"What about our pals?" Ham demanded. He seized Doc's wrist and stared at the telewatch dial. "Good! They're still tied to those chairs!"
Doc said nothing. His golden eyes showed no elation.
They rode up in the elevator. Renny raced down the tenth-floor corridor. He did not wait to see whether the Dragon concern office door was locked. His keg of a fist whipped a terrific blow. The stout panel jumped out of the frame like match wood.
Renny, continuing forward, tore the door from its hinges with his great weight.
Ham leaped to one of the bound figures, grasped it by the arm. Then he emitted a squawk of horror.
The arm of the form had come off in his hand!
"THEY'RE dummies," Doc said. "The clothes worn by Monk, Long Tom, and Johnny stuffed with waste paper, and fitted with the faces of show-window dummies."
Ham shuddered violently. "But we saw Monk, Long Tom, and Johnny in here! They were moving about, or at least struggling against their bonds."
"They were here," Doc admitted. "But they were taken away and the dummies substituted while one of the Mongols stood in front of the television transmitter, unless I'm mistaken."
Renny's sober face was black with gloom. "Then they knew the television sender was installed here!"
"They were lucky enough to find it," Doc agreed. "So they brought the three prisoners here, hoping we would see them and come to the rescue. They had the machine-gun trap down in the street waiting for us. That explains the whole thing."
Ham made a slashing gesture with his sword cane. "Blast it! We haven't accomplished anything!"
Doc swung over to the fragments of broken window lying on the floor. One piece was about a foot square, the others smaller. He began gathering them.
"What possible value can that glass have?" Mindoro questioned curiously, still trembling a little from the excitement of the recent fight.
"Monk broke this window and his captors knocked him over," Doc replied. "He lay on top of the glass fragments for a time, while the Mongols looked down at the window to see if the breaking window had caused alarm. They did not watch Monk at all for a few seconds. During that time, I distinctly saw Monk work a crayon of the invisible-writing chalk out of his pocket and write something on the glass."
Renny lumbered for the door. "The ultra-violet apparatus is at the office. We'll have to take the glass there."
They left the Far East Building by a rear door, thus avoiding delay while explanations were being furnished the police.
In Doc's eighty-sixth-floor retreat, they put the glass fragments under the ultra-violet lamp.
Monk's message confronted them, an unearthly bluish scrawl. It was brief, but all-important.
Tom Too is scared and taking a run-out powder.
He is going to Frisco by plane and sailing for the
Luzon Unlon on the liner Malay Queen. He's
taking us three along as hostages to keep you
off his neck. Give 'im hell, Doc!
"Good old Monk!" Ham grinned. "That homely ape does pull a fast one once in a while. He's heard the gang talking among themselves. Probably they figured he couldn't understand their lingo."
Mindoro had paled visibly. He strained his graying hair through palsied fingers.
"This means bloodshed!" he muttered thickly. "Tom Too has given up trying to get the roster of my political group. He will strike, and my associates will fight him. Many will die."
Doc Savage scooped up the phone. He gave a number that of a Long Island airport.
"My plane!" he said crisply. "Have it ready in an hour."
"You think we can overhaul them from the air?" Ham demanded.
"Too risky for our three pals," Doc pointed out.
"Then what "
"We're going to be on the liner Malay Queen when she sails from Frisco!"
Chapter 10
THE LUZON TRAIL
THE liner Malay Queen, steaming out through the Golden Gate, was an impressive sight. No doubt many persons on the San Francisco water front paused to admire the majesty of the vessel. She was a bit over seven hundred feet long. In shipbuilding parlance, she displaced thirty thousand tons.
The hull was black, with a strip of red near the water line; the superstructure was a striking white. The craft had been built when everybody had plenty of money to spend. All the luxuries had been put into her swimming pool, three dining saloons, two lounges, two smoking rooms, writing room, library, and two bars. She even carried a small bank.
Most of the passengers were on deck, getting their last look at the Golden Gate. At Fort Point and Fort Baker, the nearest points of land on either side, construction work on the new Golden Gate bridge was in evidence a structure which would be nearly six and a half thousand feet in length when completed.
Among the passengers were some strange personages.
Of exotic appearance, and smacking of the mystery of the Orient, was the Hindu who stood on the boat deck. Voluminous white robes swathed this man from neck to ankles. Occasionally the breeze blew back his robes to disclose the brocaded sandals he wore. A jewel flamed in his ample turban.
Such of his hair as was visible had a jet-black color. His brown face was plump and well-fed. Under one ear, and reaching beneath his chin to his other ear, was a horrible scar. It looked as though somebody had once tried to cut the Hindu's throat. He wore dark glasses.
Even more striking was the Hindu's gigantic black servant This fellow wore baggy pantaloons. a flamboyant silk sash, and sandals which had toes that curled up and over. On each turned-over toe was a tiny silver bell.
This black man wore no shirt, but made up for it with a barrel-sized turban. He had thick lips, and nostrils which. flared like those of a hard-running horse.
Passengers on the Malay Queen had already noted that the Hindu and his black man were never far apart.
"A pair of bloomin' tough-lookin' blokes, if yer asks me," remarked a flashy cockney fellow, pointing at the Hindu and the black. "Hi'd bloody well 'ate to face 'em in a dark alley. Yer'd better lock up them glass marbles yer wearin', dearie."
The cockney had addressed a stiff-backed, very fat dowager in this familiar fashion. They were perfect strangers. The dowager gave the cockney a look that would have made an Eskimo shiver.
"Sir!" she said bitingly, then flounced off.
The cockney leered after her. He was dressed in the height of bad taste. The checks in his suit were big and loud; his tie and shirt were violently colored. He wore low-cut shoes that were neither tan nor black, but a bilious red hue. His hat was green. He smoked bad-smelling cigars, and was not in the least careful where he knocked his ashes. His face bore an unnatural paleness, as though he might have recently served a long prison term.
The cockney did not glance again at the Hindu and the black man.
The Hindu was Doc Savage. The black man was Renny. The cockney, he of the loud clothes and bad manners, was Ham Ham, the one usually so immaculately clad and so debonair of manner. The disguises were perfect, a tribute to Doc's intensive study of the make-up art.
Down on the promenade deck, a steward was confronting one of the steerage passengers who had wandered into territory reserved for those traveling first class.
"You'll have to get back down where you belong!" growled the steward, showing scant politeness.
Courtesy did not seem to be due such a character as the steerage passenger. The man was shabby, disheveled. In age he seemed to be less than thirty. But he looked like a fever-ridden tropical tramp. His skin was light in hue, and he was a pronounced blond.
A close observer might have noted his eyes were unusually dark for one so fair-complected.
This man was Juan Mindoro.
Shortly afterward, Mindoro sought to reach the upper decks again. This time he succeeded. He made his way furtively to the royal suite, the finest aboard. This was occupied by Doc and Renny otherwise the Hindu and his black servant.