Chapter 19

THE WEEDS

MONK’S eyes opened a little, rolled until they were all whites, then slowly assumed normalcy, and he looked at Doc Savage.

The bronze man was some ten feet distant, tied around and around, mummy fashion, with turns of fibre rope. His head and his hands alone projected from his tyings, and cloth had been lashed over his hands so that he could not use his fingers.

Monk tried to move, groaned, “Blast it, I’m paralyzed!” then realized he was tied in much the same fashion as Doc.

“They don’t take many chances, do they?” he mumbled.

“Are you all right?” Doc asked.

“His skull is thick,” Ham’s voice said from somewhere.

Squinting about, Monk saw that Ham lay near by, bound like himself. Johnny, Long Tom and Renny, formed a row along the sandy floor.

Da Clima scowled at Monk and strained against his ropes. He lay just at the edge of the area lighted by an electric lantern.

Pat Savage and Kel Avery were opposite, both tied, and white-bearded Dan Thunden was between them. Thunden seemed to be slumbering yet from the effects of the anesthetic gas.

They were in a ragged stone chamber. Santini and his men stood about, looking elated.

“It is the big reunion, eh, signors?” Santini inquired.

“In your hat,” Monk grunted.

Santini laughed jubilantly, came over and stood playfully on Monk’s chest, bouncing up and down a little.

Monk rolled abruptly, throwing Santini, and Santini, regaining his feet, kicked Monk in the side with great violence, swearing the while in his native tongue.

Monk showed his teeth and grunted loudly at each impact. like an animal in distress.

“This is the joyful occasion for me,” said Santini.

Then he went to Renny and began to kick and abuse him as he had Monk. He treated Long Tom in like fashion, and was standing on Da Clima’s massive torso when Dan Thunden rolled over and groaned.

Dropping his diversion, Santini sprang forward and pointed at the white-bearded old-young man.

“This is what I wait for!” he snapped. “Take him somewhere and make him answer our questions!”

Two men picked up Dan Thunden, head and heels.

“Do not go near that door with the secret lock,” Santini warned. apparently as an afterthought. “We do not want our friends here to turn into skeletons. Not yet, signors.”

The two who carried Dan Thunden started out with their burden, but before they had gone far, Doc Savage spoke. His words were in the guttural, not unmusical tongue of ancient Maya, the language which only the bronze man and his five aides spoke and understood, excepting those in the lost Central American valley to whom the language was native.

“Talk to me in this language,” Doc directed in Mayan. “Make them think we’re cooking up something.”

Santini glared as he heard the unintelligible words, then snarled, “Non! No,i! Speak so that I understand!”

“Go chase yourself,” Monk advised him in Mayan. “Say, Doc, what’s the idea of this jabbering? It’ll only start him kicking our ribs again.

“I want them to separate us,” Doc said in Mayan. “if I can get by myself, I have a scheme to try.”

Monk asked in Mayan, “What is it?”

He never got his answer. Santini, sputtering his rage, took the bait.

“Take this bronze man to another room,” he ordered. “Two of you watch him! Shoot him at the least suspicion!”

Doc was promptly hauled out.

Monk muttered in Mayan, “I don’t see what Doc can do. They’ve searched him, and he’s tied up like nobody’s business.”

“Losing faith in Doc?” Ham asked sourly.

Monk sighed and lay back. “Brother, he’s the only hope we’ve got.”

DOC SAVAGE was carried into a circular recess in the stone, a place from which there was only one egress, and deposited on the sandy floor. The two who had carried him straightened up, puffing, perspiration like a shiny grease on their foreheads.

“The guy weighs a ton,” one captor grunted.

“Pipe down!” the other muttered, and planted an electric hand lantern so that its beam bore upon the bronze man.

“That’s the idea,” said the first. “We’ve gotta watch ‘im.”

But Doc Savage did not want them scrutinizing him too closely, and he discouraged their attention by the simple expedient of staring at them intently, lids widened so that the full power of his flake-gold eyes had effect.

“Cut it out!” snarled one of the two captors.

Doc seemed not to hear, and a moment later, the hand lanterns were shifted so that the bronze man did not lie in direct brilliance, nor yet in complete gloom, but in a half light where he could not move appreciably without being observed.

“The guy can hypnotize a feller with them eyes,” the more burly of the pair mumbled. “That’s what Santini said, anyhow. I ain’t takin’ no chances myself.”

