Kenneth Robeson - Doc Savage 128 - The Goblins

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THE GOBLINS
A Doc Savage Adventure by Kenneth Robeson
This page copyright © 2003 Blackmask Online.
http://www.blackmask.com
Scanned and Proofed
by Tom Stephens
? Chapter I. GOBLIN NUMBER ONE
? Chapter II. DEATH ISN'T FUNNY
? Chapter III. GOBLIN AGAIN
? Chapter IV. DEATH AGAIN
? Chapter V. THE BRONZE MAN
? Chapter VI. THE RABBIT FARM
? Chapter VII. IRRITATED
? Chapter VIII. THE DEVIL SAVED THEM
? Chapter IX. THE WIDE MAN
? Chapter X. OLD TOM BROCK
? Chapter XI. THE ECCENTRIC MAN
? Chapter XII. THE DEVILS DINNER
? Chapter XIII. HIGH ON A HILL
? Chapter XIV. THE SLIDE
? Chapter XV. THE GHOST
Chapter I. GOBLIN NUMBER ONE
YOUNG Parker O'Donnel awakened one morning in his small apartment and found a green man, about
a foot high and with a very big grin, in the living room.
Park had been up bowling the night before. He had bowled on the local team against the team from
Madcat, Idaho, a town about fifty miles distant. Park had gotten to bed late, slept like a log, and the
alarm clock had awakened him. He damned the alarm clock, and got up and stumbled into the living
room to hunt for his socks, which were always getting misplaced.
In fact, Park was so drowsy that he didn't at once realize that he'd seen a little green man about a foot
high with a big grin.
He stumbled into the bathroom, then it dawned on him.
Park jumped about a foot straight up, and gasped, “What the blazes!”
He dashed back into the living room to look, and it was still there. It certainly was. Park's eyes
protruded.
The little man was standing perfectly still in a corner. He was a rather plump fellow, and if not a foot tall,
surely his height was no more than fourteen inches.
His green was the green of rich grass, and he was green all over, except for a breechcloth which was the
color of some kind of skin. The little man came near being disgracefully naked.
“Hey!” Park said. “Who the dickens are you?”
There was no answer.
Park's next impulse was to snort at himself, for now he didn't believe that it was a man at all. The thing
must be some kind of statue.
Maybe a gag. Maybe some of his friends were pulling a little trick on him. He had some friends who went
in for gags.
Park walked toward the little man, then Park jumped a foot in the air again, and stopped. His mouth hung
open in amazement. For the little man had moved.
Unquestionably, the little man had skittered a foot or so across the floor.
Park took a close look. It was early in the morning, and not fully daylight, but there was enough light that
Park could tell he didn't care for the little man's expression. It was still a grin. The same grin, in fact. But it
was a sinister, devilish, distorted kind of grin.
Bothered by the conviction that his own hair was standing on end, Park backed away.
“I'll just get the broom,” he announced, “and push you around and see what you are.”
He retreated toward the kitchen. The last he saw of the small man, the latter was standing exactly where
he had been, but his eyes seemed to have followed Park. At any rate, they were still looking at Park,
apparently.
Park found the broom. He had a little trouble locating it. The broom, like his socks, was an article he
frequently misplaced.
“Now,” Park announced, brandishing the broom, “you grin at me again like that, and I'll swat you one.”
He went back into the living room, but now the small green man with the grin was gone.
YOUNG PARKER O'DONNEL gave his apartment a quick going over. He searched the place as if
there was a five-dollar bill lost somewhere about. He found a fountain pen, a book, necktie and other
articles he had misplaced weeks ago. But no grinning little green fellow.
Park sat down and considered the matter. “The little man who wasn't there,” he said foolishly.
Parker O'Donnel, aged twenty-four—no, he was twenty-five, for today was his birthday—was a lean,
brown young man. His height was almost six feet, and he had run the high school mile in five minutes and
five seconds. He could ride a bronc, bulldog a steer, and give a girl quite a line of talk.
He was manager-operator of the telegraph office in Sandersonville, which had a population a little over
two thousand. Towns did not come large in this part of Idaho.
His parents were dead. He did not remember his mother at all, and his father was dim in his recollection.
His father, Sandy O'Donnel, had been a roaming, eccentric man who was lawyer, cowboy, prospector,
adventurer, and about whatever other profession had come handy, as far as Park knew.
Park had learned to telegraph, and he had been operator-manager here in Sandersonville for about a
year.
