Doc Savage: Glare of the Gorgon (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage Book 19) (51 page)

Swinging downward, Long Tom got his feet on the wooden rungs and his fists around the upper rungs. He climbed down like an agile monkey. Soon, his feet touched wood. A plank had been laid for walking purposes.

“Drop it down,” he called up.

Monk released the flashlight. Long Tom caught it, began moving along the horizontal passage, and was soon out of view, only the rustle and clatter of feet stepping from plank to plank and the fading backglow of his flashlight indicated his progress.

Monk and Ham waited with more than a trace of nervousness about them. It was an unpleasant thing to find oneself so deep within the earth—and Long Tom had plunged even deeper. No telling what he would discover, nor how safe the passage might prove to be.

No little time passed when suddenly, they heard a hollow yell.

“Damn you, get back!
Back, I say!”

Long Tom’s voice! It sounded higher and more fear-stricken than they had ever heard it before.

“Don’t come any closer!”
the electrical wizard yelled.

Came a low, venomous hissing, remindful of vipers arguing, followed by the racket of feet running, echoing hollowly, coming closer.

Ham called down, “Long Tom! What is going on?”

Monk was getting ready to jump down into the pit, when the flash glow swelled, and Long Tom Roberts was scrambling up the wooden ladder, the visible portions of his masked face paler than they had ever seen.

Monk reached down a comically long arm, grabbed Long Tom by one forearm and yanked him up, setting him on his feet.

In the electrical wizard’s right hand was his magnetic gun. He had drawn it.

“It’s the Medusa,” he said breathlessly. “It was stalking along the tunnel. Came right at me!”

“Well, why didn’t you shoot it?” Ham screeched.

“I did!” Long Tom yelled. “I emptied every bullet I had into her. She just kept on coming, face terrible. Her eyes were as green as a lizard’s.”

For the briefest of moments, Monk and Ham stared at Long Tom, wondering if the puny electrical genius was playing some kind of practical joke on their frayed nerves.

The gas mask he wore prevented his face from being clearly seen. But the abject fear in his tone was unmistakable. Long Tom was speaking the truth.

Ham went to the shaft, and spiked his flash beam down, listening carefully.

Measured footsteps could be heard below. Something was approaching. No question of that.

“It’s coming this way!” he hissed.

“I’ll believe it when I see it!” grunted Monk, picking up a heavy stone.

The hairy chemist waited; they all hovered over the hole, looking down into the pit-eye.

Then the apparition stepped into view.

Under the glare of three flashlights, it was a hideous sight.

The cranium was a nest of snakes, vipers writhing and twitching with hideous life. The tangled head tilted back, and lizard eyes stared upward. The marble-white face of the thing was fixed, ugly beyond comprehension.

From its warped lips, a violent hissing escaped.

“Lookit!” Monk squawled.

“No,
look away!”
Ham screeched. “Don’t let her gaze petrify you!”

It was a preposterous warning, but under the circumstances—deep in the bowels of the earth—it rang true. All three of Doc Savage’s men felt their marrow grow cold in their bones.

Only Monk reacted in that instant. He dropped his stone. It struck the nest of twining serpents and the creature staggered, hissing angrily.

“Did you see that?” Ham yelled out. “That hair is alive! It’s real!”

Monk Mayfair yanked out his supermachine pistol, and unleashed a blazing burst at the frightful form.

The creature staggered slightly, swept around, its long pale garment swishing like a skirt under the rain of bullets.

From its crown, writhing serpent heads flew away as they were clipped by the slugs.

“What are you shooting?” Long Tom demanded. “It’s hardly hurting her at all.”

“Blamed if I know!” Monk yelled. “Let me try another drum.”

Long Tom barked to Ham, “Help me push this lid back on. We’ll stand on it.”

They did exactly that. The entire weight of their bodies pressed down on the makeshift trapdoor, while Monk scrambled to get a fresh ammunition drum.

When he returned, the simian chemist was panting with exertion, and perhaps a mixture of atavistic terror. Monk’s tiny eyes were very wide.

“Step aside!” he snarled. “I’m gonna blast that thing.”

Long Tom and Ham Brooks were only too happy to comply. For something was pushing up from below, straining and shaking the flat rock lid vigorously. Each man leapt to one side.

