Doc Savage: Phantom Lagoon (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage) (2 page)

Whenever a passing male caught her eye, she abruptly lifted the magazine by way of discouragement. They invariably moved on.

Passing women brought a different reaction. Henrietta attempted to catch their eye. Contrarily, they hurried along.

“My reputation must have preceded me,” she muttered to herself.

Finally, a woman possessing more nerve—or perhaps a larger than usual curiosity bump—than the others came and claimed an empty lounge chair across the promenade deck.

Henrietta lowered her magazine and asked, “Where is this ark bound, anyway?”

“Manhattan. Did no one tell you?”

“Forgot to ask.” And Henrietta buried her head in the magazine as a pointed inducement to be left to her sulking.

At one point, she began muttering under her breath, “I gotta pay them mugs back—but how?”

The nearby woman looked interested. “Eh?”

“Nothing.”

Henrietta had not been reading very far when she came upon an article that was entitled:

“MODERN GALAHAD SLAYS DRAGONS OF TODAY WITH BRAIN AND BRAWN”

Sunburned brows puckering, Henrietta narrowed her eyes and read along.

Abruptly, she threw the magazine up in the air and yelled, “Yippee! I’ve got it! Clark Savage is the man who can help me!”

“Got what?” asked the other woman.

“Nothing. Never mind.”

“Did I just hear you mention Doc Savage?”

“Who is Doc Savage?” asked Henrietta with what appeared to be genuine puzzlement.

“You don’t look old enough to have been stuck on that island quite that long, dearie.”

“Same to you, I’m sure,” Henrietta said huffily. “So who is he?”

“Merely the marvel man of the century,” Henrietta was told.

“A big shot, eh?”

“That is a vulgar way of putting it,” the other returned with more than a trace of frost.

Taking the magazine, Henrietta got up and went in search of an officer. By sheer luck, she happened to cross the path of the First Mate who had rescued her.

“Are Clark Savage, Jr., and Doc Savage one and the same person?” she asked without either salutation or preamble.

“Yes,” admitted the First Mate. “I believe so.”

“Where can he be contacted?” asked Henrietta.

The First Mate laughed. “Don’t tell me you’ve got trouble for Doc Savage to crack! Savage makes a business of other people’s troubles, you know.”

“Where can he be contacted?” Henrietta repeated stiffly.

The First Mate lost his laugh as if he dropped it and the article had shattered underfoot.

“We dock in New York in a few hours. You can look him up when we put in. Doc Savage operates out of that city.”

“Point me to the radio room,” ordered the blonde bombshell.

The First Mate offered to show her the way, but Henrietta put him off with a curt, “I can navigate without assistance, thank you.”

The First Mate gave succinct instructions to the radio room, and went off to nurse his wounded male pride.

HENRIETTA marched into the radio room, snatched up a blank and began writing.

“Send this and make it snappy,” she said, slapping the yellow flimsy onto the countertop. “Collect.”

The radio operator glanced at the message and saw the name of Doc Savage. He whistled in surprise.

“That Savage is quite a guy from what I hear,” said the radio operator expansively. He had a fresh, innocent face and Henrietta decided she could motivate him faster with hand-wringing than scorn.

“Can you send the message right away?” Henrietta asked anxiously.

“No reason why not,” said the operator. “Funny thing. This Doc Savage is a man known all over the world as the guy to go to if you’ve got big trouble. When I was in Africa on my last ship, I heard talk of Doc Savage. Believe it or not, the guy is as well known there as he is over here. He’s sure got a reputation. Know him personally?”

“Only by repute,” said Henrietta.

“I saw Doc Savage’s picture once,” the operator volunteered. “He is a giant of a man, his skin bronzed by the sun.”

“You don’t say.”

“It was in an electrical engineering trade journal. Doc had discovered something new about the nature of atomic forces.”

“This fellow suffers no flies to alight on his collar, now does he?” Henrietta said dryly.

“Doc Savage,” the radio operator said with grave sincerity, “will probably be remembered two or three thousand years from today.”

“You,” she shot back, “just remember to send my radiogram!”

With that, the brassy blonde flounced out of the radio shack.

