"Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 037 - The Metal Master" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

He listened to the anchor go down with a loud rumble of chain out of the hawsehole. Men dashed about
on deck, putting stops on the sails and otherwise making things shipshape.

Louis Tester started suddenly. "Why didnтАЩt I think of that before?" he growled to himself.

An idea had popped into his head.

The guardтАФand there was one, of courseтАФwas keeping his ears peeled, as he had been directed to do
by TopsтАЩl Hertz. The guard had been told that if the prisoner got away, heтАФthe guardтАФwould be
relieved of his skin while still in that condition known as living.

Directly after the anchor went down, the sentry heard a noise. It was a sound calculated to alarm him: the
thudding of muffled blows. The prisoner seemed to be working, trying to escape. The sentry sprang to
action.

He wrenched out his flashlight. He cocked his rifle. He shoved the cell door open, popped in light and the
menace of his gun.

The prisoner crouched on the far side of the cell, working with great earnestness. Just what he was doing,
the guard could not tell.
"
Caramba!" he squawled. He spoke the language of the Banana republics. "Get away from there!"
The prisoner kept on with what he was doing, which was nothing more ominous than hammering the
bulkheads with the heel of a shoe which he had taken off. But the guard could not see that.

The guard squawked again, and bounded into the room. He thought himself perfectly safe, for he had his
gun in his hand and a light on the prisoner, who had his back turned. But he was not safe.

The guard landed flat on his face, most unexpectedly. It took the breath out of him.



THE rest of the guardтАЩs breath was taken out of him as the prisoner spun from the bulkhead, came with a
great leap and landed on his back. But the guard was tough. He writhed and grabbed the otherтАЩs legs.
He might have gotten somewhere, but he got a kick in the temple that stretched him quiet.

Louis Tester sprang over the line he had made in front of the door with shoestrings, belt and necktie. He
dived out into the passage. He saw legs coming down a companionway. The noise had been heard.

Men were also coming from the opposite direction. The way to the deck was blocked.

A cabin door gaped handily. Into that, Louis Tester went, and got the door shut without too much
commotion. He did not look around for a place to hide. That would have been hoping for too much. He
whipped straight to the porthole, and he got a break.

The Innocent had portholes larger than ordinary, for they served, on occasion, to unload incriminating
cargo on one side, while a coast guard cutter came up on the other side. The redheaded man got through
it without difficulty, being agile.

He struck out for shore. His luck held. Havana harbor has for centuries been noted for vile water and