Monk charged in, bent down, jerked up the lid, and opened fire.

The bawl of the supermachine pistol was long and loud. But the effects it produced were like nothing the others had ever before seen.

It was as if skyrockets had exploded in the shaft. They had to shut their eyelids to protect their sight. Even Monk threw one hairy beam of an arm across his tiny orbs.

When the supermachine pistol ran silent, and the last of the brass cartridges had ceased to ring and clink on the stony floor, they dared to look.

The mouth of the vertical shaft was deserted. Frantically, they looked about to see if the Gorgon had stepped out and was loose among them. Flash rays showed only shifting, grotesque shadows.

Monk stepped up to the yawning pit mouth, and speared his flash beam downward. It disclosed only litter. Nothing more.

There was a clatter of retreating footsteps discernible.

“I chased it off,” Monk cried exultantly.

Long Tom asked, “What was in those slugs?”

“Scintillator bullets. They work a lot better in the dark. I figgered if that thing was going to stare us into stone statues, I’d better blind her first. Looks like it worked. Medusa turned tail and run off, and we haven’t been turned to stone, have we?”

No one disagreed with the hairy chemist. It was the truth.

Ham Brooks was waving his sword cane around in high dudgeon. He looked as if he wanted to either fight or flee, but could not make up his mind which course to undertake.

“We appear to have chased it away,” he panted. “But what do we do now? Pursue the Medusa?”

Long Tom eyed Monk. “Got any more explosive grenades?”

Monk turned his pockets inside out and said, “Fresh out of eggs.”

That left them standing where they stood before, not sure which plan of action would be wisest.

“Sure wish Doc Savage was here,” muttered Monk uneasily. “He’d know what to do.”

Ham suddenly asserted himself, saying, “I know what I wish to do. I intend to vacate this infernal mine. There is no telling what will happen next.”

It sounded like a good plan, so they moved in a mass toward the main tunnel, giving their spring-generator flashlights frequent windings to keep the juice flowing to the incandescent bulbs.

As they trudged along, Long Tom lamented, “My hypodermic bullets didn’t even faze the thing. She charged at me like she was going to sink her fangs into my throat.”

Monk said, “At least some of my trick bullets did some good.”

“Sure,” said Long Tom sourly. “But how much good? Medusa got away. Maybe she can’t see, but she’s probably around this maze somewhere.”

“All the more reason to depart these dank confines,” reminded Ham.

They picked up their pace, motivated by a desire to see open sky and breathe fresh air once again, for their gas masks were running low on oxygen supply.

So when the unexpected rumble commenced, they were already traveling fast.

The rumble started as a low feeling in the ground, but very quickly, they were having trouble keeping up their pace, for the ground beneath their feet quaked and quivered.

“Run for it!” Monk yelled. “Sounds like this place is gettin’ ready to let go!”

So they ran. They whipped around corners, tripped over railroad ties, but before they could see daylight, ahead of them the ceiling tumbled down.

The noise was sickening in its utter finality. Coal dust rolled their way like the breath of some foul subterranean beast.

Undeterred, they kept moving. Rounding the final corner, their hearts sank. The way was blocked. In truth, they were not greatly surprised, merely disheartened.

“Trapped like rodents!” Long Tom complained.

“Nonsense!” contradicted Ham. “There remains the escape shaft behind us.”

They started backing up, but Monk grabbed the others, warning, “Hold on! Maybe that’s what the Medusa wants. Maybe she’s layin’ an ambush in that shaft, waitin’ for us to walk into her trap.”

Ham demanded, “Do you know another way out of this pit, you miserable mistake of nature?”

“You know I don’t,” raged Monk. “But I don’t feel like walkin’ into another dang trap tonight.”

“This is no time for your monkey-minded arguments,” Ham snapped, striking him with his cane. “If we don’t find our way out of here very soon, we will run out of air.”

The imminent expiration of their air supply ended all argument.

So they turned, and began retreating further into the mine, deeper into danger.

Chapter XLVIII

SECRET TUNNEL

DOC SAVAGE DROVE south from the city of Chicago through the deepening night.

