Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 119 - The Time Terror

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THE TIME TERROR
A Doc Savage Adventure by Kenneth Robeson
This page copyright © 2002 Blackmask Online.
http://www.blackmask.com
? Chapter I. MYSTERY ABOUT NO NEWS
? Chapter II. DEATH AND A CLEAR SKY
? Chapter III. NEW GADGET
? Chapter IV. THE DEVIL OF TRAPPER LAKE
? Chapter V. THE STRONG GIRL
? Chapter VI. MONK AND THE DEVIL
? Chapter VII. THE UNKNOWN
? Chapter VIII. A WORLD LOST
? Chapter IX. BACK INTO TIME
? Chapter X. AS MAN BEGAN
? Chapter XI. SKUNKS AND SKUNKS
? Chapter XII. CALVIN WESTERN
? Chapter XIII. PLAN OF DEATH
? Chapter XIV. THE TROJAN'S SUIT
? Chapter XV. ABOUT EQUALITY
Chapter I. MYSTERY ABOUT NO NEWS
THE first hint of big things to come was when Onie Morton fell over the milk bottle.
This was a very innocent thing that could happen to anybody. So innocent, in fact, that no one noticed it
was too innocent. Not at first.
Onie Morton lived in the Bronx with a red-headed wife who liked to sleep late, and every morning Onie
went promptly to work at seven ten. His late-sleeping wife of course never took in the milk before he
went to work, which meant that taking in the morning milk was the last thing Onie did before he went to
work. This morning Onie took in the morning milk as usual, placing it in the refrigerator.
This must have thrown him off guard on the milk situation, because he wasn't expecting any more milk in
front of his door, and so he came backing out as usual, and he fell over more milk in bottles in front of the
door. Then he bumped into the skinny man in the gray suit.
It was a stinking mess.
“Whew!” said Onie Morton. “Phew! Whew! Phooie! What is that stuff?”
The skinny man in the gray suit had been carrying a package, and this had popped like a rotten egg,
spewing over Onie.
“Oh, I'm so sorry!” exclaimed the skinny man. “Gosh, I'm sorry.”
“Phew! Pheweeee!” said Onie Morton. “What is that junk?”
“Perfume.”
“Perfume?”
“Yes,” said the skinny man.
“It's a hell of a smelling perfume,” said Onie Morton. “Phew!”
The skinny man in the gray suit nodded sadly. “Yes, I'm afraid it is. At least that's what the people I have
been trying to sell it to keep telling me.” He shook his head gloomily. “I guess I'm wrong. I thought it was
a very lovely and distinctive odor.”
“It's distinctive, all right,” said Onie. “And a skunk might think it is lovely. But what about the people in
the office where I'm supposed to work today?”
“Maybe they'll like the odor where you work.”
Onie scowled. “Brother, who you kidding?”
“I guess you're right,” said the skinny man disconsolately. “I'm afraid this is unfortunate. You see, the
odor is defiant to water and very difficult to wash off, so you may not be able to remove it successfully
for a while.”
Onie let out an indignant yell.
“You mean I won't be able to wash this stink off me so I can go to work today?” he bellowed.
“I fear so,” said the tall man.
And he was right.
ONIE MORTON worked for Doc Savage. Onie was a news condenser, which was a term invented for
his job. Doc Savage maintained an elaborate set-up of specialists whereby the news from all parts of the
world, which came into his office on leased wire printers and by special telephone and cabled missives
from special correspondents, was gathered and condensed each day.
The idea of gathering and condensing this news was so that it could be presented to Doc Savage in a
form brief enough for his quick examination. Doc Savage was very busy. In addition to pursuing his
rather strange profession—distinctly strange, in fact—of righting wrongs and punishing evildoers in the far
corners of the earth, or of sticking his nose into other people's business, as his enemies referred to it, Doc
Savage was a scientist and experimenter of note.
Doc Savage liked to look at the news in brief to keep in touch with things, and to pick out items which
needed his specialized kind of attention. He could go over these items and smell trouble.
“Goes over them as if they was tracks and he was a bloodhound, and smells trouble,” was the way
Monk Mayfair expressed it.
The daily news digest was really quite an important thing in. Doc Savage's routine, and he had
handpicked his specialists who did the news-condensing with care.
Onie Morton, who had had the accident with the milk bottle and the stinking perfume, was one of the
news condensers.
