"Doc Savage Adventure 1935-01 The Mystic Mullah" - читать интересную книгу автора (Doc Savage Collection)

"This dock you have selected - it is secluded?" asked the Khan.

The skipper rolled his tobacco quid in his jaws. The man made him nervous.

"It's an out-of-the-way dock," he said.

"Excellent!" said the Khan, and left the tugboat bridge, or more properly, the pilot house.

The tugboat captain rolled his eyes and directed tobacco juice at the feet of One of Ills two deckhands, who had come in out of the foggy night. "Damned if I like this," he said in a tone which showed he wanted to talk to relieve his mind.

The deckhand, who knew that tone, let his boss talk without interruption.

"Damned if I like it,"' repeated the skipper. "I get a radio to go out to the Atlantic Queen, that new liner that's fog bound, and take off a passenger. I get out there, and, by golly, if it ain't three passengers, and two of 'em the queerest lookin' ducks you ever saw! Take that one who was just in here."

"I'd rather take him than the other man," said the deckhand in a queer tone.

The skipper scowled. "Whatcha mean?"

"I mean that the other duck has a knife as long as your arm up his sleeve," said the deckhand. "I just saw it - he's standin' outside the door of your cabin. Looks like he's guardin' the girl."

"The girl!" The skipper sighed. "Now she's what I call a nifty number. She's white, too. Wonder what she's doin' with these two funny lookin' buzzards?"

The skipper was not a had judge of femininity. The girl was a "nifty number." In fact, she would have put a movie casting director up on his toes.

She was tall, with dark hair and lashes that were altogether delectable. But there was something else about her. She was businesslike, capable. Her person radiated efficiency.

Her clothing was thoroughly modern, and so was the blue automatic which she held in her hand as the door opened.

The hook-nosed Khan Shar looked at the gun and smiled as if it might have been a cocktail the young woman intended offering him.

"I do not feel there is danger," he said. "We have not heard of the Mystic Mullah since our caravan left the Gobi."

The girl kept the gun in her hands. "A thousand lives depend on what we are doing," she said dryly. "If you want to be dramatic, you can put the figure higher."

The Khan's dark face drained of its color, giving him a stark, agonized look.

"You could put the figure higher and not be dramatic," he said thickly.

Neither spoke again, for the tugboat engine had changed its regular pulse and was running slowly; it accelerated, then pounded, as if the craft were backing. Shouts rang out, and scraping sounds on deck indicated ropes dragging. There was a bump, rather violent, then lesser bumps and the tug heeled so that the Khan put out a hand to steady himself. There were four large rings, each with a big jewel, on his fingers.

"I trust we have tied to a secluded dock," said the Khan~

"Hadim!" called the girl.

The door opened and a lean man with a long, brown face came in. He was dressed in a flowing jubbah and shirwals that fitted his legs tightly, and he carried his left arm stiffly, as if not wishing to disturb the long knife which the deckhand had seen up that sleeve.

This Hadim did not present an appealing picture, for someone had made a pass at him with a sword or a knife in the past, and had come just close enough to groove his face with a permanent scar from forehead to chin. He bowed deeply to the girl.

"Yes, Miss Joan," he said.