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

Doc Savage immediately began kicking off his shoes and removing his coat, shirt, tie and outer garments. He stood in black silk underwear, which doubled as swimming trunks. Without regard for the bitter coldness, the bronze man plunged into the water.

It was icily frigid. The cold was so great that it felt as if a vise had clamped over his magnificent bronze chest. Doc commenced swimming in an overhand matter, making remarkable time, but if he expected the automobile engine to flood and cease functioning, Doc Savage was greatly disappointed.

The combination periscope and snorkel—for that was what Doc deduced it must be—continued onward as the incredible machine raced along the lake bed. It was not making outstanding time, owing to the irregularities of the muddy lake bottom, but it was still moving faster than Doc Savage could swim.

Reluctantly, the bronze man broke off pursuit. He treaded water for a time, eerie golden eyes tracking the snorkel through which the driver was apparently able to breathe.

Doc had noted that the remarkable machine produced no exhaust, proof that the engine was not of the internal combustion type. Probably, it was electric in nature and ran off batteries. A screw-type propeller had been briefly visible at the stern; this was the source of the violent churning. The device had not been visible before the machine reached water. Apparently, it was retractable.

When it was no longer prudent to remain still in the water, Doc reversed course and started swimming back to shore.

Back on the beach, a crowd had gathered, and Doc Savage soon found himself surrounded.

“What
was
that chariot?” someone wanted to know.

Doc Savage did not reply. He strolled stolidly toward the pile of clothes he left behind and began dressing—rather self-consciously since a number of the growing crowd were women eyeing his magnificent physique with admiration.

His bronze hair and skin dried rapidly, a peculiar property they possessed.

Once he finally had his tie in place, Doc went to claim the motorcycle.

A police radio car pulled up and Doc changed course to confer with the arriving officer briefly. The bronze man explained what had happened.

“Have a police launch undertake a search for the silver submersible,” directed Doc.

“It’s a big lake,” the bluecoat reminded.

“The snorkel’s length will limit its operations to a mile or less off shore,” Doc pointed out. “Confine the search accordingly, for it will have to beach somewhere. I would like to swap this motorcycle for your machine,” he added, producing the letter from Chicago’s Superintendent of Police.

The officer did not exactly salute. In fact, he looked a little put out. But the exchange was made without complaint, and the bronze man was soon driving back toward the Hotel Chicago.

WHEN he pulled up in front, Doc Savage received a surprise.

There were several police machines and an ambulance arriving.

Joining the procession, Doc pulled into the garage with the group, whose sirens were caterwauling.

Parking, Doc Savage stepped out and began asking questions.

A bluecoat told him, “We got an urgent call that one of the bigwigs attending this thing has keeled over dead.”

“What name?”

“The bird’s name is McLean.”

Doc Savage’s trilling leaped into life. He throttled it before it careened out of control.

“I will join you,” the bronze man rapped.

Together, they took the elevator up to the exhibition hall.

It was not difficult to locate the stricken man, not even in the great exhibition hall with its swarms of people. A circle had formed around the scene. Rubberneckers were elbowing one another aside, others vying to peer over the shoulders of persons shorter than they, all in a futile effort to get a clear look at what was transpiring.

Knowing that tapping such persons on the shoulder and requesting that they step aside would be futile, the police began blowing their traffic whistles, shouting at the top of their lungs.

“Make way! Make way! Ambulance attendants coming through. Make way!”

With reluctance, the push parted, forming a lane through which the ambulance men and their police escorts shouldered strenuously through.

The stricken individual had been laid on the empty booth that bore Long Tom Roberts’ banner. It was obviously the only raised space available, and there was no other significance to it.

Dr. Warner Rockwell and Marvin Lucian Linden were in attendance. Their faces wore worry like masks of grief.

Monk and Ham, seeing the approach of Doc Savage, rushed up to greet the bronze giant.

“There was a green flash of light,” began Ham.

“Let me tell it!” Monk interrupted. “I saw it better than you.”

“Go ahead,” invited Doc.