Which had a lot to do with it.
LIEUTENANT COLONEL ANDREW BLODGETT MAYFAIR, the eminent industrial chemist whose
name would be in the history books of chemical development, and who looked like a hairy ape out of
Darwin, sat in Doc Savage's eighty-sixth-floor headquarters in a midtown skyscraper and took a
telephone call from Onie Morton. One look at Lieutenant Colonel Mayfair and you knew why people
who had never seen him before automatically called him Monk. He also had a ridiculous small boy voice.
Hearing him when he was mad was funnier than listening to Hitler speak with a Yiddish accent.
Monk Mayfair was one of a group of five assistants who worked closely with Doc Savage. The five
were Doc's lieutenants. One of Monk's headaches was the news-condensing service. Which was why
Onie Morton called Monk.
“Sure, sure, Onie,” said Monk into the telephone. “I get it. You fell over a milk bottle and bumped into a
package and got some stinking stuff on you. It won't wash off, so you don't want to come to work.
That'll be all right. No, I guess we won't dock your pay unless it gets to be a habit.”
Monk hung up. “Oh, for the life of Riley,” he said.
“What would you call the life of Riley?” asked Ham Brooks, the eminent Harvard lawyer and lover of
fine clothes.
“Don't start riding me this early,” Monk warned. “This ain't my day to be rode.”
“Having troubles?” Ham asked hopefully.
“Yes,” Monk said, “and you don't have to be so damned happy about it.”
“I hope they're big troubles,” said Ham.
“Well, they're not very,” Monk told him. “This just seems to be a tough morning on our news
condensers. Two of them woke up feeling sick. The girl of another one suddenly decided she wanted to
marry him, and no day would do but today. And Onie Morton just called up to say he wouldn't be
down.”
“That's four who won't be at work today.”
“Sure.”
“We only have four news condensers employed.”
“Sure.”
“With nobody at work, there won't be any condensed-news report today.”
“Your deduction,” said Monk, “seems elementary to me. Although doubtless it could be a strain on a
legal brain.”
“Oh, you realized the facts I just mentioned?” said Ham.
“Yes.”
“I seem to have underestimated your intelligence,” Ham apologized. “But not very much, probably.”
“I think I'll kill you about ten o'clock,” Monk said thoughtfully.
“If you condense that news report yourself,” Ham said, “you may not have time for any murders. You
going to do that? Condense the report yourself, I mean?”
“Naw, it ain't that important today,” Monk said.
Which was one of the biggest wrong statements of his life.
SO milk bottles, perfume, girls who decided to get married, and uncondensed news reports got no
attention until nine o'clock that night. The skinny man in the gray suit should also be included in the items
which did not get attention until nine that evening.
Nine o'clock was when Doc Savage showed up.
Doc Savage, a giant of a man with bronzed skin and flake-gold eyes, which were unusual characteristics,
had spent the day sitting on a war-strategy board in Washington. Doc was not happy, as a whole, with
his part in the war. Sitting on boards was all right; somebody had to do it.
It had been pointed out—firmly, too—to Doc, that he was doing more good to the country performing
the kind of work he had been performing for years. More good than he would be if he walked into
battles making a target of himself. He did not agree. But he had been having the same luck as the average
guy in disagreeing with generals.
He was not in a happy temper when he arrived at his office, but he was a man who did not show how he
felt. He dug around in the stuff on his desk.
“Where,” he asked gently, “is the condensed-news report?”
“Oh, there wasn't any today,” Monk Mayfair said. “It seemed to be an unlucky day for our condensers
because none of them got down to work. They'll be back tomorrow, all but the one who got married. I
told him he could have a few days off.”
Doc Savage said nothing for a moment. He leaned back in his chair. A small, trilling sound came into the
room, faintly audible, a tiny note that defied exact description. It had an exotic quality.
Monk sat up straight and looked startled. Because the sound was a small unconscious thing which Doc
Savage did in moments of mental excitement. The sound almost invariably meant something was wrong.
“Unlucky day,” Doc Savage remarked thoughtfully.
“Yes,” Monk said. “But there didn't seem to be anything unusual about what happened to our different
news condensers.”
Doc Savage said, “Quite a coincidence, all four of them failing to show up for work the same day.”
“Well, they all had good explanations. And they're honest men. We can trust them all.”
“During the past year,” Doc said, “only two of the news condensers have been absent for any reason
whatever.”
