"020 (B026) - Death in Silver (1934-10) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

Doc Savage was silent a moment, as if engaged in thought, then a weird, a most unusual sound came from the telephone receiver. It was a sound defying description. It was a most unmusical trilling, a whistle and yet not a whistle. Possessing a throaty, exotic quality, it ran up and down the musical scale, but without adhering to a definite time.



It might have been a wind whistling with ghostly quality through a ship's rigging, or it might have been the song of some strange jungle bird.



Monk stiffened as be heard the sound; he had heard the eerie note many times before. It was the sound of Doc Savage the small unconscious thing which the bronze man did in moments of mental excitement. It usually came before some startling development; often it marked Doc's discovery of some obscure fact which was later to possess great significance.



"Monk," Doc said, "have you noticed anything queer about the robberies these so-called Silver Death's-Heads have been committing?"



Monk began, "Well, their silver disguises - "



"Not that," Doc told him. "There is one strange point about the robberies themselves. Have you noticed?"



"No," said Monk. "What is it?"



"A number of men have been killed in the course of the thefts," Doc stated.



"Sure. But men are often killed during robberies."



"In each case, these men were prominent," Doc explained patiently. "And on one or two occasions, the thefts during which they were shot down were of a trivial nature. I can give you one very good example."



"Let's have it," Monk requested.



"Two weeks ago a gang of the Silver Death's-Heads, seven of them to be exact, held up a small filling station on Long Island," Doc announced. "The filling station was very small and never had more than a few dollars on hand. But a limousine had just driven into the station to fill up with gas. It was occupied by a wealthy man named Kirkland Le Page. He was shot and killed. The filling station attendant was lying on the floor of his station at the time and did not see what provoked the shooting. Le Page was driving his car himself."