DOC SAVAGE: THE INFERNAL BUDDHA (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage) (15 page)

“Doc’s got a rule against that,” offered Monk.

“Well, unless he wants to see some bloodshed up real close,” Dang Mi warned, “he’d better come across with some words I wanna hear. What about it, bronze guy?”

“The box is in a safe place,” Doc repeated. He was looking Dang Mi dead in the eye and the flake metal in his irises were whirling steadily, like a golden snowstorm.

Dang Mi noticed this phenomenon and approached.

“You got funny-lookin’ eyes,” he said. “I ain’t never seen the like.”

“Explain how you knew to ambush us at the lagoon,” Doc invited.

Maybe it was his piratical pride. Perhaps it was the slight hypnotic power exerted by the big bronze man’s steadily whirling orbs, but Dang Mi stuck out his chest and began to pontificate.

“I never exactly gave up lookin’ for this brick-knuckled pest here,” Dang began. “I had me hearties picketed here and there, watchin’ the
Devilfish
, and a couple of grottos where I thought he might be lurkin’. When I came back to the longhouse where these twin half-castes were chained, I found them gone. Sent runners in all directions to look and spread the word. It didn’t take long.”

A satisfied smile wreathed Dang Mi’s broad brown face.

“One of  ’em spotted movement in the jungle and we figured the Chans were making for water. So we laid in ambush, Malay style.”

Doc nodded as if that confirmed his own suspicions. It had been partly a fluke.

Dang added, “We found the parachute you used to drop out of the sky high up in a jackfruit tree, where you concealed it. You did a fair job o’ that. But a monkey got into the shrouds and started pickin’ them apart. When we come across them, they were dangling mighty free.”

Ham inserted archly, “Did you hear that, Monk? One of your brothers, no doubt.”

Dang Mi suddenly stepped over to the dapper attorney and slapped him with the barrel of his own superfirer.

“Don’t you interrupt me!” he raged. “I don’t fancy being interrupted!”

Monk started to laugh, as if enjoying the spectacle of the immaculate lawyer getting a dose of his own medicine.

Then the apish chemist stomped down on one of Dang Mi’s boots with sufficient force that toe bones crackled.

Emitting a squawk that would have done credit to a howler monkey, Dang dropped his machine-pistol and grabbed at his mashed foot, hopping about in circles and fighting to wrench the boot off.

Monk saw his chance. He reached for the compact weapon and trapped it with both handcuffed paws.

“Don’t nobody move!” he gritted.

Dang Mi could not have cared less about the command. He continued his hopping and howling.

This brought startled pirates running up, fists bristling with assorted blades.

Monk let loose with his superfirer. It hooted. Mechanism shuttled violently. Smoke and steel casings jumped out—an astonishing amount of the latter and an equally surprising number of the former. These intricate guns could expel violence.

Corsairs collapsed or fled madly. Some managed to do both.

Shrieks of
“Orang liar!”
rang out. In the Malay tongue, they were calling the apish chemist a wild man. He was living up to the compliment.

Monk did a good job of cleaning up on the rover crew. But his luck ran out when the drum ran empty. With an unnerving finality, the busy breech ceased shuttling. The weapon fell silent.

By that time, Doc Savage had lunged from his log seat and fell upon Dang Mi. He used his head, butting it against the pit of the pirate’s ample stomach.

Dang Mi gave a fresh howl and bleat of surprise. He got himself organized and made a wild grab for his tormentor’s head.

Doc faded backward, unscathed.

Dang blinked. He was dumbfounded to discover that he had Doc’s bronze-haired scalp in his hands.

Pirates were surrounding Doc Savage now. Blades and bullets threatened. The bronze man subsided.

Dang Mi turned the scalp over in his hands, saw that Doc Savage still possessed his natural hair, and seemed at a total loss for words. His mouth made shapes but no sounds.

Turning the scalp inside out, Dang discovered it was a steel form on which a layer of realistic bronze hair was anchored.

“This thing’s like a dang-busted helmet!” he complained.

Doc said nothing. The skullcap spoke for itself. The metallic giant wore it as a safeguard against serious head blows.

Breathing heavily, Dang Mi gathered himself up, lurched to his feet. Wincing with each step, he began to issue orders in a confused mix of Malay and Dyak dialects.

