Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 037 - The Metal Master

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THE METAL MASTER
A Doc Savage Adventure by Kenneth Robeson
This page copyright © 2001 Blackmask Online.
http://www.blackmask.com
? Chapter I. THE SCARED OLD MAN
? Chapter II. THE BRONZE MAN
? Chapter III. CUBA ANGLE
? Chapter IV. INTO THE TRAP
? Chapter V. THE CROSS THAT IS DOUBLE
? Chapter VI. BAD LUCK
? Chapter VII. THE TRICKY MAN
? Chapter VIII. THE KEY MAN
? Chapter IX. THE SQUABBLERS
? Chapter X. THE PUZZLED MAN
? Chapter XI. THE DEATH ARRANGEMENT
? Chapter XII. MURDER BY METAL
? Chapter XIII. SLICK!
? Chapter XIV. THE PUNNING MAN
? Chapter XV. TERRIBLE ISLAND
? Chapter XVI. THE MESS
? Chapter XVII. SMOOTH TONGUE
? Chapter XVIII. THE BRONZE MAN ACTS
? Chapter XIX. THE SHIP THAT FELL APART
? Chapter XX. THE PLANS THAT FELL APART
? Chapter XXI. THE PLAN
? Chapter XXII. VICTORY IN A BOX
Scanned and Proofed by Tom Stephens
Chapter I. THE SCARED OLD MAN
DOC SAVAGE’S headquarters in New York City are on the eighty-sixth floor of a ponderous midtown
skyscraper. The building is in a business section. Late at night, the region becomes comparatively deserted.
There are many dark doorways in the neighborhood.
The scared old man lurked in one of these darkened doorways.
The old man had something on his mind, something that was worrying him. He crouched in the shadowy
entry and devoted his time to peering about. He was evidently very frightened, too.
It was sleeting a little. Cold. A taxicab, when it swung to the curb near the old man’s hiding place, skidded a
bit.
A girl got out of the cab. She was tall, in a mannish cloth coat and a felt hat that was not far from being
masculine. She paid off the driver and the cab went away, after its wheels had spun for a while on the sleety
pavement.
The girl walked to the darkened doorway. She had a flashlight in her hand and she turned its beam on the old
man.
"Don’t!" he cried out wildly. "No light!"
The girl blackened the flashlight lens. Its momentary glow had flashed more than the suit full of bones that
was the old man. It had disclosed the girl’s face. She was a redhead, and sweet.
"What is wrong, Seevers?" she asked. She had a voice that went with her sweet face. Full of throaty tones.
Old Seevers was plainly very scared. His teeth made a clatter that the cold was not causing.
"I’ve just found out an incredible thing," he gulped. "That’s why I telephoned you to meet me here, Nan.
You’re Louis’s sister."
"And you have been Louis’s laboratory assistant for years, and always seemed to have good sense, or I
wouldn’t have come," said the girl. "Now just what are you talking about, Seevers?"
"I’ve learned that some people are going to be killed," said Seevers. "Murdered in a horrible fashion! And
that’s not all."
The girl was silent for a long moment.
"You’d better take a vacation for a few weeks," she said. "You’ve saved your money. Why not go to Florida
for the winter?"
"I’m not crazy!" snapped old Seevers. "I knew you would think so. That’s why I’m taking you along with me
tonight."
"Taking me where?" she demanded sharply.
"To Doc Savage," said Seevers. "Doc Savage must believe my story."
"Oh," the girl said.
She had heard of Doc Savage. It was in her tone. Man of bronze, being of mystery, one who performed
miracles: That was Doc Savage. Yet no one knew much about him. An aura of mystery hung about him. He
shunned publicity. Yet he got plenty, because reporters have imaginations and he was a mystical, interesting
figure. Because few facts about the bronze man were actually available, the legends springing up around and
about him were often fantastic.
One thing the public did know: Doc Savage’s unique profession. His life was devoted to righting wrongs,
aiding the oppressed, meting out a queer justice to exildoers. A sort of modern knight in armor. It carried him
to the far corners of the earth. And it got him into incredible scrapes.
