"032 (B032) - Dust of Death (1935-10) - Harold Davis" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

The door of Doc Savage's quarters burst open. The giant bronze man was first through, Monk and Ham close on his heels.
"Somebody yelled!" Monk exploded. "Where was it?"
The open elevator door caught their attention. They ripped toward it, glanced inside.
Unexpectedly a small weird sound filled the corridor and the elevator cage wherein the beaten unconscious operator lay. The sound was tiny, exotic, a thing difficult of description. It was a trilling, in a sense, a minute, fantastic note that might have been the product of the wind through the spires of an arctic ice field.
Monk and Ham looked at Doc Savage, knowing the bronze man was making the sound. They had heard it often. It was a small thing which the bronze man did unconsciously in moments of stress.
Doc Savage stepped into the elevator. Monk and Ham followed.
HIGH ABOVE, in the room which housed the lifting machinery, the two sinister men had been staring downward. The elevator cage had a grilled top and the interior was brightly lighted so that they saw Doc Savage and his two aides enter.
"Quick!" gulped the wrestler.
The other manipulated the cutting torch. He already used it sufficiently to nearly sever the cables. The finish of the job required only a moment. With the sound of a snapping fiddle string, the cable parted.
The cage fell away from the open door before Doc Savage and his aides could possibly get out. It gathered momentum. Doc worked the elevator control lever rapidly. It had no effect. Their speed increased.
Homely Monk jammed a thumb violently against the button which was labeled emergency stop. Nothing happened. His apish visage began to look as if whitewash were being pumped under the skin.
Floors went past in a grisly blur.
"Cable cut," Doc Savage said briefly. "Automatic stopping device jammed."
Ham, the dapper lawyer, said nothing, but brushed an imaginary speck of dust from his immaculate clothing as if he wanted to look his best when his crushed body was found after the elevator crashed to the bottom of the shaft, eighty-six floors below.
Doc Savage's bronze features had not lightened. The paleness of fear, which might have been expected, was entirely absent. His features were almost weirdly composed. Nor did he speak.
Air was roaring about the cage as they plummeted. The senseless operator stirred a little on the floor, but he would never revive in time to realize what was happening.
The wild cage flashed past the ground floor. And a startled yell came from the starter outside as he realized what was occurring.
Things happened. A giant hand seemed to reach out and grab the elevator, gently at first, then with more violence. Air, passing the sides of the cage, made an ear-splitting scream. The occupants of the elevator went down as if mashed by a giant invisible hand.
And the cage was unexpectedly still, although it seemed, due to the freakishness of the human organism, that it was now flying upward.
Monk lay very still. Ham had fallen half across him.
They both eyed Doc Savage. Their expressions showed what they wantedЧexplanations.
"The bottoms of these shafts are of special construction," Doc Savage said. "They are completely enclosed and fit tightly to the sides of the cage. The compression of the air formed a natural shock absorber."
Monk started to say something, then looked down at his clothing, surprised. He had become soaking wet with nervous perspiration.
ESCAPE FROM the cage did not prove to be a simple matter. First, the top grille was bolted in place solidly and, being stout, it yielded but slowly. Springing upward, Doc Savage managed to seize an ornamental projection in the cage top. An observer would have sworn it offered no hand grip whatever. Yet, the bronze giant clung there and struck and wrenched repeatedly at the grating until it came loose. The metal was a stout alloy. He bent it back amid a squeaking and rending.
By this time, they had the shaft door open and faces were shoved through, shouting excitedly that an emergency truck had been summoned.
The sides of the shaft were of brick, and rough. Doc Savage mounted, the strength in his amazing hands making ample security out of microscopic handholds.
Even with his efforts, however, several minutes had elapsed before he reached the lobby. A crowd milled. More persons came in from the street, excitement drawn.
Doc Savage lost no time in getting the doors closed so that no one might enter or leave. There was a bare chance the culprits might be inside.
They were not. They had lost no time in leaving the skyscraper, had entered their little sedan and were driving fast when they got a glimpse of the bronze man.
The big wrestler and his consorts were not bad actors. They managed not to show enough excitement to attract attention.
"We've laid an egg," one muttered.
The wrestler began to curse, calling his own father and mother and immediate ancestors numerous unpleasant names.
"Count Hoffe in South America ain't gonna like this," another of them groaned.
The wrestler stopped abusing his ancestors.
"We sure gave the job a botching," he agreed. "Now Doc Savage will steam straight for South America."
"And the Inca in Gray will begin to lay eggs of his own," another man agreed.
"Don't worry," snorted the wrestler. "Any eggs the Inca in Gray lays will hatch out plenty of hell."
The little sedan took them out of sight.
AN HOUR later, Doc Savage knew that those who attempted to murder them had escaped. The bronze man went to his laboratory. He began assembling mechanical devicesЧthe gadgets which he employed and which, on more than one occasion, had saved his life.
Monk, the homely chemist, stopped in the reception room to read a newspaper. Doc Savage interrupted Monk's perusal of the newspaper.
"You might get your portable laboratory together, Monk," he suggested.
The homely chemist squinted at the bronze giant. "Then we're going places?"
"We are," Doc agreed.
Monk frowned. "Do you think that fake cable with Long Tom's name signed to it, and that attempt to kill us had a connection?"
Whatever reply Doc Savage intended to make was interrupted by the appearance of a messenger, wearing the uniform of a cable company. He presented a blue envelope, which Doc opened, read, then passed to Monk and Ham. The missive was cryptic, expressive.
DOC SAVAGE
NEW YORK
LONG TOM ROBERT'S HAS DISAPPEARED
ACE JACKSON
The message was from Alcala, Santa Amoza.