Of the prisoners, only Doc Savage could follow it.

“What’s cookin’, Doc?” asked Monk.

Doc said, “We are to be taken to the pit.”

“That so? What kinda pit?”

“They are not saying,” supplied Doc. “But apparently it is well known to the crew.”

They were marched in a single file, chained together like slaves. Doc Savage had to be uncoupled from the hawser chain beforehand. This was done with all the respectful care of a zoo keeper entering a lion’s cage at the feeding hour.

The group progressed through well-worn jungle paths. Once they passed a tree festooned with green bananas, and Ham Brooks elbowed Monk Mayfair to call attention to them.

“Too bad they are not ripe,” he said waspishly. “You could climb that tree and have a fitting last meal.”

Monk growled wordlessly, which meant he was very upset indeed.

They skirted a fair-sized pool that looked as if it was filled with India ink. Its surface stood placid as pitch.

“Tar pit,” Renny muttered. “The same kind of snare that trapped mastodons and sabertooth tigers in prehistoric days. Worse than quicksand, if you fall in.”

“Or get thrown,” suggested Ham.

“Not a bad idea,” said Dang Mi. “But that ain’t what I got in mind. Keep movin’!”

They marched onward.

THE pit proved to be a natural ravine, not very large, but deep enough to contain a half-dozen men comfortably. The floor had a moist, claylike consistency. Here and there red bones protruded from the muck, suggesting that past prisoners of Dang Mi had met their end therein.

Monk, Ham, Renny and the Chans were prodded into the declivity at the points of pistols and blades. A bamboo ladder was employed for this purpose, then withdrawn.

Doc Savage was not among their number.

Dang Mi addressed the bronze man.

“I can see your men are gettin’ all their starch and sand from the sight o’ you. So I’m gonna cut you down to size. And incidentally coax you into givin’ up that dang box.”

“The box is too dangerous to fall into your hands,” Doc stated plainly.

“It’s on my island. I’ll find it, and if I don’t, you’ll tell me its whereabouts,” promised Dang Mi. “Mark my dang words.”

Leaving Doc’s friends under guard, Dang Mi marched the bronze giant into the jungle.

Doc Savage noticed that the contingent of corsairs which accompanied them carried long poles to which were affixed noose-like lengths of hemp. Evidently, there were on a hunt of some kind.

“Devices such as those are often used to snare wild game,” Doc observed.

Dang Mi stuck out a proud jaw. “This island is a perfect hideout because it’s a-crawl with varmints of all varieties,” he said. “British Coast Guard don’t venture here. Also, they fear the Scourge of the South China Sea.”

“You have been making a fair account of yourself so far,” Doc allowed.

“Fair!” roared Dang Mi. “I captured you twice, ain’t I? You call that fair?”

“Fair enough,” allowed Doc. “You captured me, but failed to take into account my men, who had landed in the water and taxied to Pirate Island.”

A scowl crawled across the pirate’s wide face. “That reminds me: How
did
you summon your men? Don’t say you didn’t, because I know you did. It was that dang camera, wasn’t it?”

Doc Savage saw no reason not to divulge the truth, thinking that he might learn more if he engaged the braggarty buccaneer in conversation.

“The ‘camera’ was in reality an ultra-violet light projector,” he elaborated. “My men carry in their equipment cases special goggles, which allow them to see that otherwise invisible light. You conveniently pointed the camera upward, so that its shine could be detected.”

“Invisible light, eh?”

“One way of putting it.”

Dang puffed out his chest. “I use it myself.”

“That,” said Doc, “is how we recognized Pirate Island from the air. Your ultra-violet projectors were left on.”

Dang’s face fell. “But how’d they know to use them goggles?”

“Radio.”

“Don’t moonshine me. No radio set has been built small enough to carry on a man.”

Doc did not contradict him. He still toted the compact transceiver on his person.

“Remind me to have flogged the brainless bloke who left them turned on,” Dang muttered darkly.

Up ahead, a Malay suddenly called out. His clucking cries were excited.
“Ular sawa putih!”

“Move, you slant-eyed heathen!” Dang shouted at his crew.

The leading group of pirates rushed ahead. Some of those in the rear hung back, while a few moved cautiously ahead to join their fellows.

