"Appleton, Victor - Tom Swift Jr 05 - And His Atomic Earth Blaster" - читать интересную книгу автора (Appleton Victor)

cheeked. His green eyes glittered with hatred. One hand whipped inside his coat
and came out again clutching a snub-nosed blue-steel automatic.
Tom had seen the move in time. With his left hand he grabbed the man's
wrist. The stranger tried desperately to wrench his gun hand free.
For a moment the two struggled furiously. Tom,

12 TOM SWIFT AND HIS ATOMIC BLASTER
though not so tall as his opponent, had the wiry, muscular strength of a well-
trained American athlete. He twisted the man's wrist farther and farther until he
gasped in pain and dropped the weapon to the ground.
"Now you're going to tell me what this is all about!" Tom shouted angrily.
"And then I'm-"
His words were choked off as he was grabbed from behind. Turning his
head, he saw that his assailants were two rough-looking men.
Tom fought desperately, but resistance was futile. Each man held one of his
arms tightly.
"What'll we do with him?" one of the captors asked, breathing hard from the
effort to hold the prisoner still. The other man had clamped one hand over Tom's
mouth, so that he could not call for help.
"I think I noticed some rope in the truck," replied the gunman in a deep voice
that had a foreign accent. "Hold him while I get it. Then tie him to that tree."
A moment later he returned with the rope. Tom was shoved back against the
tree and lashed tightly to the trunk. As one of the men knotted the rope, the other
gagged the young inventor with a bandanna handkerchief.
"Good! Now let's get out of here!" said the man with the foreign accent.
With his two henchmen at his heels, he ran back to the truck.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGERS 13
As Tom watched in helpless fury, they climbed aboard. One of the strong-
arm men took the wheel and gunned the engine into life.
Then, with a clashing of gears, they roared away from the scene, taking
Tom's amazing, new atomic earth blaster with them!
CHAPTER 2
ATOMIC SPY
TOM WRITHED and twisted to free himself from his bonds. But instead of
loosening the ropes, his desperate efforts only made them cut more painfully into
his arms.
Failing in this attempt, Tom concentrated on working the gag out of his
mouth. By pushing the bandanna with his tongue, he tried to force it out from
between his teeth. But again his efforts were futile.
Almost three-quarters of an hour after the young inventor had been taken
prisoner, he heard voices shouting his name. Then came the sound of footsteps
in the underbrush. A few moments later Tom's heart pounded with relief as Bud
Barclay sprinted toward him, followed by one of the repair crew.
"For the love of Mike!" Bud exclaimed, as he ripped away the bandanna.
"What happened to you?"
14
ATOMIC SPY 15
"Get these ropes off me first and I'll tell you later!" said Tom, who was filling
his lungs with deep breaths of fresh air.
The repair crewman pulled out a jackknife and handed it to Bud. "Here, use