Murder Melody: A Doc Savage Adventure by Lawrence Donovan (pseud. Kenneth Robeson)

Author:Lawrence Donovan (pseud. Kenneth Robeson)
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: fiction, Doc Savage (Fictional character), adventure
Publisher: Distributed Proofreaders Canada
Published: 1935-12-15T05:00:00+00:00

* * *

Doc Savage had come to his feet. His fingers searched. He discovered he still had some of the small gas capsules. Also he found a pair of the tiny explosive grenades in a hidden recess. These were small as large pills. Little levers were on the sides.

Yet one of these would have been sufficient to tear out the side of the ship. Doc held a grenade between thumb and fingers.

“Remain quiet, every one,” he cautioned. “Perhaps the light was put out for some other reason. I don’t believe the cry was heard. We are in the Columbia River. The ship is creeping along the north shore on the State of Washington side.”

The bronze man had not even glanced toward the porthole.

“How could you know that?” questioned Caulkins. “Everything seems the same to me. It’s like we were in a big coffin.”

“The wind is from the south,” advised Doc. “It brings the odors of the salmon canneries at Old Astoria. The ship had scraped muddy bottom on tide flats. These are on the north shore. We are nearing the sloughs and marshes in the vicinity of the lumber cities of Longview and Kelso.”

“What are we waiting for?” growled Renny. He had arisen. His oaken arms were flexed. His enormous fists were clenched. The giant engineer had several scores he wanted to settle. Given the word, he would have swung to the upper deck alone.

“Yeah!” chimed in Monk. “I wanta find out what them heathens’s made out of! Just lemme get my hands on half a dozen of ’em!”

“It would be wiser to wait,” advised Doc. “Perhaps it would be best for us to hide for a time in another part of the ship.”

The bronze man had a clear idea. The mysterious Zoro must have a definite objective. The Columbia River region had been his goal. Doc reasoned the stealing of Captain Jarnagin’s ship was connected with this. Zoro must have the intention of loading the vessel with some sort of cargo.

Perhaps his own glasslike cylinder had little cargo space. If this were true, Zoro needed the Narwhal. Doc judged his intention was to convey whatever the load might be to some more remote place. Then it could be stored and removed at Zoro’s convenience.

Doc’s theory later proved to be correct. And for the moment, the bronze man deliberately delayed escape or attack. He desired to know more.

“Keep all of the jackets in place,” Doc suggested. “But be prepared to drop them instantly. The ship is about to land.”

Caulkins and Cassalano followed this advice. Doc’s own men heeded the suggestion, but reluctantly. All were aching for an opportunity to even things up with Zoro.

Again the hull of the ship scraped. It was sandy bottom. The vessel was pulled through this by invisible force.

The dim light bulb flashed on again. Zoro’s men had made no movement toward the lower hold. Apparently they had not heard Cassalano’s cry. In comparison with the reeking darkness, the light now seemed brilliant.

Monk was the first to exclaim.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.