Doc leaped upward. The height of that tremendous spring would have astounded an onlooker. He clutched an extended ledge and worked his way to a window on a second-floor hallway, with hardly more sound than the noise of a prowling cat.
The hall was dark. Doc drew things from his pockets. Some sticky gum, he affixed to the windowpane. Then a faint, gritty hiss sounded.
Doc had cut the glass cut of the window! He kept it from falling inward by the gum he had stuck to it. He eased inside.
Silence gripped the interior of the house. Doc prowled noiselessly. Only one room held a light. It was downstairs. The door was locked.
Doc let Renny in. They went to the fastened door.
"We might as well go in there all of a sudden!" Doc breathed.
"0. K., Doc," murmured Renny.
He lifted his gallon of iron-hard knuckles. He struck. With a rending crash, the door panel was driven inward by Renny's great fist.
They sprang into the room. Renny held a gun. Doc's powerful bronze hands were empty.
Horrified surprise halted them.
Only two men were in the room. One was Victor Vail. The other, as denoted by the sanitary smock he wore, was obviously the dentist who had his place of business here.
Both men hung suspended by ropes around their necks from a stout ceiling chandelier.
Chapter 7
THE MAP
THE SUN was up. Doc's remarkable companions lounged in the skyscraper office. They had lost a night's sleep, but showed no effects of it.
Ham was honing the blade of his sword cane to a razor edge, looking ominously at Monk each time he tested its sharpness. Monk sat in an easy chair, reading a pocket manual of how to raise hogs. He took pains to hold the book so Ham could see the title. Monk often maintained always within earshot of Ham that some day he was going to retire and raise pork for a certain finely dressed lawyer he knew. Johnny, the archaeologist, was penning a chapter in the book he was writing on the ancient Mayan civilization.
Long Tom, looking pale as an invalid, was in the laboratory, humped over an apparatus which for intricacy would have given Steinmetz a headache.
Truly an amazing crew, these men.
Doc Savage entered. With him was Victor Vail. Renny walked in after them.
The blind man's neck was swollen somewhat where the rope had nearly strangled him to death Doc had arrived just in time to save him.
The explanation of Vail's situation was quickly made.
"The dentist don't know a thing about the gang that seized him," Doc concluded. "They called him to the door and cracked him over the head."
"It was Ben O'Gard!" Victor Vail put in, his voice thick with emotion. "Oh, Mr. Savage, I was so mistaken about that man! I thought he was my friend. I had every confidence in the world in him. When he called me here
"So it was Ben O'Gard who telephoned you!" Monk interposed.
At the sound of Monk's mild voice, Victor Vail registered great remorse. Obviously, he was terribly sorry for that crack he had taken at Monk's head with the paper weight.
"I do not know how I shall ever redeem myself for my horrible mistake," choked the blind man. "Ben O'Gard told me an awful story of how you men were holding me here to keep me from seeing him. I believed O'Gard. I know I was a fool to do that now, but at the time, I regarded O'Gard as a friend who had twice saved my life. He told me to escape and come to him. That is why I struck you."
"Forget it!" chuckled Monk.
Renny spoke up. "What baffles me is why Ben O'Gard took over the dentist's office."
Doc's strong lips warped their faint smile.
"Simple," he said. "Ben O'Gard wanted to use the dentist's X ray!"
THIS STATMENT elicited surprised looks from every one present.
"X ray!" Renny grunted. "Why'd they want the X ray?"
"I'll show you the reason in a minute," Doc replied. "First, though, I want to find out what Ham learned about the liner Oceanic."
Ham now divulged the information which several transatlantic telephone calls to England had gathered.
"On the English records, the liner Oceanic is down as lost at sea-sunken without trace," Ham said. "There's no hint of this stuff about it being trapped in the polar ice pack."
"I'm not surprised," Doc Savage said dryly.
"I've got something that will surprise you," Ham smiled. "There was fifty million dollars in gold bullion and diamonds on the Oceanic!"
An electric shock seemed to sweep the room.
"Fifty million! Will you say that again!" Monk said mildly.
"Fifty million in gold and sparklers," repeated Ham impressively.
"That explains it!" Doc declared.
"Explains what?" Renny wanted to know.
"What's behind this whole mess," retorted Doc. "Come into the laboratory. I want to show you something, brothers."
It was an excited crowd of adventurers which surged into the vast laboratory room.
From a tray. Doc lifted several large photographic prints. These were X ray pictures which he had taken of Victor Vail in his course of examining the violinist to determine his eve affliction. Until now, Doc had not had time to as much as examine the prints.
He held one up.
"Holy cow!" barked Renny.
"Exactly," Doc agreed. "More than fifteen years ago, while Victor Vail was under the influence of an anaesthetic, some one tattooed a map on his back with a chemical, the presence of which could only be detected by use of a certain tensity of X ray."
"You mean I have carried the map on my back these many years without knowing it?" Victor Vail questioned wonderingly.
"You certainly have. You recall the man with the clicking teeth who seemed to haunt your trail through the years? Well, he was simply keeping track of you and the map."
"But what is the map?"
"It shows where the liner Oceanic is aground on a land far within the arctic regions," Doc announced.
SOME MINUTES were expended examining the chart.
"But I cannot understand why I carried the map around unmolested for so many years!" Victor Vail murmured.
"Possibly I can reconstruct a story which explains that," Doc told him. "The fifty millions in treasure aboard the Oceanic led Ben O'Gard, Keelhaul de Rosa, and the other members of the crew to mutiny. They probably disposed of all who did not join them!"
"The beasts!" Victor Vail covered his face with his hands. "My poor wife. My poor little daughter, Roxey! That devil, Ben O'Gard, murdered them! And I thought he was my friend!"
"It's merely guesswork about the murder part!" Doc put in hastily. "I said that simply because the eagerness of Ben O'Gard and Keelhaul de Rosa to get this map shows they think the Oceanic is where they left it, even now. This indicates there were no survivors but themselves."
Victor Vail recovered his control. '"When Keelhaul de Rosa tried to kidnap me from Ben O'Gard, he was really trying to steal the treasure map!"
"Of course," Doc agreed. "That explains why the two factions split. No doubt they have been waging unremitting war with each other since that day, each faction trying to slay the other so they would be free to secure the chart off your back, and go get the fifty millions."
"I'm surprised they left it behind in the first place!" Monk put in.
"We barely escaped with our lives as it was," Victor Vail assured him. "To carry more than food over the ice pack was impossible."
Ham made a quick gesture with his sword cane and Monk ducked involuntarily.
"Both Ben O'Gard and Keelhaul de Rosa now have copies of this map," Ham said thoughtfully.
Doc Savage let his strange golden eyes rest on each of his friends in turn. The gilded orbs seemed to be asking a question and receiving a highly satisfying answer.
"Brothers," Doc said softly, "these birds who are after that treasure are fellows who have no right to any man's gold. What say we get it ahead of them? We can use the money to enlarge our secret institution in upstate New York to which we send criminals to be made into useful citizens. The place is becoming a little crowded."