THE OTHER WORLD - Vb-tech.co.za

18 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx DOC SAVAGE xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
DOC SAVAGE nodded, said: “We
will waylay them, of course. I will wait in the
plane. Monk, we will hide you in a trench
nearby. Ham and Renny can conceal
themselves in the weeds in the fence row at
the edge of the field.”
They scooped a trench large enough
to hold Monk, scattering the dirt widely so
that presence of the pit would not be noticed.
Monk lay flat in it. They put coats over him,
covered those with dirt, and placed straw
over his face.
“I don’t know as how I’m going to
stand for this,” the farmer announced
sharply. “It looks queer to me.”
Doc explained: “We are Federal
agents, making an investigation.”
The statement was true—he
produced credentials and showed them to
the farmer. The appointments to Federal
service, a great convenience at times, had
been given them in recognition for past
services. They also possessed honorary
commissions in the police departments of
New York City, Scotland Yard and several
other of the world’s large cities, the bronze
man’s work on the side of the law being wellknown.
The farmer was satisfied, and retired
to the house, to act as if nothing had
happened. And it was perhaps thirty minutes
later when a man ran into the stubble field.
The man traveled as if in the last lap
of a quarter-mile dash. His breath was
whistling when he piled into the Russian
plane, saw Doc Savage, and yanked a gun
from his pocket.
Doc was taken—as were all of them,
for that matter—flat-footed by the haste of
the man’s arrival.
There was no chance of his reaching
the man before the gun could be used. The
bronze man still carried the atlatl, the spearthrowing
stick. He threw this. It was not
heavy, but weighty enough to numb the
man’s wrist when it struck. That gave Doc
time to reach him.
They fought. The newcomer,
remarkably muscular, made some headway
at first, hooking a terrific right to Doc’s jaw.
Doc was unable to roll sufficiently with the
blow, saw several constellations, and sank to
his knees. He got hold of his opponent,
however, dragged him down. They fought for
a while.
Outside, Monk got up from the trench
in a cloud of dust, howled, “Let me at ‘im,
Doc!”
Doc’s foe stopped fighting.
“Doc!” he barked. “You’re not Doc
Savage?”
“Yes.”
“Why the hell didn’t you say so?”
said the young man who had arrived in such
wild haste. “I’m Chris Columbus.”
Outside, unnoticed because of the
noise of the fight, there had been sound of a
motor, but this had stopped. Then a rifle
crashed.
Monk screamed. The rifle smashed
out again. Doc Savage pitched to the plane
door in time to see Monk fold like a hinge in
the middle and pitch forward on the ground.
A hundred yards or so distant, an oiltank
truck had stopped. Two men were still in
the cab. But Two Wink Danton had alighted
on one side of the machine, Wilmer Fancife
on the other, and both had rifles leveled.
Chapter VII
RURAL MÊLÉE
ACTION during the next few minutes
was something of a landslide. Two Wink and
Fancife saw Doc in the plane. They fired. The
bronze man jumped back, then dived forward
to get down in the cabin where one big motor
would shelter him from fire.
“Get here!” he rapped at Chris
Columbus.
Ham and Renny jumped up out of
the fence-row weeds. Both held
supermachine pistols, a type of weapon
which Doc Savage had perfected—
resembling overgrown automatics, the guns
could pour out an incredible quantity of
bullets in a minute.
Two Wink and Fancife saw them,
dived for the oil truck and got inside. Two
Wink drove. The truck wheeled away.
Ham and Renny turned loose with
their supermachine pistols, the weapons
sounding like a pair of big bullfrogs giving
short gasps.
Unluckily, the weapons were
charged with the type of cartridges which
they most frequently used—mercy bullets.
These slugs were merely thin shells
containing a chemical which produced quick
unconsciousness. The bullets would little
more than break the skin of a victim, and