Doc Savage - The Pure Evil Part 3

"Of course not! You can check it."

"How?"

"Telephone the police here in this city, if you wish."

"If I do," Monk told her, "I'll ask them to explain how they call both cases suicide. How do you think they'll answer that?"

"They stated that it was evidently a coincidence and that Cooper had been planning suicide also, and made it spectacular by duplicating the odd circ.u.mstances of my brother's death deliberately."

"Yeah? The police believe that?"

"They claim to. They say that people contemplating suicide often take the most spectacular means at hand.""You must have pretty imaginative cops down there."

"I'm disgusted with them," Gail admitted.

"Why," Monk asked abruptly, "did you call us?"

"I wanted Doc Savage to take the case," Gail said. "Could I speak to Mr. Savage now?"

"Let's answer that question of mine a little more fully," Monk Mayfair suggested. "You're more than a thousand miles from New York City. . . . Do you know Doc Savage personally?"

"No. I've never even seen him."

"He know you? Or know of you?"

"I hardly imagine so."

"Then you'd better give me a long and complete explanation of how you happened to think of calling Doc," Monk advised. "Preferably something I'll believe."

Gail looking at the telephone angrily. She supposed Monk Mayfair was suspicious. She couldn't tell from his voice, but he was hedging. In the beginning, she had imagined he was some minor personage, not much more important than an office boy, but she was beginning to doubt her first judgment.

She said patiently, "I had a couple of dates with an engineer name Tremaine, who was here a few weeks ago making some installations of advanced radar equipment. He mentioned Doc Savage. In fact, Doc Savage seemed to be his hobby. He told me so much-"

"Delman Tremaine?" Monk asked.

"Oh, you know him?"

"Uh-huh. You say you dated him? He's usually pretty choicy about his girls." Monk sounded more interested. "You're probably not a bad looker."

"My brother died this afternoon and I'm hardly in a frame of mind to discuss my looks!" Gail said quietly and bitterly.

There was a silence. Monk Mayfair was evidently uncomfortable. Presently he said, "Go ahead with how you happened to call on Doc."

"As I started to say, the engineer Tremaine talked endlessly about Doc Savage," Gail continued. "He told me that Doc Savage was a remarkable combination of scientific genius, mental marvel and physical giant, and that Doc Savage followed the unusual career of righting wrongs and punis.h.i.+ng evildoers with whom the regular agencies of the law, for one reason or another, were unable to cope. He said in particular that Doc Savage was in the regular sense not a detective, and that he did not work for fees, but took only cases that were fantastic or interesting."

She halted to a.s.semble more words-convincing ones, because the explanation sounded a little weak now-and Monk Mayfair asked, "You believed all this?"

"About Doc Savage? I don't think Tremaine would lie."

"Any man will lie to a pretty girl.""But you don't understand-Tremaine was so impressed by Doc Savage. I have never seen a man regard another one so highly. No, I felt Tremaine was sincere, and I became convinced that Doc Savage must be an unusual sort."

"Unusual," Monk said, "is a weasel word for Doc. In fact, I don't know that words would do justice to Doc. And that comes from a broken-down old chemist that has been a.s.sociated with Doc for quite a while."

"You're a chemist?"

"That's right. But let's not let the conversation stray. You called Doc Savage because a fellow named Tremaine, who knew Doc slightly, had sold you on Doc's omnipotence."

"Yes."

"And you have for sale a nice story about men hung from thin air and something in a radar scope driving your brother mad with fear?"

Gail said stiffly, "I don't like the way you refer to the truth as-"

"Sister, I don't want to be blunt, but the feathers on this package you're selling are a little too colorful."

"But I don't understand!"

"I'll put it more simply. I don't believe this stuff you've told me."

"If you'll put Doc Savage on the wire-"

"Sorry. No dice."

"But-"

"Lady, if I bothered Doc with something as wild as this, I wouldn't be thought of very well."