He had joined the U. S. air force nearly eight months ago. He had not been called. He was very
aggravated about this. It seemed the air force was short on training facilities, and had not yet gotten
around to him. Or at least that was the explanation he kept getting.
Now, sitting in the living room of the small apartment which he occupied alone, Park went over these
points about his past. He was also healthy, agile, unmarried and not in love, although open to possibilities
in the latter.
“This,” he remarked to himself, “is the first indication that I might be crazy, too. A fine present for a man's
twenty-fifth birthday.”
He knew darned well there wasn't anything wrong with his mind.
Still, there had been a little man. Then there hadn't.
Park made coffee, fried an egg and baked a waffle. He could put together a mean waffle. He considered
himself not a bad cook.
Still without finding a trace of the little green man with the grin, and still puzzled, Park went down to the
office to go to work.
HE was late. The relay operator was calling him on the wire, and giving him hell. “We're stacked up with
99 stuff for you,” said the relay man. Telegraphers traditionally called urgent or important messages “99”
messages. Park sighed, put carbons in a bunch of blanks, and gave the relay man the GA signal.
Park was all set to copy a mess of stuff for the new defense plant south of town, the new factory that had
sprung up overnight. Because of the plant, Park's telegraph job had been ruled an essential one, and he
could have stayed out of the army on the strength of that. But he hadn't. He'd joined the air force.
But this stuff wasn't for the defense plant. Not the rush messages, anyway.
The “99” telegrams were all for someone named Clark Savage, Jr. They were from various dignitaries in
the war department, high officials. They were somewhat indignant and firm in tone.
Park gathered that this individual, Clark Savage, Jr., had been insisting that the war department assign
him to duty in the army where he would see some shooting action. The brass hats were refusing. From
the tone of the messages, Park decided that Clark Savage, Jr., had sent some pretty blistering telegrams
to the war department. The brass hats were still insisting that he continue the same work he was doing,
and they'd had their feelings hurt.
Park couldn't help grinning as he copied the wires from Washington. He sympathized thoroughly with this
Clark Savage, Jr., whoever he was. Park felt that he had a bond in common with Clark Savage, Jr. Like
Savage, he was trying to get into the war, and not having much luck.
Park gathered that Clark Savage, Jr., had told the war department about the same things that he, Park,
would like to tell them. Where did they get off, telling a guy he couldn't get into a place where he could
shoot Japs and Germans!
The text of the messages told Park that Clark Savage, Jr., was in Sandersonville with some assistants,
giving some technical advice to the new defense plant.
He rather liked this Clark Savage, Jr., without even knowing who the man was.
Park sent the messages off by taxicab. Park's delivery boy had quit to get a defense job, and it was either
deliver the messages by cab, or deliver them himself. When he could find a cab, it was O. K. But most of
the time there was no taxicab.
The day progressed, and was not much different from other days, until late that afternoon.
During the day, of course, Park did some thinking about the little man he had seen. Or thought he had
seen. The thing was so ridiculous that he did not know what to think.
Park's general inclination was to decide that the thing actually had been a joke, a gag, pulled by some of
his friends. He couldn't see the point of the gag. Maybe someone knew it was his birthday, and the gag
had some connection with that. He didn't know what it could be, though. Park concluded to keep his
mouth shut about the whole thing. If it was a gag, he wasn't going to bite on it.
A little before five, the girl came in.
WHEN the girl first came in, Park was busy on the wire again—more messages from the brass hats to
Clark Savage, Jr.—and he didn't really notice her. He did vaguely note that she was a small girl who
came through the door. Small girls weren't particularly his dish.
The brass hats in the war department were more indignant than they'd been that morning. Park gathered
that this Clark Savage, Jr., must have been on the long-distance telephone during the day, and given them
a further blistering. They were certainly hot under the collar, the brass hats. However, they were
unusually apologetic, for brass hats, to this Clark Savage, Jr. Park gathered that Clark Savage, Jr., was
somebody important. The fact that he was important depressed Park, because if somebody with some
pull couldn't get into action in the war, how was an unknown brass pounder like Parker O'Donnel going
to do any good?
“Hello,” the girl said.
“Write out your message on a blank,” said Park. “Be with you in a few minutes.” The relay operator was
pouring it on Park, and he didn't have time to fool around with the counter service.
The girl waited patiently until Park had cleared the wire.
“Hello,” she said.
Park looked up. His impulse was to fall over backward. Because this wasn't just a girl. She was very
extra. She was special. She was small, but she had no other drawbacks that Park could see.