“Like the shyster said,” Monk said excitedly, “it was a flash of green light. I was lookin’ in the general direction. And that’s what I saw. Knowin’ what it might mean, I rushed over fast as I could run. That Malcolm McLean was already on the floor. When I got down beside him, he wasn’t movin’. He was like a stick of wood.”

Ham sniffed, “You made so many cracks about him looking like a dead man, now you have your wish.”

Doc Savage said, “Had you seen McLean before the flash of green light?”

Both Monk and Ham shook their heads in the negative. Ham offered, “We were looking for him, but there was no sign in this deuced crowd.”

Swiftly, Doc Savage filled his associates in on the bizarre theft of the submersible automobile, for that was what it obviously was, and the fact that the driver appeared—at least from a distance—to be the same Malcolm McLean.

Monk squawled, “Blazes! How the heck could that be?”

Doc Savage imparted, “It would not have been possible for the driver of that submersible machine to have doubled back in such a short period of time. Therefore, one of the gray-featured men is not who he seems.”

Ham frowned thoughtfully. “A dead-looking face like that of McLean’s would lend itself to an artificial mask—should someone go to the trouble to make one up.”

“That is one possibility,” said Doc Savage. “Let us see to the condition of the Malcolm McLean who was stricken.”

“Don’t we kinda know that already?” husked Monk. “On account of the green flash, I mean.”

“Say nothing of that,” cautioned Doc.

Turning, the three men drew near the table where the gray corpse lay, its closed eyes strangely sunken.

Dr. Rockwell was folding up a doctor’s stethoscope as he told the ambulance attendants, “I am sorry, gentlemen. You are too late. This man has expired. You may take my word for it, for I am a physician. Dr. Warner Rockwell is my name.”

The two orderlies evinced no skepticism on that score, for the ashen coloration of the corpse told a clear story.

One asked, “Was it a heart attack?”

Rockwell shook his head somberly. “I doubt it. McLean was altogether too young to suffer from such a sad fate.”

The other interne wanted to know, “Then why does he look so dead?”

“The unfortunate fellow acquired that skin condition as a result of careless chemical experiments with silver. It is a rare, but not unknown, thing.”

The ambulance attendants looked vaguely skeptical. They had encountered many dead bodies before this, and this was a new one on them.

“Whatever happened to McLean, it seems to have affected his brain,” pronounced Rockwell grimly.

Doc Savage interjected, “What leads you to that conclusion, Dr. Rockwell?”

“Step closer, Savage. I will show you.” Bending over the inanimate form, the medical man lifted one eyelid, exposing an orb that rather resembled an old oyster shell. “Observe McLean’s eyes. They appear to have become crusted over with some stony substance I do not recognize.”

Doc Savage lifted the other eyelid, and exposed a matching ball of stone. There was the faintest suggestion of iris and pupil, but it was so indistinct only the bronze man’s impressive visual acuity perceived it.

Rockwell explained, “This was like nothing I ever before encountered, so I examined McLean’s mouth and ears, but found nothing. When I shone my pen light into his nostrils, however, I encountered an obstruction in both. Inserting a scalpel probe into one nostril, I encountered a hard substance that I imagine resembles the matter that now comprises his eyeballs.”

“What is your conclusion then?” asked Doc.

“By some means beyond my comprehension,” said Rockwell suddenly, “I am forced to conclude that poor Malcolm McLean’s brain has turned to stone, and whatever effected the transformation, it was sufficiently potent to petrify his eyeballs, as you can plainly see.”

“That was very astute of you, Dr. Rockwell,” complimented Doc. “Most medical men would not think to make an examination of the nasal cavity.”

Dr. Rockwell nodded his head slightly in recognition of the professional compliment.

Doc placed a hand over McLean’s chest, detected no heartbeat, and transferred his attention to both wrists. Finding no pulse, he placed the lifeless hands atop the dead man’s chest.

“There is no question that this individual is now deceased,” he pronounced.

Warner Rockwell shook his head slowly, saying, “None at all.”

“He is wearing a suit and tie identical to those Malcolm McLean wore earlier in the day,” added Doc.

Dr. Rockwell looked slightly confused. “There is no doubt but that here lies poor McLean,” he said gravely.