Chapter II

LANDFALL

THE ADVENT OF of the pleasure liner Amberjack was the occasion of great excitement along New York City’s steamship docks. Long before Gotham tugs nudged their blunt tire-fendered snouts alongside the gleaming ivory gem of the Atlantic, reporters began showing up in anticipation of her arrival.

The reason was evident in the bulldog editions the reporters and camera boys clutched, still warm from the heat of the presses.

Proclaimed one:

MAROONED BLONDE DUE IN GOTHAM

Wondered a second sheet:

WHO IS MYSTERY CASTAWAY?

Screamed another:

CASTAWAY GAL REFUSES TO TALK!

The assembled representatives of the press were in hopes of changing that last headline. They jostled rubbernecking Manhattanites who jumped up on tiptoe with each blast from the nearing tugs.

It was a pleasant Autumn day in November. Not as pleasant as the Caribbean had been on the previous night, but for New York, it was as splendid as the city got.

The crowd grew, swelled as, at about the point the sheer numbers of the assembled threatened to push those on the outer edges of the South Street Seaport wharves into the dingy waters of the East River, the liner hove into view.

That was the cue for the police—who were out in force—to take up their nightsticks and begin to push the crowds back so the dock workers could prepare to receive the giant ship.

She was speedily made fast, the
Amberjack’s
horn gave a final blast of relief and the gangplank was set in place.

The Captain himself escorted the blonde girl—who was still clad in her rather loud and revealing sport ensemble—to the top of the gangway and unhooked the chain so that she could disembark.

“There she is!” shouted one reporter.

“That’s the gal they found on the island!” barked another.

Instantly, flash bulbs popped, were ejected and new bulbs inserted to be ignited and discarded as fast as the cameras could be worked. Newsreel cameras ground busily.

“That’s her!” the crowd began shouting.

“Boy,” said one scribe. “I wouldn’t mind being marooned with something like
that!”

“Hey, sis!” shouted a photographer. “I’m from the
Daily Comet.
How about a li’l picture?”

The blistered blonde covered up her face to prevent her picture being taken and started down the gangplank.

“We want an interview!” yelled a reporter.

“How about a statement for the press?”

The girl did not pause when she reached the foot of the gangplank. She was hard-boiled and in a hurry.

“Scram!” she snapped. “All you newspaper mugs!”

“Come on, lady—say something. This is the press.”

“Go peddle your papers!” Henrietta flung back.

The excited newshawks jostled closer. There was not much choice involved in the matter. The surrounding crowds, eager to catch a glimpse of the mysterious castaway, were pressing in. A catastrophe impended.

No doubt a tragedy would have taken place had not the police intervened. Whistles shrilled. A wall of blue, festooned with brass buttons, surrounded the girl. When it surged, she moved with the push.

Thus was the blonde girl escorted to the first in a line of waiting taxis idling nearby.

“Thanks,” she bit out as a copper opened the passenger door for her convenience.

“Think nothing of it,” the cop replied, touching his cap politely. “What did you say your name was, miss?”

“I didn’t,” sniffed the blonde, slamming the door.

To the taxi driver, she said, “Take me to Doc Savage’s hangout. And make it snappy.”

This was overheard by the officers of the law. When the cab departed in haste, they declined to follow, as was their plan. If the mystery blonde had business with Doc Savage, it was no business of theirs. For Doc Savage held an honorary commission with the Manhattan police, and they were under strict orders to defer to the bronze man in matters such as this.

As they trudged back to the crowd with the firm intent of breaking it up, one officer was heard to mutter, “What I wouldn’t give to be Doc Savage for just one day. Imagine! Having a fetching thing like that come all the way from the Caribbean to ask for my help.”

“She might have been fetching, but she had herself a sharp enough tongue,” another bluecoat observed candidly.

A MAN who had been crouching inside a waterfront warehouse door, waited for the cab to get out of sight. He was a tall, thin-faced individual wearing an expensive tan hat with a snap brim, tan shoes and kid gloves of excellent quality. The rest of him was obscured in a rust-colored overcoat. His face was also obscured—by a handkerchief. The handkerchief—he was holding it to his face—was a big loose thing of pearl-gray silk, and it prevented much being discerned about his features.