“Wow!”
Park said, and took his pencil out of his mouth so he wouldn't swallow it. “Excuse me,” he said. “What
can I do for you?”
“Mr. Parker O'Donnel?” she asked.
“Yep,” said Park. She had blue eyes and blond hair and the kind of skin you didn't think really existed.
The young woman handed him a card.
“Miss Martha Colby, Attorney at Law,” said the young woman, repeating what the card said.
She was also, according to what the card said, from Boise, Idaho.
“I am,” said Park sincerely, “pleased to meet you. In fact, I know I am going to consider it one of the
high points in my life, like the time I had the mumps and the time a bronc stepped on me.”
If the young woman appreciated the compliment, she did not show it. She seemed to be too serious for
such a pretty girl.
“You are Mr. Parker O'Donnel?” she asked.
“Yes, I agreed to that once already,” Park said.
“And this,” said Attorney Martha Colby, “is your birthday.”
“It is.”
“Your twenty-fifth birthday?”
“Right again.”
“And your father was named, or called, Sandy O'Donnel?” asked the girl lawyer.
“That information is correct.”
The young woman sighed. She examined Park with what seemed to be some considerable doubt and
perhaps some apprehension.
“I am your new legal guardian,” she said.
“THAT'S fine,” Park said fatuously. Then he blinked. “Wait a minute, gorgeous. What do you mean,
guardian?”
“Guardian,” said the girl. “The legal term guardian. You know what it means as well as I do.”
Park felt distinctly foolish.
“You mean,” he said, “you look after me?”
“Yes.”
“But I'm over twenty-one! I'm not crazy! What the hell—I beg your pardon—do I want with a
guardian?” The young woman attorney apparently had expected some such objection. She was all ready
with her brief case, which she opened.
She said, “It is in your father's will. I presume you have not read the will?”
“I didn't know dad left a will,” said Parker O'Donnel. “It's news to me.”
“The will,” said Attorney Martha Colby, “states that I am to be appointed your guardian.”
“Holy cats!” said Park.
The young woman removed a document from her brief case, a document which showed signs of age.
She indicated this legal article.
“It is,” she said, “right here in the will. You may read it.”
“Gosh!” said Park. “Does the will say what I am to do with you, now that I've got you?”
“As guardian,” said Attorney Martha Colby, “it is I who will tell you what to do. Not the reverse.”
Park became somewhat indignant. “Oh, it does, does it! I may have something to say about that!”
Attorney Martha Colby frowned severely. “The first thing I am to do with you,” she said, “is to take you
to visit a man named Tom Brock.”
“Tom Brock,” said Park, “was dad's old partner. I don't know him, but I've heard he was the only man
who was a bigger screwball than my good old dad was.”
“I am to take you to Tom Brock,” said the young woman lawyer. “And he's to give you a good talking
to.”
“Oh my goodness!” said Park. “I never heard of such a foolish thing!”
Chapter II. DEATH ISN'T FUNNY
THE relay officer operator was on the wire with more “99” messages. They were overworked at the
relay office, and the relay man called so angrily that his dots and dashes threatened to shake the tobacco
can out of the sounder box.
Park opened the key and said, “Min, you lid,” over the wire. Min meant minute, or wait a minute. And
the word lid was a telegrapher's bit of slanguage implying the other fellow was a species of goof who had
no head on his shoulders.
The relay man sent six or seven explosive words. He was evidently the chief operator sitting in on the
wire.
Park's ears got red.
“I've got to copy this stuff,” he said, “or be in the market for another job.”
“Go right ahead,” said the pretty lawyer.
“Stick around, wonderful,” Park requested. “I want to hear more of this strange stuff you've been telling
me.”
The messages were still more stuff for Clark Savage, Jr., from the war department. More people were
respectfully and tactfully, but absolutely, denying Clark Savage, Jr., the privilege of getting into a plane
and personally chasing the enemy.
Park was a good operator who could copy, mark off messages, get blanks ready, and also think about
subjects not related to telegraphy, all while he was copying a message.
When he had the wire cleared, he sent an O. K., then closed the key and asked, “Does the will say
anything about the little green man?”
“What?” asked Attorney Martha Colby blankly.
“Man. Small. Green. Kind of a gremlin.”
Attorney Colby blinked at Park. “Maybe you do need a guardian.”
“That,” said Park, “is a snide crack.”
“What do you mean, green man?” asked the young woman. “What's a gremlin?”