“That's right,” Monk admitted.
Monk was beginning to look alarmed.
“Suppose,” suggested Doc Savage, “you check with the news condensers and see if there could possibly
be anything amiss.”
“I sure will,” Monk said hastily.
Monk noticed that Ham Brooks was grinning at him. Monk scowled. It would hurt him if he had made a
mistake. Ham would rib him, probably.
Ham said, “You don't think you overlooked anything today, do you, Monk?”
“I won't answer that,” Monk snarled. “I ain't no lawyer—I can't talk without thinkin'.”
TWENTY minutes later Monk put down the telephone with an idiotic expression.
“Doc,” he said sickly.
“Yes?”
“Onie Morton, our news condenser, bumped into a man carrying a jug of perfume. The man was a
skinny guy in a gray suit.”
“Yes,” Doc said.
“The news condenser who got married,” Monk continued, “got married because his girl took a sudden
notion that today was the only day that'd do. The girl took that notion because a man paid her five
hundred dollars to do it. She wasn't to tell her boy friend about the five hundred, but she got ashamed
and did it. The guy who gave her the five hundred was a skinny guy in a gray suit.”
“Yes,” Doc said.
“The other two news condensers didn't show up,” Monk added, “because they got up this morning
feeling sick. They were sick at their stomachs. Both of them had dinner last night with—”
“A skinny guy in a gray suit,” Ham put in.
“You keep out of this, Ham,” Monk said. “Or my second mistake for the day may be to yank a leg off
you.”
Doc Savage stood up. His bronze face was without expression, and there was no noticeable disapproval
in his tone as he said, “Monk, get a very full description of the man in the gray suit, the thin man. Work
up a drawing of the fellow, then have the news condensers add any details they can remember. Have
several thousand copies of the drawing and description made and put in the hands of the police, taxi
drivers, railway ticket agents, conductors, train porters, and bus employees. Get them in the hands of
subway guards, toll men at the bridges, and filling-station employees. Don't miss the airports. Better offer
a reward for the man's apprehension, a reward substantial enough to get results. Say five hundred
dollars.”
Monk nodded.
“Gosh. Doc, I'm sorry,” he muttered.
Ham Brooks made no remarks to Monk. It was not the time for remarks.
Doc said, “Ham, get the rest of the men together. We have to go through the news report ourselves.
There is something in it today that we were not supposed to see. That is a logical conclusion because the
thin man in the gray suit went to a lot of trouble to see that we would not get a condensed-news report
today. We will see if we can find this item he was trying to keep from us.”
Ham said, “I'll have to do all that myself, Doc.”
“Why? Where are Renny, Long Tom and Johnny?”
“Johnny, the archaeologist and geologist, is giving an important demonstration at the museum tonight,”
Ham explained. “He can help us as soon as he's through. But Long Tom and Renny left for Europe by
plane this morning. Combination electrical and mechanical engineering job the British government had for
them.” Ham came over and went through the papers on Doc's desk, selected one. “Here's the
explanation they left for you.”
Doc examined the document which his two assistants, Long Tom Roberts and Renny Renwick, had left.
The paper explained that they would be in England several weeks, probably, as part of the war problem.
Not because he was suspicious of the note, but because he made a practice of trying never to overlook
any possibility, Doc got on the telephone. He called the British war mission. Yes, Renny and Long Tom
had been asked to go to England. Could Doc talk to them by telephone? Well, it was irregular, but it
could be arranged. However, the man at the Washington war mission, himself, had put them on the
transatlantic plane.
Doc was satisfied that the thin man in the gray suit had nothing to do with the absence of Renny and Long
Tom.
“Have to sift the news report ourselves,” he said.
“What about asking Pat to help?” Ham inquired.
Pat was Patricia Savage, a cousin to Doc, a young lady who was extremely attractive and extremely avid
for adventure.
“No Pat,” Doc said.
“You don't want Pat rung in on this?”
“May we be preserved from Pat,” Doc said fervently.
Chapter II. DEATH AND A CLEAR SKY
WILLIAM HARPER “JOHNNY” LITTLEJOHN joined them at midnight and helped with the
examination of the day's news report.
“A cabalistically obreptitious anagrammatism,” Johnny remarked calmly.
