors we are a human offering the holy blue bird has brought to be sacrificed.”

“You mean—”

“They’re going to kill us—if Morning Breeze has his way!”

M
ONK instantly whirled for the plane, rumbling: “I’m gonna meet ‘em with a machine gun in each hand!”

But Doc’s low voice stopped him.

“Wait,” Doc suggested. “Morning Breeze’s warriors haven’t worked up their nerve yet. I have a scheme to try.”

Doc stepped forward, advancing alone to meet the belligerent fighting sect of this lost clan of the ancient Mayans. There were fully a hundred red-fingered men in the conclave, every one armed to the teeth.

Seized with the insane fervor which comes upon addicts of exotic religions, they would be vicious customers in a fight. But Doc stepped up to them as calmly as he would go before a chamber of commerce luncheon gathering.

Morning Breeze stopped shouting at his followers to watch Doc. The chief warrior’s features were even less likeable at close range. They were tattooed in colored designs, making them quite repulsive. His little black eyes glittered like a pig’s.

Doc dropped his right hand into his coat pocket. Here reposed the obsidian knife he had taken from the Mayan who had killed himself in New York. Doc knew, from what he had heard in the Blanco Grande hotel room, that great significance attached to these knives.

With dignity, Doc elevated both bronze hands high above his head. In doing so, he carefully kept the sacred obsidian knife hidden from the Mayans. He had palmed it like a magician.

“Greetings, my children!” he said in the best Mayan he could manage.

Then, with a quick flirt of his wrist, he brought the knife into view. With such expert sleight-of-hand did he accomplish this that it looked to the Mayans like the obsidian blade had materialized in thin air.

The effect was noticeable. Red-fingered hands moved uncertainly. Feet shod in high-backed sandals shifted about. A low murmur arose.

While the time was opportune, Doc’s powerful voice vibrated over the group.

“Myself and my friends come to speak with King Chaac, your ruler!” he said.

Morning Breeze didn’t like this at all. A variety of emotions played on his unlovely face.

Watching the warrior chief, Doc catalogued the man’s character accurately. Morning Breeze was hungry for power and glory. He wanted to be supreme among his people. And for that reason, he was an enemy of King Chaac, the ruler. The darkening of Morning Breeze’s countenance at mention of King Chaac apprised Doc of this last state of affairs.

“Tell me your business here!” commanded Morning Breeze in substance, seeking to give his coarse voice a ring of overbearing authority.

Doc, knowing that if he gave Morning Breeze an inch of rope, the fellow would take the whole lasso, made his tone more commanding.

“My business is not with underlings, but with King Chaac himself!” he thundered.

This also had its effect. Both on Morning Breeze, who turned purple with humiliation and rage, and on the other warriors, who were plainly impressed. Doc could see they were of a mind to postpone the sacrificing and take the white strangers to King Chaac.

Putting a volume of dignity and command In his voice which few other men could have managed, Doc directed:

“Do not delay longer!”

Doc’s sleight-of-hand with the knife, his knowledge of their language, his dominant bearing, all worked triumphantly to his advantage.

The phalanx of red-fingered men melted away in the middle, forming an encircling group to escort Doc and his men to King Chaac.

“That is what I call runnin’ a whizzer!” Monk grinned admiringly.

“Here’s something to remember!” Doc told him. “Anything that smacks of magic impresses these red-fingered fighters. That’s the principal thing that saved us a lot of trouble.”

They left the plane on the narrow sand beach, depending on superstitious fear to keep the Mayan populace away. The yellow-skinned folk would hardly be irreligious enough to finger the holy blue bird.

JUDGING from their physical appearance, the other Mayans were an entirely sociable people. They were not hard on the eyes, either, especially some of the young women. Their clothing showed expert weaving and dyeing, and in some of it, fine wire gold had been interwoven with luxuriant effect.

Their skins were a beautiful golden color; absolutely without blemish.

“I don’t believe I ever saw better complexions in a race of people,” Ham declared.

The young women and some of the younger men wore high headdresses of gorgeous tropical flowers. Some had trains that fell in graceful manner about their shoulders.

Monk remarked on the uniform beauty of the Mayans, with the exception of the red-fingered warriors.

“Looks like they pick out the ugly ducklings and make fighters of them!” he chuckled.

And they later found this very thing was true. To become a warrior, a Mayan had to attain a certain degree of ugliness, both physically and of mind. The Mayans had no prison system. When one of their number committed a minor crime, he was sentenced, not to exile or prison, but to become a fighting man—a protector of the tribe.

These red-fingered warriors fought off invaders, and kept the Valley of the Vanished for the Mayans alone. Thus, many of them were slain in battle, and hence actually punished.

They were the most ignorant and superstitious in the Valley of the Vanished, these crimson-fingered fighting men.

The cavalcade trod the streets of the the Mayan city.

Johnny, with the excitement of a born archaeologist making new discoveries of stupendous interest, could hardly be kept in line.

“These buildings!” he gasped. “They are erected exactly as in the great ruined city of Chichen Itza and elsewhere. See, they never use the arch in construction of roofs or doorways!”

One peculiarity about the buildings struck the others, who, with the exception of Doc, did not know a great deal about the Mayan type of architecture. The structures were replete with carvings of animals, grotesque human figures and birds.