“You should read a newspaper or a magazine sometime,” said Park. “A gremlin is a little he-witch, kind
of an imp. They walk around on airplanes when they are in the air, and they make the cylinders miss, or
the compass go haywire, or things like that.”
Attorney Colby became frosty. “Are you implying I am a gremlin? Well, that's just fine!”
“Hold on there, wonderful!” said Park hastily. “I didn't imply anything of the kind, and you know it.”
“Then what were you talking about?”
“Never mind, skip it,” said Park. “I'm sorry I mentioned it. And you aren't a gremlin, I hope not.”
Park glanced at the clock. The office was supposed to close at five, and it was five now. This was one
afternoon, Park resolved, when the place was going to close on time.
He put the by-pass plug in the wire box so he wouldn't hear the sounder if they called him again. He got
his hat.
“This guardian talk of yours interests me unusually,” he informed the young woman. “How about us
taking ourselves hither to the nearest drugstore soda fountain, and you talk to me while we slug ourselves
with a couple of malteds. Or does your taste run to something stronger?”
“Malteds make you fat,” she informed him. “I'll take a limeade. But it is a good idea.”
Park put the telegrams he had just copied in his coat pocket. There was quite a sheaf of them, and they
were all for Clark Savage, Jr.
He locked up the office.
Out on the sidewalk, he looked in vain for a taxicab. There wasn't a cab. Park glanced at his watch, saw
it was now after five, and knew there wouldn't be a cab. The taxi was always out at the defense plant at
this time of day, doubling as a bus and hauling defense workers.
“Oh, shucks!” Park said. “I'll have to deliver these telegrams myself. But I'll do that later. They just tell
the guy the same thing he's been getting all day, so he won't mind.”
“Which direction is the drugstore?” asked Attorney Martha Colby.
“This way,” said Park.
They did not get to the drugstore, however.
WHERE they got to was somewhere entirely different, and it was not their choice. It was very
troublesome, in fact.
The difficulties began when Parker O'Donnel climbed into the truck. It seemed to him at the moment that
he was doing a most natural thing when he clambered into the truck.
The truck was a big yellow moving van, and it was parked at the sidewalk not far up the street from the
telegraph office. Or rather, it was down the street, and it pulled to the sidewalk and halted, and a man
sprang out. He was a lengthy and rather seedy individual.
“Hey!” he called. “Hey, are you Park O'Donnel?”
“Sure,” Park said. “Why?”
The man jerked a thumb in the direction of the inside of the truck body. “He keeps calling for you,” he
said.
“Keeps calling for me!” Park said, puzzled. “What are you talking about, a little green man?”
The other looked dumbfounded, and said, “Your pal. Harry, your pal, I guess he is. He keeps calling for
you.”
Park had a pal named Harry. Harry Waters, who was on the same bowling team.
“What's the matter with Harry? Calling for me, you say!” Park blurted. “Is he hurt? Great grief, is Harry
hurt?”
The long, seedy man registered sadness. “I'm afraid he is.” He pointed at the van. “He's in there, lying on
some canvas.”
So Park scrambled into the truck body, which was as gloomy as a cave. He was doing a perfectly
natural thing. If Harry Waters was hurt, Park wanted to help him.
The man on the canvas in the truck was about Harry Waters' size, but his face was indistinguishable
underneath a crisscross of bandages.
“Park!” the man said. His voice, hoarse, didn't sound like Harry's. But that, Park thought at the moment,
could be because he was hurt. “Park,” the man said. “Get the girl in here.”
“Girl?” Park exclaimed. “What girl?”
“The girl lawyer.”
Park was worried, and he turned quickly and called, “Attorney Colby, this fellow wants to talk to you.”
“To me!” said Martha Colby. “Why me? Who is he?”
“Harry Waters is his name.”
“I don't know any Harry Waters,” said the young woman.
“Doggone it, will it ruffle your dignity too much to climb in here and talk to a man who may be dying?”
demanded Park indignantly.
Martha Colby hesitated. Then she climbed into the truck. The long man helped her.
Then the long man slammed the truck doors, and bolted them, locking Park and Martha in the truck
body.
Simultaneously, the man Park had thought was his friend, Harry, sat up and showed them the business
end of a large revolver.
“One bleat,” he said, “and I'll blow you two to pieces.”
He was obviously not Harry Waters.
THE truck started moving. It got going with a yank, which made Parker O'Donnel stumble wildly and
caused Attorney Martha Colby to sit down with a dignity unbecoming a member of the bar.