Doc met the craggy-faced physician’s frank gaze with his own unnerving regard. “Yet a man strongly resembling McLean made off with the invention of the late Myer Sim and drove it into Lake Michigan, evading all pursuit.”

Marvin Lucian Linden had been hovering nearby. Interest flared in his eyes. “What invention was that, Mr. Savage?”

“It appeared to be some form of snorkel car.”

Linden looked blank.

“An automobile designed along the lines of a one-man submarine capable of moving on roads and sea beds,” explained Doc. “The snorkel doubles as a periscope, providing both breathable air and navigational assistance.”

“To function properly,” Linden mused, “a periscope would have to be sealed.”

Doc offered, “No doubt the tube was double-barreled.”

Linden’s eyes lit up. “Ingenious!”

Dr. Rockwell asked, “You say the driver resembled McLean?”

Doc nodded firmly. “At several points, he turned around to track my pursuit. His features were gray and, although I could not see them clearly, I naturally assumed they belonged to McLean. Men with his condition are rather rare, as you well know.”

Dr. Rockwell’s unblinking eyes went from the bronze man to the body of Malcolm McLean and back again. He shrugged elaborately.

“Of course, I must take you at your word. But the proof of McLean’s innocence lies on the table before you.”

“A submersible automobile,” breathed Marvin Lucian Linden, half under his breath. “What a remarkable achievement, provided the thief who stole the machine has not drowned in Lake Michigan.”

The ambulance internes fell to gathering up the body, and Dr. Rockwell put in a request.

“I would like to accompany the body to the hospital.”

“You mean the morgue,” returned one orderly.

Rockwell shook his heavy features resolutely. “No, I would like the body to be conveyed to Mercy General Hospital, where I do much of my work. This is an unusual case, and it interests me as a medical man. I would like to study the circumstances before this body is consigned to the city morgue for autopsy.”

The two medical men conferred with one another briefly.

One spoke for both when he said, “Well, I guess there’s no reason not to. We’ll do just that.”

Dr. Rockwell turned to Doc Savage and his aides, saying, “If you will excuse me, gentlemen, I must be going.”

After the body was hoisted onto a wheeled gurney, Warner Rockwell followed it out through the milling crowds, and to the ambulance waiting in the garage.

Doc Savage’s gaze was thoughtful as they departed, his golden eyes shifted about the room, looking here and there, as if seeking something specific.

Ham noticed this and asked, “What is wrong?”

“I fail to see the green shadow that accompanied all previous incidents where men were struck down, their brains petrifying in some mysterious fashion.”

Monk burst out, “That’s right! Maybe we should start nosin’ around.”

THEY did not need to nose around very much, for Doc Savage discovered something intriguing on the floor not far away.

“Was this the spot where McLean was struck down?” Doc asked Monk.

“That’s right. After the flash went out of my eyes, the first thing I saw was the poor stiff lyin’ right here, lookin’ even worse than usual.”

“Observe the floor,” requested Doc.

Ham and Monk did. There was no doubt but that both men expected to see another hideous snake-headed outline, but that was what not what their uneasy eyes fell upon.

Instead, there were ragged letters—black letters as if they had been burnt there—inscribed on the floor. The words spelled out:

Gorgones
Vincit Omnia

Ham knew Latin, and translated it immediately.

“ ‘Gorgons Conquer All,’ ” he intoned. “This is new.”

Kneeling, Doc Savage touched the letter G, brought up a blackish residue and examined it carefully with aureate eyes.

“These scorched letters suggest a substance which was ignited, possibly producing the green glare,” he ventured. “Since Long Tom’s booth was empty, there were no other persons close enough to be stricken by the phenomenon.”

“Could this be the same burnt matter found on Myer Sim’s desk?” asked Ham.

“Unquestionably,” replied Doc, scraping up scorched residue into a plain white envelope he produced from a pocket.

Doc stood up, features grim in their metallic way.

“What are we gonna do now?” asked Monk.

Doc Savage suggested, “Perhaps news of Malcolm McLean’s apparent demise will change the mind of Miss Falcon, insofar as her willingness to talk.”

Chapter XVIII

VIOLENT ABDUCTION