"Look, Seevers," said the girl, Nan. "Tell me what is on your mind."
"You can listen when I tell Doc Savage," said Seevers. "You can verify certain facts that will make the story
more credible."
"All right," said the girl. "I’ve always wanted to meet this Doc Savage. I don’t believe he’s half what they say
he is."
Seevers took her arm in a thin claw. "Come on. I’m in a terrible hurry."
"Why?"
Seevers hesitated, peering about. "I am afraid of being killed."
"By whom?" She sounded skeptical.
"By the Metal Master, probably," muttered Seevers.
The girl gave the feminine equivalent of a snort. Plainly, she was not convinced that the old man really had
anything of importance. She thought him a little mad.
"I never heard of anything called the Metal Master," she said.
"You will!" Seevers shuddered. "Don’t make any mistake about my sanity. The Metal Master exists, and it is
going to do some awful things to this world, unless Doc Savage can stop it!"
The girl gave her skeptical snort again.
"You sound too melodramatic to be in earnest," she said.
Old Seevers did not reply.
They passed under a street light. The girl was more than pretty. She was little short of ravishing. She was not
a doll face. Her beauty was classic.
"We’ll stop at this cable office," said old Seevers, pointing. "I am expecting a message, a cablegram."
The cable office was one that remained open all night. There were two young men on duty. They ogled the
young woman, hypnotized by her beauty.
"Anything for Jonathan Seevers?" asked the old man.
One clerk came to life and produced a blue envelope.
"Just came in," he said.
Old Seevers opened the message. It was from a town in South America, and read:
INFORMATION WHICH YOU CABLED ME VERIFIES WHAT I HAVE SUSPECTED STOP IMPERATIVE
CALAMITY BE AVERTED STOP GO TO DOC SAVAGE IMMEDIATELY WITH STORY STOP I AM TAKING
OFF NOW IN MY PLANE HEADED FOR NEW YORK STOP BE CAREFUL
LOUIS
Having read the missive, the girl glanced up. She looked stunned.
"From my brother, Louis!" she gasped. "And he is flying from South America, right now!"
"Exactly!" said old Seevers. "Your brother knows just how horrible this thing is."
They hurried out of the cable office.
HARDLY three minutes later, a stranger walked into the cable office. He was a lean fellow whose clothes
looked as if they had been slept in. He wore a rubber apron and a green celluloid eyeshade was over his
eyes.
"Jonathan Seevers let his cablegram blow out of the window of his shop," he said. "He can’t find it. He wants
you to give me a duplicate."
The cable clerk was still in a coma, thinking of the beautiful vision who had just left. He riffled through the
sheaf of carbons, came to the one desired, and pulled it out. Then he hesitated.
"It is customary to have identification before we deliver a message to any one other than the person to which
it is addressed," he said.
"I work for Seevers," said the man.
The statement was a lie. It had that sound. The clerk frowned.
"I’m sorry," he said. "You’ll have to identify yourself. Bring a note from Seevers."
The man made a snarling sound. He reached under his coat, brought out a pistol and aimed deliberately. The
pistol went off twice. The clerks fell on the floor, bullet holes through brains.
The killer got the cablegram carbon and ran out of the office.
Chapter II. THE BRONZE MAN
DOC SAVAGE’S profession was trouble. Other people’s troubles. He had friends, more friends than enemies
by a large score. But there were plenty of enemies, and occasionally they tried to kill Doc Savage, figuring
that was their only hope. Some of the enemies had very ingenious ideas about how to accomplish their ends.
So Doc Savage had to take precautions.
One of these precautions was a system of sensitive alarms which registered the appearance of any prowlers
near his office. A marauder did not need to break in. If he as much as walked near the door, buzzers whined
and indicator lights glowed.
One of the buzzers suddenly whined. Its sound had an alarming quality.
The headquarters—a reception room first, then a library and laboratory covering many thousands of square
feet of floor space—was dark, except for one light over a small germ culture table on which were experimental
cultures of a spermatocyte nature. This light revealed nothing but a hand of the individual who was at the
table.
