NIGHT TERROR
Thunder was chuckling softly in the distance when Monk awakened, Doc’s hand upon his shoulder. There was no lightning. Monk squirmed, peered into the inky void, and gulped. “Hey, what the——”
“Quiet!” Doc cautioned. “I think something’s going to happen.”
Monk bounced out of his bag, much to the disgust of Habeas, who had been asleep on the foot.
The pig grunted a few times in discontent, then with strange abruptness it became silent.
Monk fished out a match and thumbed it alight. He hid the tiny flame in his cupped palm, so that only a spear of light escaped and fell upon the pig.
Habeas was sniffing like a pointer. Coarse bristles along his back were on end. Monk listened, and could hear nothing. But the pig had detected the presence of something.
“Habeas has remarkably keen senses,” Doc said softly. “The nearest of the things must be at least a mile away from us.”
“What things?”
“Just a minute,” Doc said, “I’ll let you listen.”
The bronze giant went to the other men and awakened them. All moved to one side, a few yards clear of the camp.
A strange-looking bit of apparatus stood here. Doc had evidently erected this after the others had gone to sleep. Long Tom, the electrical wizard, recognized it instantly.
“A supersensitive listening device!” he said.
The electrical expert did not trouble to explain further that the thing utilized sensitive parabolic pickup microphones and amplifiers of great power, similar to those employed in radio sets. He presumed that the others knew this.
Doc Savage flicked a switch which connected the loud-speaker to the amplifier output. The sensitivity of the listening device was at once apparent. An owl hooted in the distance, and the sound poured out of the loud-speaker in a great bawl. Habeas Corpus grunted. That, too, was magnified a thousand fold.
Suddenly there came from the loud-speaker noises foreign to the other night sounds. These were watery notes, a great splashing and gurgling. Then came tremendous hissing noises, as of a monster breath expelled.
Doc switched off the listener.
“Huh?” Monk gulped. “That sounds like something wading along the edge of the lake.”
“There’s another of the things in the opposite direction,” Doc advised. “As far as I can tell, there are only the two of them. They’re approaching slowly.”
After a brief interval, the bronze man switched on the listening device again. This time, the splashing sounds were louder, and it was evident that they came from both up and down the lake shore.
“Do you reckon they’re huntin’ us?” Monk asked uneasily.
“We’ll wait,” Doc said. “We won’t use this listening device any more, either. The things may hear the amplified sounds.”
The men waited, listening so hard that they could almost hear the gurgle of blood in their own veins.
* * * *
No listening device was needed now. The noisy wading was becoming louder as the fantastic waders of the night approached.
“I hope they meet each other and fight it out,” Long Tom said uneasily. “They sound as big as elephants.”
This proved a futile hope. The gigantic things prowling along the lake shore apparently met. One of them emitted sound, a roar which terminated in a hacking and sputtering.
“For the love of Mike!” Monk breathed. “First time I ever heard a sound like that.”
There came a loud clank. It was like a tin can being kicked, only infinitely louder. It was followed by another. Metal crumpled noisily; rivets shrieked; brace wires parted with loud dongings.
“Our plane!” Monk growled. “They’re tearing it up!”
He started forward.
“Wait!” Doc admonished sharply. “Those things may be dangerous.”
A tremendous splashing was accompanying the ruining of the plane. This came nearer, as if the monsters were pushing the plane to the beach.
“Ain’t we gonna do something about this?” Long Tom asked indignantly.
“I planted a camera in the treetops, upon first hearing them,” Doc explained. “The things are almost in position now to have their pictures taken.”
From the ground beside the electrical listening device Doc picked a metallic-looking object, slightly smaller than a baseball. He threw this in the direction of the beach.
The thing detonated with a flash that stabbed at their eyeballs like hot flame. It was powerful flashlight powder which would expose the plate of the camera. He had been able to plant the camera with shutter open, thanks to the murk of the night.
At the flash, both monsters came crashing through underbrush and timber toward the camp.
