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

Their stories all agreed upon one point. They had gone to sleep rather queerly after drinking various kinds of beverages with their dinners. Consensus of opinion was that they had been drugged.
The men were naturally asked to identify themselves. They did this without trouble. The result surprised every one.
Each one of the twenty men was quite a big shot in one of two lines.
Some of them were well-known financiers in charge of holding companies. These companies bought stocks and held them for a rise. Besides stocks, they bought houses, office buildings, steamship lines, blocks of farms, or anything else that could be purchased cheaply and might be sold for more money later on. All of these so-called holding companies were very prosperous, among the most prosperous of their kind.
The rest of the twenty men were directors in mutual insurance companies. The companies of which they were directors were large, but not especially spectacular. The companies of which these men were directors were known as conservative. They had never shown any great profits.
A lot of heads were scratched when the twenty men made known their identity. Just what connection twenty men who were prominent in insurance and holding companies could have with twenty convicts was a mystery.
Or was it? A puzzling angle came to light very shortly, when the warden had a brilliant idea and summoned Doc Savage.
"You say John Winer, the slain guard, mumbled that Doc Savage shot him?" the warden asked.
Confirming nods from the rest of the guards and the relating of Winer's last words seemed to convince him.
"Send for Doc Savage," directed the warden. "He may be able to help us. It is hardly reasonable that he could have had a hand in this murder."
The warden knew Doc Savage by reputation.
Chapter 3. THE GIRL JOURNALIST
DOC SAVAGE, when the warden's phaлton brought him through the prison gates, created quite a sensation. It was now daylight, and a bright, sunny day well lighting the bronze man's arrival.
The prisoners had been kept in their cells, and from the windows of these, a great many could look out and witness the coming of Doc Savage. More than one of these observers had a cold chill and hastily ducked back. For Doc Savage was the nemesis of evildoers.
The sensation of the bronze man's arrival did not extend alone to the prisoners. The guards craned their necks and their mouths came open and their eyes went wide. They had been wondering what to expect.
When they saw Doc Savage, they were not let down.
The bronze man was a physical giant. After he had stepped out of the car and a bit away from it, so that he was not close to anything to which his size might well be compared, he did not seem so large. This was due to the remarkable symmetry of his physical development.
There were other striking things about Doc Savage. His skin was of an unusual bronze hue, as if burned by countless tropical suns; his hair was straight, fitting like a metal skullcap, and of a bronze hue only slightly darker than his skin.
Most striking of all, perhaps, were his eyes. Weird they were, like pools of flake gold always stirred by tiny gales. They seemed to possess a hypnotic power, an ability to compel.
Doc Savage was taken to the warden's office. There were a number of newspapermen and one newspaperwoman present. The newspapermen had the usual baggy suits and worldly looks, but the newspaperwoman was different. She did not look as if she belonged. She kept in the background and did not seem to care about having her face show.
Doc Savage was presented to the warden. The warden was an honest tough guy who did not believe in beating around bushes and who would have stood up for his rights against the president as quickly as he would have stood up against one of his guards.
"A dying prison guard named John Winer stated that you shot him this morning," said the warden bluntly. "The shooting occurred at a quarter of five this morning. Have you an alibi?"
"No," Doc Savage said.
The bronze man had a voice in keeping with his appearance. It was not loud, nor low either, but it had a timbre, a quality of vibrant power and pleasantly musical undertone which marked it instantly. It was a voice which obviously had received years of intensive training.
"Then you're under arrest," said the prison warden.
The State prison official who had gone to get Doc Savage shoved himself forward.
"I'm afraid arrest is not the wise thing," he said. "I found this Doc Savage giving a lecture on something or other—"
"On electrokinetics," Doc Savage supplied.
"On electro—electro—well, he was lecturing," said the official. "He was lecturing to a fellowhood of big-shot scientists and they had been in session, and this bronze man had been talking to them, all night."
"Are you sure?" asked the warden.
"Sure I'm sure. And the scientists raised hell when I broke up the lecture!"
"It was an important lecture and demonstration," said Doc Savage dryly. "We hoped it would lead to the solution of the problem of transmission of energy by Hertzian waves."
"It looks," said the warden, "as if you have an alibi."
THE woman newspaper representative eased about among the onlooking members of the press. She held in one hand some small object, a mechanical device of some description, which she was attempting to keep concealed.
Doc Savage waited, his metallic, extremely good-looking features expressionless. Only his flake gold eyes belied his easy attitude; they seemed to be in motion steadily, never to rest in their scrutiny of his surroundings.
The warden growled, "Why didn't you tell me you had an alibi?"
"An alibi is technically a plea of having been elsewhere when an alleged act was committed," the giant bronze man explained. "The word somehow has grown to have a stigma attached and does not appeal."
The warden scratched his head. "You know anything about this?"
"Nothing."
"And there's no funny business about stigmas and words about that?"
"None."
The young woman journalist was still shifting her position. She seemed to be attempting to work into a position where she could lift the object in her hands and point it at Doc Savage.
The warden turned as a messenger entered the office. The messenger bore an envelope which he handed to the warden, and which the latter in turn opened, and read. The warden looked up and eyed Doc Savage.
"From the governor," he said. "He suggests that while you are here you might be kind enough to look the situation over and afford us some assistance."
"Of course," Doc Savage said.
The warden abruptly thought of something concerning this unusual man of bronze.
"Will you want us to send for any of your assistants?" he asked.
"That will not be necessary," Doc Savage assured him.
The press representatives were permitted to accompany Doc Savage and the warden, together with some prison guards, as they moved on a tour of inspection. The fidgety young woman journalist went with them. She kept hidden the thing in her hands as best she could.
When out in the brilliant sunlight, it became evident that the young woman was rather a looker. She wore a coarse frock with practically no lines, but it failed what it was probably intended to do, conceal a lithe young form that did not leave much to be desired.