It was a remarkable hand. The size did not seem especially striking until compared with surrounding objects,
when it became evident that the hand was of no small size. The fingers were long. The skin had a surprisingly
fine texture. But the unusual feature was the evidence that the hand possessed incredible strength. The
sinews on the back were nearly as large as an ordinary man’s fingers.
The hand had a skin of a remarkable bronze hue.
When the buzzer whined, the bronze hand vanished from the glow of the tiny bulb. No lights came on. The
owner of the hand moved through the murk with soundless speed that was surprising. A moment later, he
opened the door of the reception room.
A tall girl in a mannish coat lay on the corridor floor. A masculine hat had been knocked off her head. Her
face was upturned. It was an exquisitely attractive face.
Her mouth was open. A whitish powder was smeared around it.
There was a light in the modernistic corridor, it showed the bronze man who came flinging out of the reception
room. He was a Herculean figure. His hand, seen alone in the light, had seemed huge, yet it was not out of
proportion. Muscles remindful of big wire hawsers were evident under his clothing.
Perhaps the most striking thing about the bronze man was his eyes. They were of an unusual flake-gold tint,
and the gold flakes seemed always in motion, as if stirred by tiny winds. They were strange, compelling
eyes. Strangers on the street often looked at those eyes and were so gripped that they found themselves
bumping into other pedestrians.
The bronze man’s features were regular. His hair, of a bronze hue slightly darker than his skin, fitted his head
like a metal skullcap.
The bronze man did some fast moving. A glance whipped over the corridor showed no one else there.
He scooped up the girl and lunged with her into the reception room, through the library and into the
laboratory. He did not turn the lights on. He evidently knew the place well.
He planted the girl on a marble-topped table. He felt for her pulse. He listened for her heart.
Her heart was not beating.
MANY a famous doctor and surgeon would have liked to have been present in that laboratory during the
course of the next five minutes. What happened was an example of what skill and medical knowledge can do.
Chemicals were mixed with flashing rapidity. They were administered to the girl, both as a draught and with
hypos. Then she was shoved into a complicated device that was designed to start her breathing. Adrenalin
was administered.
Twenty minutes of that, and the girl had her eyes open. She looked at the bronze man.
"You’re Doc Savage," she said faintly. "I’ve seen your pictures."
"You were attacked in the corridor?" Doc Savage asked.
The bronze man’s voice was as unusual as his appearance. It was deep, cultured, full of controlled power.
"Yes," breathed the young woman. "What happened to Seevers?"
Doc did not answer that.
"Was any one beside Seevers with you?" he asked.
"No."
He carried her to the rear of the laboratory room, to what resembled a solid wall. He put a palm to the wall,
held it there, took it away, put it there again. He did this three times. A perfectly concealed panel opened. It
had a lock that was actuated by a sensitive thermostatic combination concealed in the wall. Heat of the
hand, applied in the proper combination, was enough to open the lock. It could be opened in no other manner.
The niche inside had a narrow couch. Doc put the girl there.
"Be back later," he said crisply. "You are too weak to talk now."
He brought stuff in a glass.
"If you get to feeling dizzy, drink this," he directed. "It’s a stimulant. Do not make any noise."
"O. K.," she managed to say. It was a wisp of a whisper.
Doc Savage closed the hidden panel behind him. Only a very good magnifying glass would have detected the
crack around it. Due to the clever construction of the place, the extra thickness of the walls could not be
determined without measuring them with surveying instruments.
DOC SAVAGE went back through laboratory, library and reception room and out into the corridor. The
corridor door was of armor steel and had no locks or knobs or other visible means of being opened. It closed
mysteriously behind the bronze man.
Doc Savage had scooped up, in passing through the laboratory, a rather unusual-looking metal box. It had a
lense, and might have been an old-fashioned magic lantern, except that this lense was almost black in color.
There was a switch on the side of the box. Doc flicked this.
A strange thing happened in the corridor. Along the floor in front of the elevators was a mat. It looked as if it
we made of gray sponge rubber. It was wide enough that any one getting out of the elevators would be likely
to step on it. In fact, only a spry jump would take a person over it without touching it.
