"Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 010 - The Phantom City" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

"Wallah!" hissed one of the four. "Is it much farther?"

"Not much." Doc pointed. "There!" A row of covered piers was before them. The buildings might have
been gigantic match boxes, with slightly arched tops. Here and there was a wharf which was not
covered.

Down the wide water-front street, a sign on the front of a pier warehouse read:

HIDALGO TRADING CO.

Perhaps two hundred feet nearer was an uncovered pier crowded with crates, moving cranes, and tool
sheds.

Doc made directly for this pier. They entered the litter of boxes and machinery, worked outward through
an alley between high stacks of oil drums. The floor planks were very greasy, oil-soaked.

It was very dark. The men found it impossible to see each other. Two guns were kept pressed to Doc's
back.

Quickening his pace slightly, Doc drew away from the muzzles.

"lmshi 'ala mah!" gritted a man. "Go more slowly!"

An instant later, the guns again shoved against cloth.

"Go on!" grunted an Arab, when there was no movement. No answer.

The man cursed, dug a match out, and whipped it alight on his trousers.

"Wallah!" he wailed.

Instead of Doc's back, their guns were gouging a burlap covered bale of rope.

THE four brown men cackled Arabic profanity in chorus. "Son of a dumb camel!" snarled one who had
brought up the rear. "You let him trick you! He slipped away in the darkness! There is no submarine
here-e-e-o-oww!"

His words turned into the squawl of a cat with its tall under a chair rocker.

There had been no perceptible sound, but bronze hands had suddenly trapped the speaker's elbows from
behind. The Arab's yell rose to a piping bleat of agony; he felt as if he had lost his arms at the elbows.
Pain caused his hands to splay open. His gun bounced across the oil-saturated wharf planks.

He felt a terrific wrench at his back. Cloth tore; leather straps snapped. The poisoned sword came away
from his spine, sheath and all.

The man was lifted, hurled forward. He was not flung head first, but sidewise. He struck two of his
companions. All three piled against the baled rope.

The swarthy fellow with the match jumped aside. The movement extinguished his match. He flourished his