Doc Savage - The Pink Lady Part 7

Cy went away.

ENOUGH time pa.s.sed for Doc Savage to become somewhat stiff where he was lying. Twice he moved cautiously, kneading muscles which were inclined to go to sleep.

Cy returned. "We got some business," he told his men.

The pink man demanded, "What about me?"

"I told him about you." Cy's tone was not unfriendly. "He said he'd have to see and talk to you first. You gotta stay on ice until then."

"You mean tied up like this?"

"Sure."

The pink man swore, doing an expertly profane job of it, but directing his malevolence toward his luck rather than any particular individual, so that his captors, not offended, laughed at him.

Cy said, "I'll put you on some old sailcloth in the shed here, out of the sun."

They carried him into the shed, left him alone after examining the ropes to make sure they were solid-but not too tight.

Cy told him, "You stick here and behave, and you'll be better off by a long shot. If you're lucky, you might cut yourself a piece of cake worth half a million or so."

The bound man stiffened. "How much?"

"You heard me. Think it over."

Doc Savage eased back out of his place of concealment. He kept under cover. Watching Cy and the others, he saw that they were all retiring to the ramshackle building which held the telephone. Doc followed them.

He put on speed, tried to circle and get there ahead of them without showing himself. It was impossible-he got only as far as a gaping side door of the place, where he saw there was no concealment inside-and had to turn back.

But first he planted the microphone. He shoved it in a gaping crack in the wallpaper. There were old shavings on the floor. He partially concealed the wire under those with a movement of a hand, then trailed the wire outside. The weeds were thick. He moved away some twenty yards, as far as the mike wire would let him, and flattened.

There had been some empty boxes in the room where he planted the mike, and the men were dragging these around, evidently to use them for seats, when the tubes of the amplifier warmed up and began functioning.

Cy said, "Stub, you take the south window; Nate, you watch from the door. You can see the shed from the door, and if that guy in the shed tries to make a break, see how good a shot you are."

"He probably won't try to make a break," declared a voice that evidently belonged to Nate. "Anyhow, I feel sorry for the poor devil."

"That's all right," Cy said harshly. "But if he makes a break, and you don't shoot him, you'll be feeling d.a.m.ned sorry for yourself."

THE spokesman got to the point immediately. He said, "The job comes off at five o'clock this evening.

They load the shipment in a truck at the Atlantic & Hudson warehouse on Eleventh Avenue at five o'clock. Or at least the truck will leave at five. It always does. The truck will go south and take the Holland Tunnel under the river."

A man said, "There is no safe place along there to knock it off."

"We don't do it there. Fifteen miles out, there is a stop light. There is no cop at this stop light. Stub, here, will be at the stop light in a cop's uniform. You're an electrician, aren't you, Stub?"

"I used to be, when there was money in it."

"All right, you're one this afternoon. You doctor the wiring of this stop light, and fix it so you can make it turn red when you see this truck coming."

"What if I don't recognize the truck?"

"You don't have to. You'll recognize our car. We'll be right behind the truck."

"Cars go like h.e.l.l on that highway. I may not know you in time."

"One of us will be holding a handkerchief out of the window. It will be that yellow handkerchief of mine.

It'll be held out of the left window."

"All right," Stub said. "Now, where do I get me a cop's uniform."

"Dammit, promote one."

"It'd better be a Jersey cop's uniform."

"Sure."

Stub, in a humorous tone, said, "They lock you up in that place for impersonating a cop." Everybody laughed.

Someone asked, "After the truck stops, then what?"

"I'll take the right side. Stub will already be there, on the left. We will make it look as casual as we can.

Get the driver and his relief into our car. I'll get into the truck with Stub. I'll drive. We'll split up, and meet later at that broken-down farm of mine. You all know where the farm is."

Apparently they all knew where the farm was. A few questions were asked concerning details. These, and the answers, did not tell anything more than had already been told.

It was evident that the conference would soon break up.

Doc Savage disconnected the microphone wire. He did not attempt to pull in the mike, but let it lay. To try to recover it would be too dangerous.

He eased back through the weeds, keeping low, and returned to the vicinity of the shed. It was possible to get through a side door of the shed without being seen. He did so.

The pink man grinned at him."Where'd you come from?" he whispered.

Doc said, "Long Tom, do you still want to go through with this?"

The pink man-he was Long Tom Roberts, member of Doc Savage's group of five a.s.sociates-shrugged. "Might as well. I sweat blood by the quart while that guy Cy was questioning me.

He kept trying to trip me up. But I think I fooled him."

"It was fortunate you could refer him to some doctors, and it was still more fortunate you had prepared the doctors in advance, so they would back up your story."

