"061 (B050) - Devil on the Moon (1938-03) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

Thinking about the girl, Bob Thomas caught himself wondering just exactly who she was. After all, no one seemed to know where she came from. She didn't have a job evidently. As a matter of fact there was a good deal of mystery connected with her. Bob Thomas didn't like it one bit. It smacked too much of trouble. And Bob Thomas was the type of fellow who didn't go hunting for it.
Of course, if Lin Pretti really needed help badly, he'd be only too glad to help. But something told him Lin Pretti wanted anything but that right now. What she wanted most was to be alone. Bob Thomas gritted his teeth and swore.
While Bob Thomas watched, Lin Pretti moved toward the bay with an armload of bloodstained weeds, which she apparently was going to throw into the water.
She had been gone only a moment when hands unexpectedly took hold of Bob Thomas.
THERE were several pairs of hands. When Thomas fought them, some of the hands became fists and struck back. He went down with men in a fighting pile.
"Blast him!" a voice grated. "He's not as weak as he looked!"
This was the first time Bob Thomas had ever heard himself called weak-looking. He was six feet two, and he had made a football name in college. He kicked, and heard a victim reel away moaning. Bob got an arm loose, struck. Someone fell heavily.
Clouds passing overhead made it dark. Bob Thomas began to feel confident that he was going to escape—or perhaps he might even whip them all!
"Behemoth!" someone screeched.
The tone which answered this call was one Bob Thomas never forgot. It was a great, gusty whisper. An incredibly cavernous whisper.
"Gimme room to take 'im!" said the whisper.
The men released Bob Thomas, and he stumbled to his feet, but not quickly enough to evade a charge. A great body hit him. Thomas struck back with his fist, hit something that felt more like iron than flesh. Then great arms squeezed him.
He was suddenly and completely helpless.
"I got 'im!" said the huge whisper.
A flashlight blazed. Bob Thomas twisted to see what nature of monster held him.
Behemoth was a giant with hair on the back of his hands—bright-red hair—and no hair on his head. His face had freckles, his nose flared, and the bulge of his teeth gave his lower face a squarish effect. His shirt gaped at the neck to show red fur. His shirt had two pockets; both were full of cigars, and he was smoking one.
"Hey!" someone exploded. "This ain't Vesterate!"
It was plain they had thought they were seizing the green man.
The captors scowled at Bob Thomas in disgust.
"Here comes Lurgent!" a man said.
Lurgent came up. He was a tall hawk in a brown suit.
"Hi-ya, boss!" said the giant Behemoth.
Lurgent looked at Bob Thomas. "Who's this?"
"That's what we're wonderin'," Behemoth said.
Lurgent came over and poked Bob Thomas with a finger. "What are you doing here?" he demanded. "Who are you?"
Bob Thomas, baffled, did what he thought wise. He avoided the truth.
"I was dancing at that roadhouse over the hill yonder. I had a spat with my girl and took a walk to cool off. What's the idea of your men grabbing me?"
He thought that was a rather good story. It seemed to deceive the men, too.
"I'm sorry," Lurgent told Bob Thomas politely. "You see, we are guards from a nearby insane asylum, and one of the patients has escaped. We're hunting him. My men mistook you for the—ah—nut." Lurgent glared at Behemoth. "What the hell are you holding him for? Turn him loose!"
Bob Thomas was released. He got to his feet. He killed time straightening his clothes.
Bob Thomas thought over what he had just been told, and the strange things that had happened.
He suddenly recalled that Lin Pretti had never told him why she was in this district. Perhaps she had wished to be close to a relative who was confined in an institution! Suppose the relative had escaped? Naturally, the girl would be concerned, and she might try to cover the truth. She might deny, for instance, that the green man was a demented relative. Most people are sensitive about having insanity in the family.
"How was your escaped maniac dressed?" Bob Thomas asked.
Lurgent grinned. "He's a bad case, and we humor him. Let him wear silly-looking green tights. He once saw a motion picture of a man who went to the moon, and now he imagines he's the man on the moon."
"That explains what he said about being on the moon."
"You saw him?"
Lurgent yelled.
"Yes," Bob admitted sheepishly.
"But you said you hadn't!"
"I know. I said that because I didn't trust you gentlemen."
"We're sorry, buddy."
"Will you gentlemen tell me something?" Bob asked.
Lurgent granted. "Anything we can."
"Is Lin Pretti a relative of this insane man?"
Lurgent nodded. "His sister."
"Thank you," Bob said. "She was with me when we found the nut—the green man."
"I see." Lurgent seemed quite friendly. "What happened then?"
Bob Thomas launched into a description of what had taken place.
"Who has the blue glass cylinder?" questioned Lurgent, after Bob Thomas had finished.
"Lin has it."