"Robeson, Kenneth - Doc Savage 1938 02 - The Mountain Monster" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

Cold chills swept the engineerТs long, lanky body. And then his straining ears
caught another sound, a sound such as he had never heard before. It came like
the splashing of boots in thick mud.
But it was more than that. It was as if some giant man or beast was taking huge
steps, and not with two feet or four, but with many.
Somehow, John Alden found he had left the cot; his fear-numbed hands sought the
rifle that hung over the door. He levered a shell into the barrel. A moment more
and he had dashed from the cabin.

COLD rain whipped into AldenТs face. Drenched and shivering in pajamas, the tall
engineer crouched, all senses alert.
Those screams could have come from only one man. "Buck" Dixon, his partner, must
be in peril. And Dixon was a former soldier, knew how to take care of himself.
Buck Dixon had gone down into the valley to call on some new arrivals. He must
be hurt, possibly deadЧ
John Alden strained his ears. The queer sounds he had heard vanished. Rain and
thunder broke the stillness.
He found himself recalling the stories the Indians had told him of The Monster,
the legend of a dread, foul beast that lived in the mountains.
And it was then Alden received another indication of the horror that was to
come.
There was an odor in the air, an unclean, almost overpowering odor. It was
sickening. It seemed like the scent of some animal.
And the Indians had said such an odor was always present when The Monster
appeared!
John AldenТs tongue suddenly felt thick. The odor had a peculiar, cloying
sweetness that hung in the air despite the rain. It penetrated the brain, made
him feel almost light-headed.
And it had another result as well: While his entire body shrank with distaste,
although the odor was repelling, yet it had a queer fascination, an almost
hypnotic pull.
While his mind cried out for him to turn and run, John Alden found that his
muscles were not obeying. Instead, foot by foot, he was moving ahead into the
darkness, where the scent became more powerful.
John Alden had never been called a coward. But he was afraid then.
He knew that another force, stronger than his own, had taken possession of his
body. That force was dragging him resistlessly onward.
He opened his own mouth to scream. No sound came from his lips. His vocal cords
apparently were paralyzed. The dread odor grew stronger and stronger.

JOHN ALDEN broke into a run. A choking, bubbling sound came from close ahead,
seemed to break the uncanny, hypnotic spell.
The sound came again, but John Alden was no longer afraid. There was nothing
supernatural about that sound. It came from human lips.
The trail made a sudden twist. A dark object, sprawled doglike, loomed ahead.
The queer, bubbling sounds came from it.
The sprawled figure tried to rise as John Alden came in view. Shrill words burst
from it:
"I saw it! I saw it! It was a big monster, a huge, creeping shape with many
legs. It almost got me. Then it went away. It jumped over the trees."