"I'll say." Long Tom grinned again.

"Whose idea was that?"

"Yours."

"But it was not in the typed instructions I gave Monk and Ham."

"No, but I happened to remember you mentioned the gag once. So I thought I would play safe. I didn't have time to see the doctors myself. So I had Johnny do that. He was busy seeing the doctors-that was why he wasn't at Monk's shack back there on the river."

"And you want to go ahead with this?" Doc asked again.

"Sure. That is, if there is anything I can learn."

"If you learn anything," Doc said grimly, "it will be more than we know now."

"You haven't found out what is behind the mystery about pink people."

"No."

"They couldn't have been dyed pink-just like I dyed my skin and hair and teeth."

"As I understand it, even the girl's eyes were pink," Doc said.

"So are mine. I'm wearing pink caps over my eyeb.a.l.l.s-those new kind of gla.s.ses, only stained."

Doc Savage did not answer. He was listening. There were footsteps approaching.

"See you later," Doc whispered.

He eased back cautiously, got out of the shed, and sank in the weeds.

He was astounded when, the next instant, Long Tom let out an angry bellow.

"Cy! Cy!" Long Tom squalled. "Watch out! Doc Savage is here!"

His bellowing could have been heard at least half a mile away.

Chapter VII. THE DEATH.

DOC SAVAGE dived to the right, landed in a small ditch. He pulled out a smoke grenade, flipped it.

That one was waterlogged, failed to detonate. But the second one functioned, loosening a dark pall ofsmoke which sprang up like some animal out of hiding. The wind carried the smoke toward the fence.

Doc did not keep in the smoke. He went the opposite direction, hoping the smoke would mislead them.

Long Tom was still howling.

He roared, "Savage! He was in here tryin' to question me! He heard you guys comin', and skipped!"

Cy's voice, very angry, said, "All right! All right! We saw him."

"Grab him!" Long Tom shouted. "Hurry up!" Long Tom launched into wild exhortations that became inarticulate so that his words were squealing and not understandable.

From the inarticulate English, Long Tom switched into Mayan, the lost language of an ancient race which Doc and his a.s.sociates used for communication when they did not wish to be understood.

"I realized a man had looked through a crack and seen you talking to me," Long Tom said in Mayan. "I didn't give you away. I was covering up!"

Long Tom then switched into incoherent English, made it coherent, and exhorted, "Get him, gang! If you don't, he'll call in the police!"

They did not need the exhortation. They were doing their best, spreading in a circle, guns drawn, around the pall of smoke.

A man c.o.c.ked his pistol. Cy said, "No, no, hold it! No shooting if we can help it! Somebody might hear it."

Doc Savage was behind them by then. Their own noise had helped him. He made for the big dilapidated structure where they had held the conference about the robbery.

The building was empty, and he recovered his microphone and the wire. He rolled the wire rapidly, shoved the stuff in a pocket.

He headed then for the truck, the machine with an imaginary tailoring company name on its body. The truck was parked well in the open, so that it was necessary to run at least thirty yards without any cover whatever. He put his head down, called the utmost out of his leg muscles, and made it.

A few feet from the truck, an empty tin can lay in the path. He deliberately kicked this; it made a clanking racket. He got plenty of attention-startled yells, two bullets which ripped paint off the bulletproof sides of the truck.

He got inside the machine, yanked the door shut. He switched off the radio which had guided him to the spot.

Then he discovered there was no key in the ignition lock.

CY and his men had deserted the smoke cloud which had misled them momentarily. They rushed toward the truck.

Cy yelled, "Get a hand grenade. Head him off from the gate."

Inside the truck, Doc heard the order, and it was not pleasant news. This delivery truck, being light, wasnot heavily armored. A grenade under the floorboards would not be pleasant.

Doc was feeling under the dash. He found the ignition switch and gave it a twist. It was so constructed that turning it upside down in the mounting closed the circuit, which was normally closed by movement of the switch key.

He started the motor, meshed gears, and twisted the wheel. For a few yards, he headed toward the gate.

Then he saw a man, chest out, legs pumping, a black blob of metal in either hand, sprinting for the gate.

The man would intercept him, and the metal blobs were obviously grenades of the military type.

Doc hauled down on the wheel, turned the truck sharply.

He chose the route out toward the ancient dock. He reached the wharf without trouble, and drove the machine out on it. The elderly boards groaned and sagged. He applied the brake hastily, brought the machine to a stop.

For the moment, the bulletproof sides of the truck hid him from the pursuers. He opened the truck door, prepared to dive into the greasy-looking water.