“They must have located our place by the camp fire earlier in the night,” Ham breathed grimly.
“Scatter!” Doc ordered. “These things show signs of intelligence. They’re dangerous.”
Stealthily, the men parted.
Doc Savage remained where he was, except that he moved a few feet to one side, stooped, and opened a bag. This was part of their equipment, all of which they had fortunately removed from the plane.
Out of the bag Doc took two metallic containers, each of perhaps a quart capacity. Balancing one of these in either hand, he waited. They were great tear gas bombs.
He delayed throwing until convinced one of the monsters was within fifty feet. Then he hurled both gas bombs. They landed, bursting with loud whups.
Then Doc dodged wildly. Something came at him—something thrown. Whether by accident, or due to the fact that the monsters had heard some slight sound which Doc had made, the object was thrown accurately.
It hit Doc. It was such a blow as he had never before felt. He was propelled backward, crashed into a tree, bounced from it to a smaller sapling, and dropped. He lay perfectly still after he fell.
* * * *
The thrown thing had not struck Doc Savage squarely, however. A shift, executed almost as he felt the thrown object, had put him partially in the clear. He had an opportunity to tense his great muscles to absorb the shock.
He lay in the soft weeds and dead leaves for only a moment, then reared up. The monster was charging him.
Doc glided to the side, one hand exploring the blackness for saplings and trees, to avoid collision. With his other hand he felt for his flashlight. He found it—a shapeless mass of battered metal and squashed glass. It had come into contact with a tree and was useless.
The monster missed Doc and ploughed on through the brush, travelling blindly. Its coughing, hacking, sputtering and other hideous sounds indicated the effects of the tear gas.
It veered toward the lake, its companion following. With a great splashing, they fled into the night. They traveled with amazing speed, for their sounds were soon lost to the unaided ear.
Doc started toward the beach, desirous of getting to his camera. The plate should tell them the nature of the monsters. But he encountered the tear gas. The night breeze, which was very light, had not yet pushed the stuff out on the lake.
Rather than trouble to dig a gas mask out of his duffle, Doc decided to wait until the breeze dispersed the vapor. That should not take many minutes.
His men came back to the camp.
“Have any of you got ideas about what the monsters were?” Doc asked them.
None had. It seemed nobody had a flashlight in his possession during the affair. This explained why no light had been shown.
Doc dug a flashlight from their luggage and swiveled the beam about. He was searching for the thing that had been thrown at him. It took only a few minutes to ferret out the object.
“Whew-w-w!” Monk breathed. “Did one of them throw that?”
That was a rock as large as a water bucket.
Doc spattered the flash beam about.
“Look here!” yelled the bony Johnny. “Tracks the things made!”
The prints were roughly rectangular in shape, and outlined plainly in the soft earth.
“They’re bigger than any man could make!” Monk muttered.
This was no exaggeration, the prints measuring much longer than Monk’s feet, which were not small.
The amazing thing, however, was that the prints were without definite shape.
Doc Savage, examining them, noticed that the earth was pressed perfectly smooth where the weight of the monsters had borne down. There was no mark of hair or scales, nor were indentations of claws distinguishable.
“The prints don’t give us much of an idea,” Doc said. “Fortunately, we have the camera.”
They spent several minutes inspecting the undergrowth, noting how saplings were crushed down, and even small trees bent aside and their limbs torn off.
“Those babies were really strong,” Monk muttered.
The gas had dispersed by now.
“We should have a good flashlight photo of the things,” Doc declared, and led the way toward the beach.
Once on the sandy strand, he stopped. He played his flashlight beam. For a moment, the fantastic trilling note which was part of this remarkable man of bronze became audible. It seemed to have a slightly disgusted quality.
“What is it, Doc?” Monk asked.
“The monsters smashed into the tree that held the camera,” Doc advised. “Moreover, they seem to have been lucky enough to walk on the camera. There’s hardly enough of it left to stuff a pipe.”