There was no apparent possibility of Doc Savage gaining his freedom, so securely was he bound. The bronze man’s five aides knew something of his remarkable ability, had seen him accomplish the seeming impossible in the past, and even they had been skeptical about his chances. Mixed with the skepticism had been hope, though, for Doc had a way of making the incredible seem simple.

Santini’s men had wrenched the heels off Doc’s shoes to make sure no gadget was hidden there. ‘The nails which had held the heels projected. The shoes were fitted with modern zipper fasteners instead of time-honored laces.

Moving an imperceptible bit at a time, Doc hooked a heel nail in one zipper ring and stripped it down. He did the same with the other shoe.

From somewhere down the passage that led from the room, Santini’s voice ordered, “Come here, you two!”

“You mean us?” called a guard.

“Si, si, you!” snapped Santini’s voice.

“But we’re watching — “

“Canes!” snarled the voice. “Dogs! He will not escape in the minute I need you!”

The two watchmen walked out of the stone cubicle.

Doc Savage kicked off his shoes. His great frame seemed to turn to rubber, for be doubled backward in the fashion of a skilled contortionist, and his toes found the knots that secured his rope bindings. There were no feet in his socks, merely spatlike straps under the instep, leaving his toes uncovered.

The bronze man’s toes took on the prehensile deftness of fingers. In fractional seconds, the knots were untied. He twisted about, working with fabulous speed, but making little noise. He came to his feet.

Down the stone passage, the two guards were peering about in puzzled fashion, for they had not found Santini at the point from which the man’s voice had apparently come.

“Boss!” one growled. “Where the deuce did you go?”

There sounded two dull thumps. Both men dropped senseless. Neither was ever exactly sure what had happened, for they did not see or hear the metallic nemesis who loomed abruptly behind them and struck with both fists simultaneously.

Nor did either guard realize at the moment that they were the victims of a skill at voice mimicry and ventriloquism.

Santini had not called. Doc had done that.

DOC WENT forward and looked into the room which held his five aides, along with Pat, Kel Avery and Da Clima. A number of Santini’s men were there, alert and watchful. An attempt to free the captives was sure to mean a fight, noise, an alarm.

From a nearby cavern emanated gruff words, interspersed with angry explosives. That would be Santini questioning old Dan Thunden. Doc made for the sounds.

In addition to Santini, four men were with Thunden. Four ropes had been tied to the whitehaired man’s wrists and ankles and a man held the end of each rope, pulling backward with all of his strength.

Thunden’s finger tips were gory horrors. Santini held a pair of small pliers. Even as Doc sighted the group, the pincers were employed to yank another nail off one of Thunden’s fingers.

Thunden moaned, writhed. Crimson crawled from lips into which he sank his own teeth.

“That is all of the finger nails, Signor Thunden,” Santini said callously. “It seems that we will have to pull out an eye next. I will do it slowly, so that you can see with the other eye the knife as it cuts the muscles to free the orb from your head.”

The recitation of grim details seemed to accomplish what the previous torture had not done.

“What do you want to know?” he groaned.

“I suppose you have no idea?” Santini sneered.

Doc advanced a little to be in a position to better catch the words. His feet, still bare, contacted something. He stooped and felt with sensitive fingers.

It was the packs which his aides, Monk, Ham, Johnny and Da Clima, had brought from the plane. The knapsacks made a little mound. Doc stepped around them and went on a few feet, then stopped.

Dan Thunden said, “The stoahroom, suh, is just inside the wooden doah.”

Santini swore. “You mean that we have to take a chance with those — with those — “

“With my little friends, yes,” Dan Thunden growled. “And I do hope you have an accident.”

“How do we get in there?” Santini demanded.

“Can you walk on stilts?”

“Non!”

“I don’t give a hoot how you get in!” Dan Thunden snapped. “I have told you wheah the stoahroom is.”

“Just how is it opened?” Santini asked.

“Theah is a black ledge in the rock,” said the whitehaired man. “You jam youah weight against that.”

Doc Savage waited to hear no more, but glided backward. He paused to run deft fingers over the packs lying on the floor, and thus managed to locate the one which Monk had found.

Monk’s pack was distinctive because it held a thing without which Monk seldom ventured into action — the apish chemist’s amazing portable laboratory which contained chemicals and apparatus for almost every purpose, all nested in a marvelously compact space.

With Monk’s pack, Doc raced along the passages.

THE BRONZE man reached the massive wooden door with out incident. He listened, an ear against it. There was no trace of the sound that was like fat frying. His fingers found the secret catch and the timbered panel swung back, grating softly.