Dang urged Doc forward. Doc picked up his pace with an easy swing.

The corsair complement arrived at the scene of the excitement soon enough.

By torchlight, they beheld an unnerving tableau.

A group of Malays had flushed a Burmese python out of the brush. It was a monster, fully thirty feet long and as pale as alabaster. An albino specimen, obviously, its hide displaying a pattern of white diamonds along its intricately-scaled back. It flicked out its rubbery tongue at rapid intervals.

They were employing the nooses to capture the muscular reptile by the head and tail. Their idea seemed to be once it was caught, they would pull in opposite directions, uncoiling the struggling serpent.

This appeared to be a sensible plan. In execution, however, it quickly went awry.

They got the head all right. The ivory-hued serpent opened its mouth wide and made inarticulate hissing sounds of outrage. Myriad hooked teeth showed, designed for fastening upon prey. The tail bunched and coiled wildly. For all its girth, the python was active.

It wound a looping coil about the waist of one hapless Dyak. He uttered a sound that was unforgettable, and the coil constricted tightly.

Others rushed to the aid of the flailing fellow. Powerful curved fangs seized one would-be rescuer by the forearm.

He howled, unable to tear loose, and was soon caught up in another loop composed mostly of scaly neck.

Now, two unhappy pirates struggled in the irresistible coils.

Nooses were dropped. Serpent-bladed
krises
came flashing out.

“Don’t kill it!” Dang Mi exclaimed. “We need that critter for the pit!”

There was some backtalk. Hot words flew back and forth while the two trapped worthies began to grow feeble in the obdurate coils of the mighty reptile. They emitted weak bleating sounds. Eyes began squeezing shut in surrender to inexorable death.

Doc Savage intervened then.

Lunging forward, he reached the python head. Doc stayed in front of the snake, away from its twisting body.

Moving in, Doc grasped the serpent by the neck bones, and his strong bronze fingers began to probe and manipulate, tendons standing out like iron rods.

This operation took several minutes, in which the furious python endeavored to snap at and bite Doc. The bronze man evaded each attempt with what seemed to be practiced ease.

It was as if Doc had been battling bull pythons all his life.

The trapped men went down, writhed, and their writhing grew looser and looser until they were still.

After a minute or so, the python began to subside. Its ghostly form relaxed. Doc released the now-limp head, letting the python down to the jungle floor. It lay supine, its diamond-scaled sides heaving like bellows.

When he was finished, the metallic giant stood up. A casual observer could easily discern that Doc was not in the least winded.

Several corsairs fought to extract their brethren from the coils, which had not yet relaxed. Even in slumber, the constrictor would not let go of its prey. The rescuers fell back and began cursing the serpent, calling it,
“Hantu ular sawa.”—
“Ghost python.”

Doc Savage pushed these pirates aside as if they were hapless children and exerted his mighty muscles. Bronze hands seized heavy loops of snake, heaved them aside.

One pirate was thus extricated. He was barely breathing.

The other wretch was likewise rescued from the brink of extinction.

Doc bore one pirate under each steel-thewed arm and deposited them in an open space. He went to work on them, testing bruised ribs for breaks, and employing proven methods for restarting regular respiration.

When it was all over, Dang Mi approached cautiously and the degree to which he was impressed by the bronze man’s physical prowess was written all over his beamy face.

“I was plannin’ to dump you into the pit with that dang-busted python,” he said slowly. “Now I see I’m gonna have to rethink this whole dang operation.”

He looked like a man who had recalculated his future and discovered it to be far bleaker than he’d ever imagined.

DANG MI SURVEYED the torpid albino python while assorted unhappy expressions crawled and fluttered over his broad-beamed features.

At length, he made a decision.

“Bring that dang thing anyway. You, Savage, you get in the middle where it’s thickest and help carry the brute.”

Doc Savage regarded the situation as if considering his options.

Dang Mi helped him along by shooting up dust before his feet. When that failed to move the bronze man, he coolly shot the brains out of the most injured of the two rescued pirates.

“I don’t brook no objections, mate,” Dang growled.

Seeing no point in courting injury, the metallic giant seized the enormous snake about the middle and hefted it to the height of his waist.

The other cut-throats—those who still possessed locomotion—took firm hold of other portions and in this muscular manner the snake was straightened out and held aloft.