This mat, when the eye of the strange lantern was turned on it, began to glow with an eerie blue luminance.
Footprints, as well, appeared on the corridor floor.
Doc Savage entered his own private high-speed elevator and rode down to the street level. There were three
other elevators in operation at this time of night. He asked the attendants questions.
"Who came and went from my floor within the last few minutes?"
"Why, an old man and a girl went up," said one elevator operator. "The girl was a peach for looks, what I
mean. And some men went up, too. Four."
"Before or after the man and the girl?"
"After. They came down later, with the old man. They said he had been seized with a dizzy spell."
"Thank you," said Doc Savage, and went out on the street.
He turned his lantern on again. It was, in reality, s compact and powerful projector of invisible ultra-violet light
Ultra-violet light has the strange property of causing certain substances to fluoresce, or glow. Ordinary
vaseline has this quality.
The man in front of the elevators on Doc Savage’s floor was soaked with a chemical mixture which was sticky
and glowed with an extraordinary brightness under the ultraviolet light. It would stick to the shoe soles of any
one who walked on it, and tracks would be left for some time.
Doc Savage followed glowing tracks down the street. They led around a corner. He had a little difficulty,
because the chemical footprints did not register well on the sleety sidewalk.
The trail, however, was not long. It led into an alley. It was a dark alley. Doc produced a flashlight which
spouted a lean, utterly white beam.
On the alley pavement was a weird blob of metal.
THE metal blob had a length of perhaps a dozen feel, and a width of half that. It appeared that a molten
mixture of steel and brass had been dumped in the alley to harden.
But there were many queer aspects to the metal mass. For one thing, had molten metal been dumped there,
the pavement around about would have shown some evidence of the terrific heat. There was none.
Yet it certainly looked as if the metal had been put there in a molten state. Little streams of it had run out at
the sides, just as liquid metal would do. It had filled cracks in the alley pavement.
Most fantastic of all, pieces of wood stuck out of the mass, along with bits of cloth and leather. Doc Savage
examined the leather.
Automobile cushions! Not the slightest doubt of it. This molten mass had been an automobile. He saw the
tires, four of which had been on the wheels, and a spare. Fire. And the wooden wheel spokes were intact.
The bronze man moved about, using his flashlight. Then he did something that was rare with him. He had
trained his nerves for shocks. He rarely showed emotion.
Yet he started violently.
For the next few seconds, he stood perfectly still. And there came into being a small, weird sound. It was a
trilling. It ran up and down the musical scale, adhering to no definite tune, yet definitely melodious. Much
about the strange trilling defied description. It might have been the song of some exotic feathered creature, or
the note of a wind filtering through a denuded forest.
A small, absent thing which the bronze man did in moments of mental stress, was this trilling. It had a quality
of ventriloquism, seeming to come from everywhere, yet from no definite spot. The reason for the trilling stuck
up stark and horrible in the flashlight glow.
A bony, wrinkled human hand! Projecting from the wad of metal on the alley pavement!
Doc Savage worked furiously at the mass of metal. It was solid, as if molten and poured there. The body was
imbedded in it. Some other parts of it were exposed, he found after a moment’s search. There was part of a
leg. An elbow. The tail of the man’s coat.
Strangest of all, the man’s garments were not even scorched. Yet he was imbedded solidly in the mass of
metal.
Doc Savage returned his attention to the hand which projected so horribly. On one of the fingers was a ring.
He removed it. Identification, perhaps.
He used the ultra-violet lantern. The footprints ended here. There were marks on the sleet which indicated a
car had gone away. There must have been two cars. One—something fantastic had happened to it. The other
had taken away the remaining men.
There seemed to be nothing more to do. It would take hours, perhaps days, with hacksaws to free the body.
Doc went back toward the skyscraper which housed his headquarters.
He carried the ring.
An elevator operator told him, "Some men went up to your floor, then came back down. I guess they found
you weren’t there."
"Know them?" Doc asked.
"They were the same men who took the old man down."