The bronze man was well aware that a police bulletin had been issued for his apprehension. He was under no illusion that this was a routine matter. The mounting deaths in Chicago’s criminal underworld, combined with the fatalities associated with his investigation, and fueled by sensationalistic newspaper speculation, had forced the hand of the Superintendent of Police.

Doc Savage would be brought in for questioning, but there was more to it than that. Public sentiment had turned against the bronze man. He would be held as a material witness, he realized, but also as a test, to see if the killings stopped while he was incarcerated.

Doc had no intention of allowing that to happen. He learned the truth at the Chicago municipal airport, when he attempted to rent an airplane, and saw that the police had congregated around the hangar in which he had kept his speed plane.

The bronze man maintained a comfortable distance, but he was a skilled lip reader. Observing the conversing bluecoats, he quickly gleaned the truth of the situation.

Monk had left the rental sedan parked in an out-of-the-way spot. Doc claimed it without being seen. Departing the airport discreetly, the bronze man headed south. His restored disguise helped him to evade capture, but he could not be certain that his rental machine was not known to the authorities.

The bronze giant drove at an efficient but cautious pace, lest he be pulled over. This cost him valuable time, but he counted on his aides to proceed without him.

As he drove, the bronze man fished around the commercial radio frequencies, and learned of Dr. Rockwell’s failure to revive the twice-deceased Malcolm McLean. Evidently, the physician had given up almost immediately.

Nothing disturbed his impassive expression as the bronze man listened.

The announcer was saying, “
Hope has dimmed that a scientific savior had been found. The administrators at Mercy General Hospital have gone into seclusion, refusing all comment. Rumors of Dr. Warner Rockwell’s death abound, but remain unconfirmed at this hour. Authorities remain tight-lipped in their search for the notorious Doc Savage, a so-called crusader for justice who had been given a free hand to investigate the Medusa Murders by the Chicago Police Department.”

Doc pulled over at a roadside filling station, and purchased an extra edition. While the attendant was filling his tank with gasoline, he gleaned more details of the situation in Chicago.

Newspapermen were describing a tangled web of deceit in which Doc Savage had arrived in Chicago to simultaneously wage war on the Chicago underworld and cement his growing reputation as a righter of wrongs.

Certain facts had surfaced, for which the Fourth Estate could not account. The murder of Myer Sim, the theft of his snorkel automobile and the suicide of Janet Falcon, did not fit into the overall picture. This did not dissuade editorial writers from putting forth wild assertions that made for engrossing reading, but lacked persuasive logic.

“The motivation for all this mad carnival of murder, remains to be discovered,” admitted one columnist.

None of the reporters seemed to have concluded that more than one wicked brain stood behind what they had dubbed the Medusa Murders. Nor did the police put forth any specific criminological theory, other than to insist that Doc Savage was wanted for questioning only.

Driving on, the bronze giant kept the dash radio tuned into a Chicago station that was issuing frequent news bulletins. One brought his eerie trilling back to life.

“This just in!”
broke in the announcer.
“Reports that Dr. Warner Rockwell has himself succumbed to the brain-petrifying doom have been denied by the directors of Mercy General Hospital. It seems that an overeager reporter working for a tabloid known for reporting rumors as facts started the story. The sheet in question has withdrawn the story and legman Jack Swangle has been summarily discharged. But Dr. Rockwell has yet to surface, and the story refuses to die.”

By the time he approached Vermilion County, Illinois, Doc Savage had successfully eluded all police notice. But it had cost him valuable time.

Coming up to the old abandoned coal mine, the bronze giant pulled over and brought from the floorboards a portable shortwave radio transmitter-receiver. He had placed the set in the sedan upon renting it, and had used the transmitter upon departing the airport to warn his aides, but received no reply.

The set was still warmed up. Doc lifted the microphone and began speaking.

“Doc Savage calling Monk Mayfair. Doc Savage calling Monk. Come in, Monk.” He paused, then continued, “If you can hear my voice, proceed with extreme caution into the coal mine. If my calculations are correct, the true author of these hideous slayings may be en route to the place. Await my arrival.”

There was no response of any type. Doc did not try again. He assumed by now his men would have invaded the coal mine and were searching assiduously.