Johnny was a very long and incredibly thin man and nobody looked surprised at these words. Most of
Johnny's words were as lengthy grammatical specimens as he was a long human. He wore clothes which
fit him the way a circus tent would fit its center pole if all the other poles fell down. He carried a monocle;
once he had needed it, but Doc had operated on the bad eye and now the monocle was a magnifier.
Professors with long beards were amazed at his knowledge of archaeology and geology.
Monk Mayfair also joined the hunt. Monk had succeeded in getting a composite picture of the skinny
man in the gray suit who had caused the nonappearance of all the news condensers, and had distributed
them as Doc had directed.
It was Doc Savage, though, who found the item someone hadn't wanted them to see.
It was:
PLANE IS MANGLED
IN CANADIAN CRASH
Trapper Lake, Northwest Mackenzie, Canada—The wreckage of an airplane which had been strangely
mangled was found by an Indian trapper near here last night.
The nationality of the plane was not learned at once. But Henry Muskrat, the trapper who found it, stated
that it had the appearance of having been torn and crushed to fragments after it crashed. What caused the
damage is not known. There was some panic among superstitious Indians who claimed a supernatural
monster of the werewolf type had wrought the damage, but these reports are, of course, discounted.
A report that red-painted pieces of fabric covering were part of a Japanese rising-sun emblem on the
plane were also believed inaccurate. Authorities point out there would be no reason for a Japanese plane
flying over this section.
Monk Mayfair finished reading the item and said, “You think that is it, Doc?”
The bronze man was not too positive. “It is the only likely thing which has turned up.”
“How'll we check to make sure?”
“Telegraph,” Doc said, “to the Mounted Police official in charge at Trapper Lake. Ask for full details.”
Monk said, “Why not use the radio? We have powerful equipment and we could get direct or nearly
direct contact. The Mounted Police stations have radio up there—”
“Telegraph,” Doc said.
“Sure,” Monk said. “As you say. Only I thought—”
“And then use the radio, too,” Doc said. “But keep the two separate. On second thought, wait an hour
before you start using the radio.”
“Telegraph first, then use the radio?”
“Yes.”
“I don't get it,” Monk said, puzzled. “But I pulled one bonehead play, so I ain't asking no questions.”
THEY got an answer to their telegram in forty-five minutes, which was remarkably good service.
The reply said:
REPORTS OF MYSTERY SURROUNDING PLANE CRASH ARE GROSSLY EXAGGERATED.
PLANE BELONGED TO BUSH FLIER NAMED CURLY JONES, WHO JUMPED WITH
PARACHUTE AFTER OIL LINE BROKE. PILOT JONES LANDED SAFELY AND REACHED
TRAPPER LAKE THIS MORNING.
CORPORAL OSGOOD,
NORTHWEST MOUNTED POLICE.
Ham Brooks examined this and sighed. “Well, there doesn't seem to have been any skeleton in that
closet,” he remarked.
“Untesselated and unclinquant,” remarked Johnny.
“What?”
“I just said it was simple,” explained Johnny.
“Too bad you couldn't use simple words to say so,” complained Ham.
A buzzer sounded and a small light flashed, indicating they had a visitor. Monk arose and went to the
door. He came back looking sheepish.
“Well, the circus is in town,” he said.
Everybody knew what he meant.
“Pat,” Doc said.
Patricia Savage came in gayly and said, “This is nice. The welcome mat out as usual.”
She was a tall, well-made girl, exceedingly perfect of form, with the same bronze coloration of skin and
hair, and a touch of the same gold in her eyes as Doc Savage. She was a cousin, one of Doc's few living
blood kin, and for a livelihood she operated an ultra-swanky beauty establishment for the Park Avenue
clientele. She charged umpteen prices at the place.
Doc glanced at the clock. It was almost two in the morning.
“Up rather late, aren't you, Pat?” the bronze man asked idly. “Been to the opera, or something?”
“A prize fight is more her speed,” Monk muttered.
“You've got something there,” Pat told Monk. “However, you are both wrong. And you know very well
you're wrong.”
Doc Savage sighed.
Pat added, “What about the skinny man in the gray suit?”
“How did you find out about him?” Doc asked.
“Oh, I've got a friend on the police force,” Pat said. “He called me up and told me you had put out a
circular with a pencil drawing of a man on it, and his description, and an offer of five hundred dollars if he
could be located. I knew something was up.”
“So now you think you are going to join in the excitement?”
“I do. And how!”
