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

appeared, hands on hip holsters, and saw the body of the man on the landing.

"I'll be damned!" gasped one officer, impressed by the dead man's popping eyes. "Whatcha know about
that? The eighth one!"
They went on up the stairs and entered the big reception room of the Association of Physical Health.
There was much excitement, one of the stenographers having fainted.

The two policemen shouted down every one, gave orders that nobody was to leave, and one took up a
position at the elevators after ascertaining there was no back door. The other cop made a brief inspection
of the portly man who had been shot to death behind the divan.

One of the dead man's arms was outfiung, and the wrist was encircled by a shiny metal band which the
policeman at first mistook for a wrist watch, only to learn, on closer inspection, that it held in place a
round metal disk which bore an inscription that read:

Should anything happen to this man, notify Doc Savage.

"Hell's bells!" gulped the officer, and ran for a telephone.

The blonde operator was too nervous to put up a connection, so the policeman did it himself, fumbling
clumsily with the board.

"Doc Savage speaking," came over the wire.

The voice which had answered was one so unusual that the officer was startled into momentary silence.
There was a remarkable depth and power to the voice, a quality of capability which even the
shortcomings of telephonic reproduction did not mask.

"There's a man dead here," said the policeman. "On his wrist is an identification tag asking that you be
called if anything should happen to him."

"What is the number on the back of the tag?" Doc Savage asked.

The officer went over and examined the tag, finding a number he had overlooked the first time. Then he
came back.

"Twenty-three," he said.

The policeman waited for some comment - then a bewildered expression overspread his flushed features.
He absently put a finger up and rubbed an ear, as if that organ were playing him tricks.

He was hearing one of the strangest sounds ever to come to his attention. It was a weird trilling, this note,
having a fantastic rising and falling cadence, yet adhering to no definite tune. It might have been the
product of a faint wind through the cold spiles of an ice field, or it might have been the sound of an exotic
tropical bird. The note ebbed away as mysteriously as it had arisen.

"I shall be there shortly," Doc Savage said, and there was no trace of emotion in his unusual voice.

The policeman hung up and breathed, "Whew! Something about that guy gets you, even over the
telephone!"