"046 (B052) - The Vanisher (1936-12) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

"The humpback does things that look queer," said McGinnis. "The whole business may not be on the up and up."
His listeners held their silence.
McGinnis sighed shakily.
"Thanks for turning me loose," he said. "And if I decide the humpback isn't on the up and up, you'll hear from me."
He went out.
MONK bounded for the door, howling, "You ain't gonna let that lug walk out?"
"Let him go!" Doc said sharply.
Monk squeaked, in a clumsy effort at furtiveness, "I'll follow him. See where he goes."
"No," Doc said. "Desirable as that is, we do not want to cause the man's death."
McGinnis, reappearing unexpectedly in the door, outside which he must have waited and eavesdropped, smiled crookedly at them.
"Thanks," he said. "I wanted to be sure you meant it."
He went away again.
Monk made gurgling noises. "But what're we gonna do now?"
"We will investigate Sigmund Hoppel," Doc said, "and some one named Max Landerstett."
Sandy Yell gave him a tight-lipped face when he glanced at her. But back in her eyes was a wonder, and the beginnings of an infinite admiration for the giant man of bronze.
"I guess—the reason you gave for turning McGinnis loose—was sincere," she said at last, hesitantly.
Chapter 9. TANGLE
SIGMUND HOPPEL was not in the telephone directories of New York City.
"Washington, D. C., was mentioned in McGinnis's delirium," Doc said.
They found the name in a telephone directory of Washington, D. C., and environs.
They took Doc Savage's big speed plane to Washington, making time that would have surprised persons accustomed only to the rather good clip of the commercial air lines. Doc's speed plane was tri-motored, streamlined, silenced, soundproof, could land on water or land, and had been studied as a sample of aлronautical advance by experts.
Doc set the ship down on the Potomac River south of Washington, D. C. They passed the columned white majesty of Mount Vernon, the slave houses, the greenhouses, the landscaping of the gardens, and the hillside tomb of George Washington, a few minutes before they set the plane down for a landing on the Potomac.
"Sigmund Hoppel lives on an estate on the Potomac below Mount Vernon, according to the directory," Doc said.
Now that they were bobbing on the river—not too near the vicinity, but two miles upshore, where their plane would not be as liable to attract suspicious attention—Ham frowned critically at Syrmanthe Yell.
"You don't like me very well, do you?" the entrancing blonde asked.
"He don't like anybody but himself," Monk said unkindly.
Sandy Yell frowned at Monk. "I think he is perfectly justified in being suspicious."
Monk stared at her, his expression saying that he considered it incomprehensible that she should be standing up for the dapper and sharp-tongued Ham.
Ham looked out one of the plane's windows to hide a knowing smile. Ham had been practicing psychology, in order to get the best of Monk. The apish Monk was such a homely fellow that women instinctively felt sorry for him, or something, and wanted to be nice to him.
Ham, on the other hand, was such a handsome fellow in comparison that the fairer sex instinctively resented his unkind remarks about Monk's appearance, remarks which Ham could not resist making.
Ham had decided to be particularly cutting toward the next personable young thing they contested for, on the theory that she would think him a woman hater and try to win him over. Ham thought he knew enough about women that this would work out.
It seemed to be working, too.
Sigmund Hoppel did live on the large estate downriver which they had sighted from the air. A filling-station attendant gave them the information after they had beached the plane and gone ashore. They decided to walk to the estate by land.
When they were nearing the estate, pretty Sandy Yell paused and made a strange request.
"Have you any handcuffs?"
"Yes," Monk told her.
"Then put a pair on me."
"What?"
"Put a pair on me, please."
While Monk and Ham stood dumfounded, Doc Savage said, quietly, "Do it."
SIGMUND HOPPEL belonged to what a radical would term the capitalistic class, judging from the impressiveness of his estate on a wooded bank of the Potomac.
The house consisted of several pillar columns, displayed the old lines of Southern architectural construction. It was laid out somewhat after the style of historic Mount Vernon, except that there was a modernized touch here and there.
There was a small but nice airplane landing field to the rear. Garages for half a dozen cars and as many trucks. A swimming pool. And to the west side of the building a golf course, one consisting of nine holes, and just beyond an array of tennis courts.
The ground in front of the house sloped down sharply to a boathouse, toward a pier to which was moored a fifty-foot cabin cruiser.
"This place," Monk said, "should be in the movies."
Doc Savage addressed the blonde. "This Sigmund Hoppel is the same Hoppel who has been mentioned a number of times in investigations into lobbying activities in Washington?"
The girl hesitated, then nodded. "The same."
Monk waved an arm. "And so this show place is to entertain politicians, eh?"
Doc stopped the others and directed, "Wait here."
He left them behind a patch of shrubbery a short distance from the edge of the estate and went forward. He kept out of sight, a simple task because there was plenty of shrubbery. An estate of this size must require a number of gardeners to maintain, but there were none in sight.