Not a square inch but was sculptured in some likeness. The Mayans seemed to dislike leaving even a tiny bit of unadorned space.

They came finally to a stone house larger than the rest. It was lifted slightly above the others upon a foundation of masonry.

They were ushered inside, into the presence of King Chaac.

KING Chaac was a distinct shock. But a pleasant one.

He was a tall, solid man, only a little stooped with age. His hair was a snowy white, and his features were nearly as perfect as Doc’s own! Dressed in an evening suit, Chaac would have been a distinct credit to any banquet table in New York. He wore a
maxth
, or broad girdle, of red, with the ends forming an apron in front and back.

He was stationed in the middle of a large room.

Beside him stood a young woman. She was by a long stretch the most attractive of the Mayan girls they had seen. The perfection of her features revealed instantly that she was King Chaac’s daughter. She was nearly as tail as her father. The exquisite fineness of her beauty was like the work of some masterly craftsman in gold.

“A pippin!” gasped Monk.

“Not bad,” admitted Renny, his long, tight-lipped face losing a bit of its puritanical look.

Doc, in a low voice only the pair discussing the girl could hear, said sharply: “Dry up, you gorillas! Can’t you see she understands English?”

Monk and Renny looked sharply at the girl—and both instantly became red as well-cooked beets.

For it was evident the ravishing young Mayan lady had heard their remarks and understood them. Her features were flushed, and she was distinctly embarrassed.

Doc, in his halting Mayan, began to greet King Chaac.

“You may speak your own language,” interposed King Chaac.

He spoke English that was fair enough!

For once, Doc was taken with surprise. It was a long twenty seconds before he thought of something to say. Then he waved an arm slowly to take in all his surroundings.

“I don’t quite understand all this,” he murmured. “Here you are, obviously descendants of an ancient civilization. You are in a valley practically impregnable to outsiders. The rest of the world does not even dream you are here, You live exactly as your ancestors did, hundreds of years ago. Yet you greet me in excellent English!”

King Chaac bowed easily. “I can dispel your curiosity, Mr. Clark Savage, Jr.”

Had Doc been less of a man than he was, that would have knocked him over.

He was known here!

“Your esteemed father taught me the English tongue,” smiled King Chaac. “I recognize you as his son. You resemble him.”

Doc nodded slowly. He should have guessed that. And it was very good to know his great father had been here. For wherever Savage, Sr., had gone, he had made friends among all people who were worthy of friendship.

The next few words exchanged had to do with introductions. The ravishing young Mayan lady’s name was Monja. She was, as they had surmised, a princess; King Chaac’s daughter.

The squat, surly chief of the red-fingered warriors, Morning Breeze, was ordered outside by King Chaac. His going was slinky, reluctant. And he paused in the door for a final, avid look at Princess Monja.

That glance told Doc something else. Morning Breeze had a crush on Monja. And judging from Monja’s uplifted nose, she didn’t think much of the chief of fighting men.

“I don’t blame her, either,” Monk whispered to Ham, making very sure his voice was so low nobody else heard, “Imagine having to stare at that phiz of his across the breakfast table every morning!”

Ham looked at Monk—and released a loud laugh. Monk’s face was fully as homely as Morning Breeze’s, although in a more likable way.

DOC Savage put the query that was uppermost in his mind. “How does it happen your people are here—like this as they lived hundreds of years ago?”

King Chaac smiled benignly. “Because we are satisfied with our way of living. We lead an ideal existence here. True, we must fight to keep invaders away. But the warlike tribes surrounding this mountain do most of that for us. They are our friends. It is only every year or two that our red-fingered warriors must drive off some especially persistent invader. Thanks to the impregnable nature of this valley, that is not difficult.”

“How long have you been here—when did you settle here, I mean?” Doc asked.

“Hundreds of years ago—at the time of the Spanish conquest of Mexico,” explained the old Mayan. “My ancestors who settled the valley were a clan of the highest class Mayans, the royalty. They fled from the Spanish soldiers to this valley. We have been here since, satisfied, as I said, to exist without the rest of the world.”

Doc, reflecting on the turmoil and bloodshed and greed that had racked the rest of the world in the interim, could not but agree that the course these people had taken had its merits. They might be without a few conveniences of modern homes, but they probably didn’t miss them.

Elderly King Chaac spoke up unexpectedly: “I know why you are here, Mr. Savage.”

“Eh?”

“Your father sent you. It was agreed that upon the passage of twenty years, you were to come to me. And I was to be the judge of whether or not to give you access to the gold which is of no value to we of the Valley of the Vanished.”

Lights of understanding flickered in Doc’s golden eyes. So this had been the text of the remainder of that letter, the burned first portion of which he had found in his father’s robbed safe!

It was all plain now. His father had discovered this lost valley with its strange inhabitants and its fabulous hoard of gold. He had decided to leave it as a legacy to his son. He had secured possession of the land inclosing the Valley of the Vanished. And he had made some arrangement with King Chaac. The thing to do was to find out what kind of arrangements!

Doc put the inquiry: “What sort of an agreement did my father have with you?”

“He did not tell you?” the old Mayan asked in surprise.

Doc lowered his head. Slowly, he explained his father had died suddenly. The elderly Mayan maintained a reverent silence for a time alter he heard the sad news. Then he outlined the business aspects of the gold deal.

“You will necessarily give a certain portion to the government of Hidalgo,” he said.