Chapter XIII

73

STRANGE FISH

Doc was leaning forward to put his eye against the slit in the curtain when he suddenly realized someone was stalking him.

Someone was nearby in the darkness! There was a small sound, the sound dry grass makes when stepped on.

Tiny, but definite. The breath, he thought wildly, of death.

His nerves began crawling. It couldn't be one of the cowboys, he was fairly sure of that. It must be one of the fat man's crew. Doc remained frozen. The other, he suspected, had seen or heard him approach the window.

Inside the cabin, the fat man said, “All right, there it is. Fifty thousand dollars, all American money, none of it in too large bills. That's what you wanted.”

“I—I've changed my mind,” Johnny Toms said. The terror had built up in him. It was taking the roundness, the deepness—the manly sound—out of his voice.

“You backing out?”

“I—I'd better.”

“Why?”

“A man named Savage—Doc Savage—is here. I'm afraid of him.”

“I know about that,” the fat man said. “Don't let it bother you.”

“But—”

“I've got half a dozen men crawling in on this ranch right now,” the fat man said. “They'll get Savage. They'll get Bill Hazel.”

Doc Savage caught a movement in the darkness. A place in the night changed shade slightly, and he knew his stalker had moved closer.

A HURTING came into Doc Savage's chest, making him realize he had stopped breathing. He started breathing again, with an effort, and the first breath nearly rasped in his throat. He watched the spot in the darkness, concentrating on it with a tension that began tying him in knots. Could the skulker see him well enough to shoot? He couldn't be sure. He couldn't recall when he had been more scared.

The fat man in the cabin began talking to Toms again, speaking rapidly.

“I don't know what story Bill Hazel told. I don't care. The truth is this: Bill Hazel was working for us, for the Nazis, during the war. He was on Goebbels' staff. He was one of several Americans and Englishmen, traitors who were well−paid, who did propaganda broadcasts on the radio.

“Hazel developed himself some connections in Berlin, and that's how he got his hands on certain films. He's had this particular film several months. I don't think he got it all at once, and this wasn't the only film he got.

He had a bunch of them. But this one turned out to be the jackpot. The way things are going now, it is dynamite. He knew it.