Gail lost her temper. Her nerves all seemed to come loose at once, and the loose-flying ends flailed out angrily at Monk Mayfair. She gave her opinion of Monk, not flattering, of his intelligence, less flattering, and included a couple of his ancestors in the disapproval. "You dim-witted, discourteous lunk-head!" she finished. "If you think you're going to keep me from seeing Doc Savage about this thing, you've got another guess coming."

Less impressed than he should have been, Monk asked, "What do you intend to do about it?"

"Why, you thin-brain, I'll see Savage myself."

"Not while I'm on the telephone, you won't."

"I'll see him personally. I'll talk to him. I'll come to New York."

"That's ridiculous," Monk said. "Anybody smart enough to think up the wild story you just told me wouldn't be that dumb."

Gail gave her personal opinion of Monk's intelligence in six short words, and hung up. She looked at her hands. They were shaking, and she had a grisly feeling that she would be certain to have hysterics if she moved out of the telephone booth. So she remained there a while, until her feelings were under better command.She went directly to the airlines ticket booth which connected with the hotel lobby, tapped her way grimly to the counter, and told the sleepy-looking clerk, "I have to get to New York immediately. When can I leave?"

After glancing at the clock, the clerk said, "Twenty minutes."

"I want a round-trip ticket." Gail bit her lips, remembering that she had very little cash with her. Not enough, certainly, to pay for an airlines pa.s.sage to New York. "Would you take my personal check?"

she asked, and listened to the clerk murmur apologetically that it was against company rules.

"You hold a seat for me," Gail said with determination. "I'll be leaving on that plane." She was back with a very few minutes to spare with enough to pay for a round-trip ticket, and about thirty dollars for expenses. Not much, but the best she could manage, and she'd borrowed it from a person she didn't like-Morry Gibble.

Driven by impatience, Gail was the first aboard the plane after it had wheeled up to the ramp and emptied its local pa.s.sengers. As a result of boarding early, she had quite a wait, and sat frowning, thinking that she'd better compose herself.

Gibble had thought she was doing an idiotic thing. She'd had to tell Gibble what she was doing before he would loan her the money. Not that she minded telling Gibble-it was simply that she didn't care for the rather piggish manner Gibble had toward women in general. Not, she supposed, that Gibble was a chaser. He just wanted to be.

Now the last pa.s.sengers came aboard, the pilot and co-pilot pa.s.sed forward into the control compartment, and the stewardess made the door fast. The usual white-clad lineman wheeled his fire extinguisher cart to a position near the port engine and waited until that engine was running, then went to the other engine.

Gail, who had flown very little, watched nervously as the engine outside her window spat considerable sheets of red flame from its exhaust stack. She wondered if she could call the stewardess' attention to the flame, but decided no one else was alarmed, so it must be normal. Anyway, they were rolling fast now and the s.h.i.+p was preparing to leave the ground. It had left the ground. They were airborne. Give me five or six hours, Gail thought grimly, and we'll see who keeps me from talking to Doc Savage.

Presently the edgy feeling of a new flier wore off, and she tried to emulate the other pa.s.sengers, who were all asleep or pretending to be. Sleep, she soon discovered, was out of the question.

She began to have doubts about her wisdom. Good Lord, what am I doing here? she wondered suddenly. And, quite seriously, she examined herself for signs of hysteria. She concluded with what she hoped was logic that she was quite sane, level-minded, and knew what she was doing.

But Gail was surprised, thinking about it now, that she should go to such extreme lengths to seek the aid of a man of whom she had only heard. But Tremaine, the engineer who had told her of Doc Savage, had been so utterly impressed by Doc-the Man of Bronze, Tremaine had called him-that she supposed his enthusiasm had rubbed off on her permanently. Anyway, she'd thought of Doc Savage with full confidence. As naturally, she thought now, as a kid who has been hit by a playmate yells for his mother.

