"Doc Savage Adventure 1945-01 The Hate Genius" - читать интересную книгу автора (Doc Savage Collection)

MOST males would admit that looking at Patricia Savage was an experience. She was a cousin of Doc Savage, a distant one, but she had some of the family characteristics which made Doc a striking figure. She had his height, and his remarkable bronze hair, and she had -- almost -- the strange flake-gold eyes which were Doc's outstanding peculiarity of appearance. She was something to be shown in kodachrome.

"I won't laugh at you," she told them. "But it's an effort not to."

Monk asked sourly, "How'd you know we would sneak out by the fire escape?"

"I figured that as soon as you told Doc I was here, he would get some such impulse," she said. "What's going on?"

"Going on?"

"Now, now, don't keep me in suspense," Pat told him. "And don't beat around the bush. Why did you rush to Lisbon? Why did Doc rush to Lisbon? What is it this time?"

"I don't know," Monk said. "And that's the truth. Doc hasn't taken time to tell us anything."

"But something is in the pot?"

"Of course."

They had returned to the sinful-looking velvet interior of the suite which Monk and Ham occupied. Monk and Ham skidded their handbags into the bedroom, and waited for Doc and Pat to have a row. Doc would come out loser, they surmised, but it should be interesting to listen to.

Doc Savage lodged himself in a chair. He knew Monk and Ham expected to hear a row, and he knew Pat expected him to start one, and he decided to fool them. He wouldn't have an argument with Pat.

He looked thoughtfully at the floor. And in a moment his fears and his nervousness wrapped around him like a clammy blanket. His mood became like something from a grave.

Ten thousand curses, he thought gloomily, upon whatever it was that made Pat like dangerous excitement. Pat was okay. She was lovely. She was so beautiful she made men foolish, and she had brains. He wished to God she would marry some nice guy and mastermind him into becoming President, or something.

If only she hadn't come to Lisbon. Her presence here horrified him, because he knew the extent of the danger.

He was half tempted to tell her what she was getting into, just for the satisfaction of scaring the devil out of her. He smothered the impulse, because it would do no good. It would scare Pat stiff, but she would string along with the thing because of that crazy yen she had for dangerous excitement

"I'm going to fool you," he told her. "I'm going to let you in on our little party without an argument."

She looked at him suspiciously. "Don't you feel all right?" she asked. 'I mean, this doesn't sound like you."

"Would you go back to New York if I asked you to?" he demanded.

"I would not!"

"All right, I won't argue," he said. "I just give up. Stay if you want to."

She stared at him intently, trying to read him.

"You're scared," she decided. "Doc, you're scared. This is, I think, the first time I ever saw you plain out and out funked. You're just so plain darn terrified that you don't feel like arguing with me."

He nodded and said heavily, "That's right."

He could tell that she was shocked, that she was beginning to get scared herself.

"Why are we in Lisbon?" she demanded. "What is this, anyhow?"