DOC SAVAGE: THE INFERNAL BUDDHA (The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage) by Kenneth Robeson, Lester Dent, Will Murray Read Free Book Online Page A

sand. Sails were struck smartly.
    One end of the daggerboard was affixed to the crosspiece set between the projecting catheads at the bow, and the other dropped to the beach, forming an efficient gangplank.
    Finally, they began putting off crew and prisoners. A narrow rowboat of a type known as a kolek was also carried off, evidently for safekeeping .
    The prisoners came willingly enough, inasmuch as people with their hands and feet shackled are more likely to feel better on dry land than on a ship, which after all could sink without warning. Being shackled to a sinking ship was not a position to inspire optimism. So they went willingly, even the big engineer, Renny Renwick.
    He stepped onto the beach, his face as pleased as could be. Seeing this, Dang Mi muttered, “Watch that one. He’s got something up his sleeve, he has.”
    Poetical Percival, regarding the giant engineer’s fists unhappily, blinked and said, “If he does, it must be titanic.”
    Neither man understood that his pleased expression, conversely, was an indication of Renny Renwick’s unhappiness with his present situation.
    The prisoners were guided at the points of krises through a riot of tropical trees. Swaying coconut palms predominated. Their feathery crowns shivered in the breeze. Bougainvillea flowers on their vines made splashes of scarlet, pink and magenta. Pineapples and bananas were plentiful, as were the prickly green jackfruit so remindful of bloated cactus pads. Trembling spider orchids grew in profusion, seeming poised to pounce upon the unwary. The ground was moist and muddy from the recent monsoon rains, and their feet—both bare and booted—made unpleasant sucking sounds as they progressed.
    Eventually, the march ended at a cluster of longhouses well inland.
    “Put ’em in the guest house,” Dang ordered his Malays, pointing to a seedy structure a few rods apart from the rest.
    “What about the blue strongbox?” asked Poetical, nodding in the direction of the beached junk.
    “We’ll move the box when them three are safely ensconced in the guest house,” decided Dang.
    The guest house was a typical longhouse, a thing like a elongated cabin set on stilts to protect the inhabitants from snakes and other crawling perils of the jungle, with a thatched roof of dried palm fronds.
    Rude steps led to the single floor and they were marched up these. Renny, coming last, put his weight on the first step. It groaned. The second step, accepting his weight, creaked loudly.
    It was the third step that surrendered to the giant engineer’s massive bulk. It splintered, precipitating the monster-fisted engineer into a littered pile of kindling.
    “Holy cow!”
    Krises came out. Blowpipes, as big around as a man’s forearm, were brought to parched lips. Sudden death impended.
    A hissed word from Dang Mi staved off disaster.
    “Let ’im be!”
    “Why not give him what for?” Poetical wondered. “He doesn’t know anything about the Buddha.”
    “I have plans for that human rhinoceros,” Dang undertoned, as Renny clambered to his feet.
    “Plans?”
    “Later, me hearty.”
    There being no other way to accomplish it, Renny was allowed to employ his gargantuan hands to hoist himself up to the longhouse. There was no door. The steps, a ruin now, were hacked to flinders under wavy-bladed swords.
    “That oughta hold them,” Dang said, pleased with himself.
    “I frown,” Percival said laconically. “They could jump down.”
    “And they’d be jumping into a hornet’s nest of blowpipe darts,” said Dang in a voice loud enough to be plainly heard by his captives. “Each one poisoned to a fare-thee-well.”
    The prisoners found grass mats on the rude floor and settled into unhappy attitudes.
    Satisfied, Dang motioned for his new accomplices in knavery to follow him back to the cove.
    THEIR foot sounds were a brushy rustle for a time, then the cacophony of the jungle reasserted itself. Background sounds of waves creaming on a beach made a