Doc Savage said nothing. But he lost no time getting in the private express elevator to ride up. A moment
later, he stepped out in the eighty-sixth floor corridor.
The armor-plate door of his headquarters suite was gone.
NOT gone, exactly. It was a puddle on the floor. To all appearances, it had simply melted. Yet nothing was
burned.
Doc Savage studied the incredible scene. Some of the metal casing of the door had also dripped down on the
floor. He touched the wad of metal. Cold.
He entered. Nothing was disturbed to any extent. But the place had been searched. A few cabinets were
open. They were large enough to have held a person.
He went to the secret panel and unlocked it by operating the thermostatic combination.
The girl smiled at him. She was still weak. But her nerve was all right.
"I’m glad you’re back," she said.
"Hear any one a few minutes ago?"
"Faint sounds," she admitted. "You told me to keep quiet. I did."
Doc Savage showed her the ring. There was nothing unusual about it. It was cheap; worn.
"Ever see it before?" he asked.
The girl nodded. "Yes. It belonged to Seevers. He always wore it."
Doc Savage nodded, sat down, and gave her some of the stimulant to drink.
"Now," he said. "Tell me the story."
Her voice was firm enough.
"There’s not much of it," she said. "Seevers telephoned me. He was worried. Wanted me to meet him and
come to talk with you. He said something about a Metal Master, and something terrible about it. But he didn’t
go into details. I thought he was—well, balmy. That is, until he got the cablegram from my brother. And my
brother—his name is Louis—seemed to think there was something wrong, too."
"Who is your brother?" Doc asked.
"Louis Tester," the girl replied. "I am Nan Tester. We are twins. My brother is an expert on electricity as
applied to chemistry. Or at least, he used to be"
"Used to be?"
The girl drank more of the stimulant.
"I haven’t seen much of Louis the last two years," she said. "He has been off in some out-of-the-way place
working, where he has a laboratory."
"Where?"
"I don’t know."
"From where did the cablegram come?"
"South America. He is on his way North. I don’t know why he was down there. In fact, I didn’t know he was in
South America."
"Who was Seevers?"
"He used to work with my brother. Seevers was sort of a teacher for my brother for a long time. He is a nice
old man."
Doc Savage did not tell her she should have said was a nice old man.
Chapter III. CUBA ANGLE
DOC SAVAGE allowed the young woman to rest, after ascertaining that she knew no more than what she
had told. While she was resting, he telephoned the cable company.
He learned about the two clerks who had been murdered and about the cablegram which had been taken. He
got a copy of the cablegram from the central office, where it had been relayed.
"How is your nerve?" he asked the girl.
"I don’t know," she said.
Doc tried her.
"Seevers is dead," he said.
Her nerve was all right. She bit her lips.
"He was a nice old man," she said.
"Do you have any idea what is behind this?" Doc Savage asked.
She considered. "I can’t think of a single angle."
"You were poisoned," Doc told her. "They smeared a cyanide powder over your mouth."
"I know." She shuddered. "And after that, it was the strangest thing! I seemed to be flying through infinite
space at terrific speed! And yet it didn’t seem like it was me doing that, but some one different, some part of
me that I had never been conscious of before"
"You were dead," Doc Savage told her.
She eyed him solemnly. "You wouldn’t kid me?"
"That," he assured her, "is the truth."
"And you brought me back to life?"
"It has been done often before. People actually die on operating tables and elsewhere, only to be revived by
the use of adrenalin and other methods."
Nan Tester did not say anything. Apparently having been dead was something to think about.
"You are going to be left here again for a few minutes," the bronze man told her.
"What are you going to do?"
"Do not make any noise in here," Doc told her, apparently not hearing her question. "The place was searched
a while ago. They were probably looking for you."
Doc Savage left her concealed in the secret compartment. She had wanted to know what he planned, but he
had appeared not to hear the inquiry—a small and aggravating habit which he had when he did not wish to
explain his future moves.
He went to the cable office to which had come Louis Tester’s cable from South America, and where the two
clerks had been murdered. The place was full of police officers, investigating the killing.