The well-dressed man spun suddenly and ran back into the warehouse, to a dark corner where another man lurked at a knot hole that overlooked the pier at which the
Amberjack
lay docked.

“It was that she-hornet!” he barked.

The man at the knot hole spun. His face was a dim shape in the poor light. He remained in the shadows, as would one accustomed to doing so by force of habit. All that could be discerned of him was his shirt. It was a rich chocolate brown. “You sure of that, Pippel?”

“Positive.”

“What the hell is she doin’ here?”

“Must’ve got rescued,” growled Pippel, letting the handkerchief fall from his face.

“But why would she come to New York?”

Pippel said, “Only one answer to that. She’s wise! The question is: what are we gonna do about it?”

“Only one answer to that, too,” said the one at the knot hole grimly.

“You’re probably right. You stay here. I’m gonna follow the girl.”

Pippel ran on to a side door of the warehouse, slipped outdoors, and piled into a small green sedan. The car pitched over ruts and took the turn into the street on two wheels.

There is quite a fleet of taxi cabs prowling the island of Manhattan, each with its own distinctive livery. The cab hired by the blonde castaway happened to be one of the more rare types. It sported a ghastly two-toned blue paint job, and this was easily found and overhauled.

“Let’s see where she goes,” the man called Pippel muttered under his breath.

IN the two-toned taxi, the blonde, peering out the back window warily, said, “Step on it, driver!”

“Lady,” said the driver, “they got a speed limit in this town!”

Then came a stream of sulfurous words from the otherwise delectable lips of the blonde so blistering that the driver bore down on the gas pedal as if in hope of outrunning them.

The taxi made good time. The driver barely had opportunity to peer into his mirror to examine his unusual passenger. A stoplight afforded him his first opportunity.

The girl had her head turned completely around and her sun-blistered nose all but pressed against the rear window.

“See that green sedan?” she said suddenly.

“Yeah.”

“He’s tailing me.”

“Must be press. Them guys stick like glue.”

“Lose him.”

“What about Doc Savage?”

“What I have to tell Doc Savage is between him and me,” snapped the blonde. “And I don’t need any nosy reporter butting in. Get me?”

The driver did. When the light changed, he began cutting in and out of traffic and got to work on losing the green sedan.

Finally, by detouring to Brooklyn, he did.

“How’s that for service?” the driver beamed into the rear-vision mirror.

“If you’re expecting a big tip, don’t,” the blonde said tartly.

The taxi driver’s long face fell. “Why not?” he demanded, rather bluntly.

“I just came off a desert isle, buster. I ain’t even got a seashell in my pocket.”

“Does that mean you can’t pay the fare?” the jehu asked unhappily.

“I am,” the blonde retorted, “down to my last clam.”

This admission did not sit well with the cab driver. He promptly pulled over, got out and flung open the rear door. He cocked an angry thumb over his uniform shoulder.

“Out,” he snapped.

The blonde folded her sunburned arms.

“Make me,” she said in a defiant voice.

“Believe me, blondie, I will,” the cabby averred. “And I have just enough experience with fare beaters like you to make it stick.”

“If you knew who I was,” the blonde said, “you wouldn’t talk to me that way.”

The cabby was insistent. “I don’t care if you’re Amelia Earhart come back from the Great Unknown. Out!”

The blonde made stubborn faces. The cabby stood his ground.

Finally, the grim girl stepped out of the cab, seized the taximan by the point of his nose and gave it a painful twist.

It wasn’t exactly judo, but it had the same effect. The cabby let out a pained howl and found himself staring at assorted stars and colored comets. He went down.

Came the
clunk
of a car door shutting, followed by another.

When the cabby regained normal vision, he was watching his hack depart the vicinity.

The green sedan pulled up not long afterward. A man leaned out of the driver’s window and asked, “You look like a guy who’s been gotten the best of by a blonde.”

“You can say that again, brother. First she tries to beat me out of the fare. Then she steals my hack.”

“Where was she headed?”

“Back to the city. If you’re after her, how about a ride?”

The man in the green sedan might have heard the request. On the other hand, he might not have. In any case, he took off in the general direction of the Brooklyn Bridge.