Doc’s movements in the passage beyond were silent. Monk’s pack held a spare flashlight, and he used this. The black ledge which Dan Thunden had mentioned was easily distingu ished.

Doc started to plant weight against the dark stone, then hesitated. He drew back and searched for something with which to exert force without getting too near. He was thinking of those many traps which old Dan Thunden had rigged in this strange subterranean place.

Footsteps sounded beyond the door. They were rapid, running. Doc drifted silently into a patch of gloom. A flashlight swayed close.

Leaking appeared, dripping perspiration, his upper lip held between his teeth. There was a desperate expression on his unlovely face, a quivering eagerness in his plump hulk.

Leaking’s look showed Doc exactly what was up. Leaking had heard Dan Thunden’s words and was bound to inspect the storeroom ahead of Santini. Such action could only mean treachery.

Leaking must intend to doublecross his boss.

‘The flashlight which the perspiring man carried picked up the black Tedge. Leaking’s time was evidently short, for he threw his weight against the black ledge. Nothing happened.

The man stood back. In his excitement, he had failed to attach significance to finding the heavy wooden door open. Once more, he plunged against the strip of dark stone.

Mechanism grated. Steel flashed. There was a hollow glug.

Leaking reeled, swayed. He seemed to come apart in the middle and fall in a flood of scarlet.

The upper part of his torso fell forward and blocked the slender panel of stone which had opened.

Doc advanced swiftly, not looking at Leaking’s body, and examined the unholy mechanism inside the door. It was of hardwood, cleverly made, actuated by a lever on which a heavy weight bore.

Attached to the device was a great, razor-sharp cleaver, roughly fashioned from some iron part of a sailing ship. This was rigged so as to slash outward when pressure was placed upon the black stone.

It was this cleaver which had chopped Leaking in two halves.

Doc Savage still carried Monk’s pack. He opened it, using his flashlight. The bronze man knew where every phial of chemical reposed. He drew out bottles, then walked into the storeroom, eyes alert for other grisly traps.

THE STOREROOM was not large, and the walls were inset with crude shelves. On these reposed jars of baked earthenware.

Doc opened the handiest, dipped in fingers and brought up some of the contents.

The bronze man did not seem surprised at what he saw — leaves, a bilious green in color, dried and carefully packed. The sprigs did not have the color and shape of tea, nor yet of sage.

A botanist would have been intrigued by the leaves, for they were of a type difficult to catalogue. But Doc Savage, who was ordinarily interested by anything new and strange, gave them little attention. He let them fall back, and opened several more of the most convenient containers.

Over the leaves in each jar, he sprinkled a bit of the chemical which he had taken from Monk’s portable laboratory.

His departure was as ghostly as his coming, and executed none too soon, for steps could be heard as a number of men came near. They appeared, Santini and some of his followers.

They did not glimpse Doc, for he had concealed himself where they would walk past, leaving him behind them. At sight of the open door, Santini snarled profanely and sprang forward. He discovered Leaking’s decapitated form.

“Che!” he gulped. “What — what is this — “

Then he burst into a roar of ugly mirth which bent him over and caused him to slap his beribboned chest to regain his breath.

“Leaking is try to pull the crooked deal on us, si,” he chortled. “And old Dan Thunden is try the same thing. Leaking is fall into Thunden’s trap. Come hello! How beautiful!”

They advanced into the storeroom and clutched up the handiest jars, which were those that Doc Savage had opened and sprinkled with chemical.

“At last we have the material,” Santini murmured, and waved an arm to take in the other jars. “There is enough of it here to make us all rich men.”

A man eyed Santini eagerly. “Boss?”

“Si.”

“You’re going to keep your promise, ain’t you?” asked the man. “You said, back on Long Island that night, that we would all be given the weed when we found the storeroom.

Santini hesitated, then nodded. “It is true. Later, you can all

The men were bright-eyed with eagerness. There was a near madness in their manner. a strange spell woven by sight of the unusual weed in the jars.

“Now,” muttered the spokesman. “Let’s sample the stuff. It’s supposed to make a guy feel better right off, ain’t it?”

Santini nodded. “It is.”

“What’s the word? Do we sample it now, or not?”

“It must be mixed with water,” said Santini. “We will try it at once. All of us.”

“That’s the idea!” The speaker was almost blubbering his joy, and the others were like him, excited to the point of incoherence.

“The real Fountain of Youth,” one gulped.

“You said it,” agreed another. “The stuff that makes you live forever!”