"Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 043 - Cold Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

He was Major Thomas J. Roberts, electrical wizard. His appearance had given him the
name of "Long Tom."


AS Long Tom finished speaking, a clock started chiming with musical notes.

Doc Savage crossed to the desk and picked up the telephone. The clock chimes touched
the final stroke of eight oтАЩclock with a harmonious lingering.

"Union 0-1214," said Doc, when he had the New Jersey connection.
A voice started to speak from the other end.
Without preliminaries, the voice said. "YouтАЩre Doc SavтАФ"

Then it seemed as if the receiver had exploded. The voice was sliced off. No reverberation
followed. There was no lingering roll of sound, such as could have been expected if the
instrument had remained even for a few seconds in service.
"That was a powerful blast," Doc said. "The phone was torn out. The man who tried to talk
was an old man."

Doc didnтАЩt explain further. He didnтАЩt waste more time in speech. He had thumbed the
receiver bar. Two minutes later, he was given a trace-back on the Jersey call.
"Blind number," he said to the others. "ItтАЩs off the Newark-Trenton highway in a marshy strip."

Doc moved ahead through the outer door. His three companions paused only to make a
swift collection of a few special devices they might need. The bronze man did not seem
hurried, but the others were compelled to move fast.
DocтАЩs special elevator dropped with the speed of a rocket. It slowed with a cushiony
rebound, when it reached the bronze manтАЩs private garage in the basement. DocтАЩs long low
car, with its extra-powerful motor under the long hood and its windows of bulletproof glass
set in armor steel, glided toward the Holland Tunnel.



Chapter 2. THE HOUSE IN THE MARSH
SHORTLY before the eight oтАЩclock telephone call made by Doc Savage, a battered old
roadster turned off a paved New Jersey highway. Headlight beams laid ghostly fingers
across a foggy strip of marshland.

When he was perhaps a mile and a half from the main highway, the driver abruptly switched
off the lights. He parked the little car in concealment of bushes beside a crooked lane.
Climbing from the car, the driver walked cautiously ahead. Dim lights made a blur in the fog.
They indicated some habitation.

Close up, this might have been seen to be an old log house. It appeared to squat gloomily in
the murky depths of the Jersey marsh. The bulk of its presence was marked only by faint
illumination from an upper window and one slanting finger of dancing, vari-colored light
emanating from what seemed a mere slit at ground level.
From the basement, or some underground chamber, came a low throbbing. A trained
observer would have said delicate machinery of some sort was being operated. Apparently,
there was but one outside watcher. And his figure was only a furtive shadow among other