"Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 022 - The Annhilist" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

Doc Savage was at the window, and he watched steadily for some moments. Then he backed away,
stood over Janko Sultman and looked at the small round hole which the bullet had made in the window.
It was on a line with the top of the building across the street.

"Strange there was no sound of a shot," said the medical examiner.

The bronze giant did not reply, but bent over and parted Janko Sultman's frizzled hair. Then he slapped
Sultman's face with sharp, stinging force.

Sultman groaned, stirred, and shortly afterward was sitting up, his hands malting aimless gestures. His
eyes were cloudy.

"Boke," he mumbled thickly.

"Who is Boke?" Doc Savage asked.

The cloud went out of Janko Sultman's eyes and he held his head with both hands.

"Joke," he groaned. "I say dot bullet no joke. I guess you not understand right."

"Why should anybody try to shoot you?" Doc Savage asked sharply.

Sultman held his head and wailed, "I do not know, and dot is the truth, sure enough!"

Doc Savage went out into the reception room without saying anything, and found fresh excitement had
arisen, with two of the stenographers screaming hysterically and the blonde telephone girl telling every
one loudly that she was through.

"No telling who will get shot next," she wailed. "I'm through with this place! I'm quitting!"

Doc Savage went to the elevator and a policeman stopped him saying, "I'm sorry. Hardboiled ordered
you kept here."

The bronze man nodded, and roamed with apparent aimlessness over the offices. He peered into
numerous small rooms where patients were examined, passed nurses and physicians without a word.

Down in the street, police sirens were wailing.

Doc Savage entered a washroom, closed the door and opened the tiny window. It gave into an air shaft.
There was no door at the bottom of this, and no fire escape. The bronze man slid outside, negotiating the
small aperture with a startling ease.

Had there been a hundred observers, fully ninety-nine of them would have sworn that not even a cat
could climb the sheer wall. But the metallic giant went up in uncanny fashion, supported by the corded
strength of his fingers and the shallow grooves between the bricks.
Reaching the top, he traveled over rooftops until he found a skylight, below which an artist painted. The
artist, surprised, made a long smear on his painting as a giant man of metal smashed the skylight and
dropped lightly at his side. While the artist stared, open-mouthed, the bronze man walked out.