"Doc Savage Adventure 1933-12 The Phantom City" - читать интересную книгу автора (Doc Savage Collection)

"It is well none in this city can understand the language she speaks," a man said thoughtfully. "Only you, 0 enlightened one, can converse with her. And it took you, even with your learning, many days to master a few words of her tongue."

"Watch the street!" snapped the hidden man. "Draw your guns! But use them only to produce fright!"

One fellow muttered: "The girl should be slain - "

"Fool! We may need her to guide us to this Phantom City! We keep her alive and unharmed. Understand that. If something happens to a hair of her white head, Allah help the man responsible!"

The four squatting men drifted uneasy glances at the box, as if it held a dangerous monster. They feared this master of theirs.

"The bronze man whose arrival we await - is he the only one we have crossed the ocean to see?" one fellow mumbled.

"He is the one," said the voice in the box. "He is Doc Savage!"


TWO blocks distant, a limousine cruised to a street intersection and turned left. The car was long, expensive, somber in color. There was nothing flashy about it. The windows were up.

The traffic cop on the corner glanced at the license tags. He snapped erect. In New York, low license numerals designate the cars of the influential - this one was a single figure. The officer squinted to see who was in the machine. He smiled widely and executed a brisk salute.

Several pedestrians who chanced to gaze at the car fell to staring, jaws slack. Each of them recognized instantly the limousine occupant.

At the next corner, a fat man stepped back to the curb to let the big machine pass. He got a good look at the man behind the wheel. He nearly dropped a bundle he was carrying.

"For the love of mud!" he breathed

An enterprising newsboy, witnessing the incident, rushed up and offered the portly man a newspaper.

"Wanta read about that guy mister?" he asked eagerly. "Buy an Evening Comet! It's got a feature story about him! Tells how he just cleaned up a gang that was terrorizing a manufacturing town!"

"Who is he?"

The newscarrier looked disgusted. "Mister, I thought everybody knowed that man! Why, he went into this manufacturing town of Prosper City with his five helpers, and mopped up an outfit that had murdered no tellin' how many people! He does them kind of things regular! Helpin' people who need it, and punishin' wrongdoers is his profession!"

The stout man blinked. "Was that Doc Savage?"

"You said it!"

The limousine rolled on two blocks, and turned into the gloomy side street which led past the giant spire of gleaming metal and gray stone which housed Doc Savage's quarters. It neared the recess where the brown men lurked.

"Ta'al!" grunted one of the swarthy quartet. "Come along!" The four leaped into the street, spread fan fashion, and rushed. They flourished their long-barreled automatics.

"Wallah!" hissed one. "Truly, this man is of amazing appearance!"

A faint glow from the dash was sufficient to disclose the man at the limousine wheel - the only occupant of the car. The features of this individual were striking - so remarkable that it was very apparent why, a few seconds ago, the fat man had been awed by his single glimpse.

The figure behind the wheel was that of a giant sculptured from solid bronze. In the metallic man's neck, in the great hands on the wheel, huge sinews stood out in repose like bundled cables.

The bronze of the hair was a shade darker than the bronze of the skin. The hair lay straight and smooth, like a metallic skullcap. The unusually high forehead, the lean, corded cheeks, the muscular mouth, advertised a rare power of character.

Most striking were the eyes - like pools of flake gold glistening in the vague light. Their gaze seemed to have a hypnotic quality, an intensity almost weird.