Chapter XIII

78

STRANGE FISH

“That's what we've got,” the cowboy said. “Three. One is leaking a little, but he'll survive.”

Chapter XIV

THE first planeload of Army Intelligence bigwigs arrived from Washington a little before noon. The Sheriff of the county, confused by the whole thing, was glad to turn the prisoners over to someone who knew what to do with them. Hazel was dead, along with the fat man and the one Hazel had killed. The others were alive, and all but two of them in need of repair. The one the cowboy had shot wasn't badly off. The fellow who had slit Hazel's throat, and whom Doc had clubbed with the machine gun, had a fractured skull. That was worrying Doc.

The men from Washington had brought an 8−mm. movie projector. While one of them was setting it up, Doc gave a brief summary.

“You remember when Count Ciano, the son−in−law of Mussolini, was executed? Mussolini had a movie made of the execution. It was in all the newspapers about that.” Doc paused.

“Yes, I recall now,” said one of the intelligence men.

“Bill Hazel was working for the Nazis and he got the films during the war,” Doc went on. “He tried to collect blackmail with this particular reel, and the man he was trying to blackmail set his agents on Hazel. Hazel got the films to the States, and came over himself to collect them. The agents followed him. That's what it was all about.”

Another of the men said, “I wonder how the pictures happened to be taken in the first place?”

No one answered him.

They watched the film.

It was a weird film. A horror. It was documentary, a record of executions of war prisoners by a Nazi Gestapo officer. Between each shot, there was a record of the date, place and time of the executions. Then there would be another documentary shot of the Gestapo officer either shooting, beheading, machine−gunning, or using poison gas. At no time were less than two victims put to death. At times there were so many—these were in the machine−gun slaughtering—that they could not be counted without stopping the film for the purpose.

One of the intelligence men suddenly said, “Oh, God!” and shut off the projector.

Doc Savage got up hurriedly and went out into the morning sunlight. Into the fresh air. The others came outside also, looking sick from what they had seen.

“You can see,” Doc said, “why the film was so important.”

Ham Brooks didn't see. He said, “I don't get it. That picture is a record of the killings one Nazi officer handled personally in the war. But there were lots of those murderers. Did I miss something?”

Doc asked, “Haven't you seen newspaper pictures of Johann Jon Berlitz?”