Since she had come by this reliance on Doc Savage secondhand, the man must be quite a strong character.

Her thoughts turned to the oddness of her brother's death, and Cooper's subsequent demise, set at her mind. She didn't want that. It wouldn't be best to go to Doc Savage bearing a head full of confusing guesswork that she had concocted during the night. She wondered if the stewardess would furnishanything to make a pa.s.senger sleep. Probably not. It wouldn't hurt to ask, though.

Gail arose and moved back to the galley in the rear, where the stewardess was bending over a sheaf of reports. She was sorry, said the stewardess smilingly, but she wasn't allowed to supply sleeping tablets.

But perhaps a gla.s.s of warm milk would help? Gail thanked her, drank her milk, and moved back toward the seat.

Tip-toeing past the sleeping pa.s.sengers, Gail gave each a glance as she pa.s.sed, envying them their ability to sleep. . . . Which accounted, she realized later, for her noticing a seamed hand that was the color of a factory brown shoe. Shocked, without instantly knowing why, she lifted her gaze. The hand belonged to a man asleep with a newspaper peaked over his head and face.

Gail moved on. Tiny cold-footed creatures were on her spine now. Terror. And she knew why-or thought she did. Imagination? Had she imagined it was short-sentenced Mr. Morand with his face under the teepee of newspaper?

Gail no more than hit her seat than she realized she couldn't stay there. She had to know. So she walked back, trying to be casual, and told the stewardess, "I'd like an aspirin, too."

The stewardess looked at her oddly, asked, "Are you ill, Miss?" And Gail knew she must look as gla.s.sy as she felt. Because she'd seen, reflected in the plane window as she pa.s.sed, a swatch of white hair which the newspaper didn't quite cover on the side of the man's head opposite the aisle. Mr. Morand had had white hair.

Once more back in her seat, Gail sat there with cold chills. Did Morand know she was aboard?

Preposterous. Of course he did.

Gail shuddered repeatedly. Instead of being an odd character who had offered a veiled bribe, Morand became a figure as sinister as a rattlesnake. She felt danger solidly around her. Her brother and Cooper had been murdered, it was easy to imagine, and she was being following. If I can only leave the plane un.o.bserved at the next stop, she thought wildly.

She hadn't checked the stops the plane made. She wished she had. She had no idea where it would sit down next, and when-three hours later-the lights of a city, pale in a thin veil of groundfog and approaching dawn, swelled up at the plane, she had no idea what city it was. The stewardess didn't announce it.

The plane settled in its final approach, the tires kissed with sharp barks of agony, and presently they were at a standstill and two men in topcoats were wheeling a landing stage into position. The plane door opened. Cold air came in, reminding Gail that, warm as it had been at home, it was winter and cold here in the north. She s.h.i.+vered, but might have s.h.i.+vered anyway-because Morand had risen from his seat, was making for the door.

Morand. It was Morand, with his dunce-cap of white hair. He'd turned up his coat collar, yanked a black hat down over his ears, and his face wasn't toward her at any time, but she knew him to be Morand.

She couldn't leave the plane now. He'd thwarted her. He didn't have his bag, so he was coming back, she reasoned. Nonetheless, she clung to a frantic hope that he was leaving the plane for good.

Not all of the other pa.s.sengers filed out to stretch their muscles. Some did. Mostly these were men, and only one was a woman. Gail watched the men as they pa.s.sed, rather hoping she might pick out one Galahadian fellow and ask him for help. But none of the men rode white chargers; they were, as a whole, rather surprisingly oblivious of Gail. They hardly noticed her, although she was a very pretty girl.Gail left her seat cautiously and moved back to the door, where she jerked to a stop. Morand was outside, near the wheeled steps.

"Nice flight. Smooth air. Pleasant," Gail heard him remark to the stewardess. "New York. How long?"

So he was going on to New York! Gail returned to her seat, and sat there watching her fingers open and close, as if they were gripping at fear.