Two new clerks were on duty.
Doc Savage filed two cablegrams for transmission. The first one was addressed to Louis Tester, care of the
airport at Panama, Canal Zone, where his plane would be apt to land for refueling. It read:
SEEVERS MURDERED STOP YOUR LIFE MAY BE IN DANGER STOP DESIRE YOUR STORY
IMMEDIATELY STOP CHANGE YOUR COURSE TO HAVANA CUBA AND INTERVIEW MY ASSISTANT
COLONEL JOHN RENWICK AT HOTEL MIRMA IN HAVANA STOP TELL HIM STORY STOP ACCEPT HIS
HELP STOP YOUR SISTER WITH ME.
DOC SAVAGE
The second cable was directed to Colonel John Renwick, Hotel Mirma, Havana, Cuba, and said:
MAN NAMED LOUIS TESTER WILL ARRIVE IN HAVANA FROM SOUTH AMERICA BY PLANE STOP
MEET HIM AND GET STORY CLEARING UP MYSTERY OF METAL MASTER STOP HIS LIFE MAY BE IN
DANGER
DOC SAVAGE
Doc handed these two communications over the counter for immediate transmission. The two clerks behind
the counter seemed to be nervous, which was no wonder, with the place full of frowning cops.
DOC SAVAGE now gave his attention to the policemen. They listened to him with the greatest of respect, for
they knew his reputation, knew also that he was a high honorary officer in the police department, among
other things.
Doc told them to go to the elevator operators in the skyscraper which housed his headquarters for a
description of men who might be the murderers. Doc did not explain why he happened to make this
suggestion. The policemen looked very curious about it, but did not insist when Doc failed to volunteer a full
explanation.
Doc Savage also mentioned that it might be interesting to investigate the alley where old Seever’s body lay
imbedded so incredibly in a blob of metal.
Two officers went to see about this. One soon came tearing back with his eyes wild. He had found the mass
of metal, and the body.
The police investigators now asked Doc Savage to have another look at the fantastic thing in the alley, and
furnish them with any theories which they might pursue in their investigation. Doc was not unwilling. He knew
very well that the police had an efficient organization, and he frequently coöperated with them.
Doc went to the alley with the policemen.
The two clerks in the cable office seemed very glad indeed to see the bronze man and the cops depart. Their
relief was tempered somewhat by the fact that one cop remained behind, to see that no one wandered around
messing finger prints. The clerks, pretending to examine messages, held a whispered consultation.
"This is sorta risky" one said. "We better blow. We’ve got them two cablegrams that the bronze guy filed."
"We better see what the chief wants us to do," the other muttered.
The man went to a telephone. The cable office phones were fitted with box affairs over the mouthpieces, so
that the instruments could be spoken into with privacy. This made it simple for the man to telephone without
the policeman on guard overhearing.
"Doc Savage filed two cablegrams," said the clerk, when he had his party.
"Read them to me," directed the person at the other end of the wire.
This individual spoke in a whisper. It is very difficult to identify a voice from a whisper over a telephone wire.
The clerk read both messages.
The whisperer cursed heartily, but did not forget to keep whispering.
"That means the girl got to Doc Savage," said the whisperer. "It also means that she couldn’t tell him what it
is all about. He’s trying to get hold of Louis Tester, to learn the story. We’ve got to stop that."
"Sure," said the clerk. "But how?"
THE other had quick wits. Almost immediately, a cablegram was dictated over the phone. It was addressed
to Louis Tester, care of the airport at Panama, Canal Zone, and read:
摘要：

THEMETALMASTERADocSavageAdventurebyKennethRobesonThispagecopyright©2001BlackmaskOnline.http://www.blackmask.com?ChapterI.THESCAREDOLDMAN?ChapterII.THEBRONZEMAN?ChapterIII.CUBAANGLE?ChapterIV.INTOTHETRAP?ChapterV.THECROSSTHATISDOUBLE?ChapterVI.BADLUCK?ChapterVII.THETRICKYMAN?ChapterVIII.THEKEYMAN?Cha...

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