“There is no excitement,” Doc said.
“I'll stick around.”
HAM BROOKS came into the room. He was excited. “I've been on the radio, in contact with the
Mounted Police post at Trapper Lake, the way you wanted,” he told Doc. “And I'm beginning to find
worms in the apples.”
He handed Doc Savage a message. It said:
PLANE MERELY HIT HILL AND CRASHED. NOTHING UNUSUAL ABOUT IT. BODY OF
PILOT WAS FOUND IN WRECKAGE. PLANE WAS OWNED BY MINING COMPANY.
NOTHING ABOUT CASE TO WARRANT YOUR INTEREST.
CORPORAL OSGOOD,
MOUNTED POLICE.
Monk said, “But the other message said a bush flier was the pilot and that he was alive.”
“That,” Ham agreed, “is what I meant by finding worms.”
Pat stared at them. “You mean one of the messages is a fake?”
Doc Savage answered her quietly.
“Both of them, no doubt,” he said.
“You mean somebody doesn't want us up there?” Pat asked. “Doesn't want us investigating that plane
crash?”
Doc nodded.
Pat said, “I'm in favor of investigating it then.” She looked very pleased. “If somebody is going to all this
trouble to keep us from fooling around with the thing I would say it might be interesting.”
“A dubitative arbitrament,” Johnny remarked.
“That's right,” Monk agreed.
“What's right?” Pat asked. “What'd he say?”
“I think he said we might be wrong,” Monk explained. “But he hopes we aren't.”
WHEN the telephone whistled, everyone jumped. It actually whistled, because it was the instrument
attached to a high-frequency buzzer, which meant it was the unlisted number called only by people who
were closely associated with them.
Monk picked up the instrument.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes. . . . Yes. . . . Yes. . . . O. K.”
He hung up.
“A very agreeable conversation, your end of it,” Ham said.
Monk was excited. “That was Onie Morton,” yelled the homely chemist. “What do you think! The skinny
guy in the gray suit is at Onie Morton's place now. Onie wants us to come up.” Monk grinned. “Onie has
got the guy tied hand and foot.”
There was a concerted rush for the hatrack, then for the door, Pat with them.
But Doc got in Pat's way and said, “Pat, this is once you do not mix in it. You stay here. You are not
going to have anything to do with this.”
Pat sniffed.
“Listen, we've been over that before,” she said. “Let's not have an argument—”
“Right, let's not have an argument,” Doc said.
The bronze man grasped Pat's arm. He hauled her across the room.
“Hey, what're you doing?” Pat cried, alarmed.
Doc Savage shoved Pat into the library. He fastened both doors, locking Pat in the place.
Through the closed and locked door, Doc said, “Think it over, young lady.”
The bronze man looked pleased with himself as he rode down in the private high-speed elevator and
climbed into a car in their private basement garage. Monk, Ham and Johnny did not look exactly
displeased, either.
Ham chuckled and said, “She's a lot of fun, but these things are too dangerous for a girl. True, she hasn't
been hurt in any of them yet, but she's been lucky as a cat.”
Monk grinned complacently. “Now, if we could get rid of that chimp, Chemistry,” he said. “We would
have some peace.”
Chemistry was Ham Brooks' pet chimpanzee. Monk detested the animal because of the startling physical
resemblance it bore, on a reduced scale, to himself, to Monk. In order to irritate Monk, Ham made a
habit of taking the animal along whenever possible.
The car was equipped with emergency red lights and a police siren. They used these sparingly and got
uptown at a good speed. In the Bronx, they drove directly to Onie Morton's modest apartment.
Onie Morton met them at the door. A strong odor still surrounded Onie.
“Where,” Monk asked, “is he?”
“Is who?”
“The long drink in the gray suit.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Onie said.
Monk blanched. “Didn't you just telephone me you had him prisoner?” he bellowed.
摘要：

THETIMETERRORADocSavageAdventurebyKennethRobesonThispagecopyright©2002BlackmaskOnline.http://www.blackmask.com?ChapterI.MYSTERYABOUTNONEWS?ChapterII.DEATHANDACLEARSKY?ChapterIII.NEWGADGET?ChapterIV.THEDEVILOFTRAPPERLAKE?ChapterV.THESTRONGGIRL?ChapterVI.MONKANDTHEDEVIL?ChapterVII.THEUNKNOWN?ChapterVI...

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