“I'll blow you to pieces,” repeated the man who had been bandaged. “People will just think the truck is
backfiring.”
Park stared at the big revolver.
“Then you would have a couple of bodies on your hands,” he told the man in a shaky voice. “It might be
inconvenient. So keep your shirt on.”
The man with the gun snorted. He stepped back. There were some piles of canvas in the forward end of
the truck. Now that the vehicle was moving, these canvas piles underwent upheavals and became more
men with guns. Four of them. They were unsavory-looking fellows.
“Somebody,” said Park, eyeing them, “must have made a raid on the State pen.”
The remark did not make Park popular.
“Shall I shoot them now, Jerry?” asked the bandaged man.
“Naw, the blood might leak out of the back, and somebody might notice it,” said Jerry.
Park grinned at them foolishly. For a moment, he thought it was another gag. The talk was too
bloodthirsty to sound real.
But after Park examined the men intently for a few moments, his hair began to have an absurd sensation
of wishing to stand on end. The talk was real, and they meant it.
Park was just beginning to get thoroughly scared when Attorney Martha Colby kicked him on the shin.
“You big clown!” she said.
Park jumped, barked in pain, grabbed his shin. It was a wonder the involuntary behavior didn't get him
shot.
“Ouch! What's the idea?” he blurted.
“I am not in the mood for practical jokes!” Attorney Colby informed him. “I came here on serious
business.”
“This,” said Park, “is no joke.”
Attorney Colby stamped a foot. “I know better. I knew you were an irresponsible specimen the minute I
saw you. No wonder your father willed you a guardian.”
“Oh, my, oh, my!” said Park. “It's real, I tell you.”
“Don't be silly.”
Two of the men with guns laughed loudly. One of them said, “Hey, the dame doesn't know which end is
up, does she?”
Attorney Martha Colby stared at the speaker. It dawned on her that the thing was no prank, no practical
joke. The guns were real, and the unpleasant intentions of the men were real.
Martha became quite pale.
THE men, five of them altogether—the long one must be up front driving the truck—and all with guns,
now went about the business of searching Park, and looking at Martha appreciatively and remarking that
probably she did not have any lethal weapons hidden under her frock. Martha's frock fitted her rather
flatteringly. The young woman became red with indignation.
From Park they took fifteen dollars and eighty cents, what was left of last week's check, and they
sneered at the sum as if a fellow who had no more than that in his pockets didn't rate very high.
“At least,” said Park, “I don't earn it in a way that gets you in jail.”
He was sworn at. He was threatened with death on the spot.
Apparently, Park realized with horror, they really meant the death threats. There was no undertone of
kidding, nothing in their ugly voices that held out hope. They were a group of assassins, and they were
keyed up to do murder, and they didn't seem to mind where they did it.
They took the telegrams out of Park's pockets and, naturally, read them.
The effect the telegrams had on the men was astonishing. The first man to read them turned as white as
his face, which was dirty, could possibly have turned.
“Doc Savage!” he croaked. “Look! These messages! For Doc Savage!”
The others stared at him. “Savage is in town?” one asked.
“Sure.”
“Is he mixed up in this—”
Another man, less stricken by uneasiness, stalked over and snatched the telegrams and read them. “Oh,
hell!” he said. “Savage is in town. But these are just telegrams that this guy, as telegraph operator, has
copied for him. They're just messages from Washington telling Doc Savage that he is too valuable doing
the work he always has done, and that his application for active service with the army is denied.”
Parker O'Donnel was startled himself. He had heard of Doc Savage. He hadn't connected the name of
Clark Savage, Jr., with that of Doc Savage. But Doc Savage he had heard about.
Doc Savage was supposed to be an unusual man, a fellow who followed the strange profession of taking
a hand in other people's troubles. Doc Savage was reported to be a remarkable man, in that he was a
combination of physical ability and mental genius that was a little superman. Park had read this in some
magazine article about Savage. The Man of Bronze, Doc Savage was called.
Doc Savage had five associates, a group which worked with him, the aids being skilled in various
摘要：

THEGOBLINSADocSavageAdventurebyKennethRobesonThispagecopyright©2003BlackmaskOnline.http://www.blackmask.comScannedandProofedbyTomStephens?ChapterI.GOBLINNUMBERONE?ChapterII.DEATHISN'TFUNNY?ChapterIII.GOBLINAGAIN?ChapterIV.DEATHAGAIN?ChapterV.THEBRONZEMAN?ChapterVI.THERABBITFARM?ChapterVII.IRRITATED?...

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