And that was that. She didn't leave the plane. Morand was the last to enter the s.h.i.+p, and he stood near the door watching the stewardess until she politely requested him to go to his seat and fasten his safety belt for the take-off.

Four additional pa.s.sengers, two women and two men, none of them acting as if they belonged to the others, had gotten aboard. They, and the one who had gotten out to stretch, settled themselves. The plane went through its engine ritual, taxied down to the turning ap.r.o.n, paused for c.o.c.kpit check, then headed down the blacktop runway with acceleration that dragged Gail back against the cus.h.i.+ons.

Presently they were airborne again.

The stewardess came past, and Gail asked shakily, "Miss, what is our next stop?" She hardly knew her own voice.

"New York," said the stewardess.

"Could I-are the police-" Gail swallowed the rest. . . . What could she tell the police? What could she prove? . . . Because the stewardess was looking at her oddly, she said, "Never mind. I-I wanted to ask a question about the police. It wasn't important."

The stewardess left wearing a too-careful look of unconcern, and Gail knew she was suspicious. That was all right. If she has someone, a policeman even, watch me, so much the better; the more honest people watch me, the safer I'll feel, Gail thought.

Now there seemed nothing to do but wait, and Gail knew she was going to do it poorly. She leaned back. Her body felt heavy against the cus.h.i.+ons. The motion of the plane was not as tranquil now, for there was a little uneasiness from rough air, and she wondered if she was going to be airsick. Ill from fright, would be more like it, she reflected.

There was a stirring opposite her. She turned her head, not thinking much about it-her anxieties were all centered on Morand, whose seat was back of her own-and saw that a man was rising from the other seat. He had occupied a double seat alone; there was a row of singles down one side of the plane cabin and doubles down the other; and she had not noticed him specially before.

The man, astonis.h.i.+ng her completely, was in the seat with her in a split second. He was a small man, adept, and he didn't fool around with what he was going to do.

His hand came against her face, covered her mouth and nostrils. She felt moistness; a pad in his hand was wet with something.

Mustn't breathe, she thought wildly. And, somehow, she had the thought in her mind in time, before the stuff was against her face. She held her breath. The liquid, whatever it was, from the pad began stinging her face.

Foolishly, it seemed to her, she remained frozen. She couldn't move, couldn't struggle. The inaction seemed childish, hypnotic. Actually, she may not have remained pa.s.sive for long. No longer than terror would have kept anyone suspended.And now she didn't dare move. Because the man's free hand, the one not holding the stuff to her nostrils, had flashed an enormous knife before her eyes. A cheap knife, a camper's knife, its blade an inch and a quarter across and several inches long.

The a.s.sailant didn't say anything. He hadn't said anything. She had, waiting in horror, the weird feeling that she hadn't really seen him at all. There was about him, it seemed to her, an intangible sepulchral air of a shroud. He even smelled of undertaking rooms and death, but that of course had to be imagination, because she was still keeping air out of her lungs.

If she breathed, she would die. The notion filled her brain. There was no room for any other thought. She was going to die here in the plane seat. If she breathed the stuff, she would die. If she struggled, there was the knife, and she would die anyway.

Then, as unexpectedly as he had come, the man was away from her, and making the only sound he had really made, a hissing like an annoyed snake.

Chapter V.

HE had come with his death like a black ghost, and that was the way he left. No sound whatever, after the one brief hissing.

Gail came up clawing the thing from her face. A pad of damp cheesecloth, it seemed to be.

And she saw why the man had abandoned her. Why, probably, she was going to live for a while longer.

Two men, one enormous, a giant, were coming from forward in the plane cabin. The big man was ahead, the shorter one, who was almost as wide, followed.

A kind of rus.h.i.+ng stillness overlaid everything, due probably to the plane interior which was soundproofed to the fullest extent, yet not silent at all. The engines, the rush through the air, made a gentle moaning in which everything was happening.