The Midas Man: A Doc Savage Adventure by Lester Dent (pseud. Kenneth Robeson)

Author:Lester Dent (pseud. Kenneth Robeson)
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Adventure, Doc Savage (Fictional character), Fiction
Publisher: Distributed Proofreaders Canada
Published: 1936-05-15T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter XII

THE BURDEN OF SUSPICION

Doc Savage was in motion. He calculated nicely, allowing just enough time for flying débris to settle, but moving quickly enough that the dust and smoke would help conceal him.

A mess of splintered laths and torn flooring delayed him slightly. The wreckage was still groaning as it settled. A large scab of plaster fell tardily off the ceiling.

Doc waded over the torn mass of a rug, sidestepped a divan which the explosion had mangled. There was a mirror door and an ordinary door side by side at the end of the room. Most of the mirror glass was out. Being aware that mirrors are usually put in closet doors, Doc Savage ignored that one. The second panel was stuck. It proved simpler to bash the thin wood out and crawl through, than to bother with opening it.

A gun barked at him the instant he was in a hall. He rolled, twisted, and gained an angle in the corridor. Where he had been when the shot crashed, a cloud of black smoke appeared. It spread rapidly. A draft pulled some of it through the hole which he had smashed in the door. The rest mushroomed out in the hallway, shutting off visibility.

The stuff was coming from a metal container which Doc had left there.

The gun did not slam again. The shot had come from a point which seemed to be a staircase. Up this, feet pattered. The noise they made was rapid and rather light, almost effeminate.

Doc Savage headed toward the fleeing individual. The smoke, while it concealed him completely when he was within the cloud, left no traces of soot on his person. Nor did he seem to have difficulty breathing while in it. However, creeping toward the stairs, he fell to absently rubbing his hands, one with the other. He rubbed his neck. Then, apparently realizing what he was doing, he put forth an effort and stopped this.

That smoke bomb was a very particular type. A great deal of experimenting had gone into its concoction.

At the foot of the stairway, he paused.

“Johnny!” he called.

“Here!” came a muffled voice.

It was Johnny’s voice, although the wordy archæologist and geologist rarely used a word so small. He seemed to be upstairs and toward the front of the house.

Bullets came down the staircase in a businesslike procession. It was plain that whoever was up there wanted to be alone with the prisoner.

Doc Savage produced another of the powerful little grenades.

“You had better move!” he called to the gunman. “In about ten seconds, there is not going to be much left of the spot where you are standing!”

The bronze man listened intently. He never killed or seriously injured any one, if it could be avoided.

The bullets kept coming.

Doc adjusted the firing mechanism of the grenade. He chose a moment when there was a pause in the shooting and flicked the little thing upward. It landed with a small clatter.

The gunman fled.

The house shook on its foundations. Noise, smoke, laths, plaster, and a few stray stair treads came flying down.

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