by Harold Ward
Meanwhile Holm’s plane, rushed to the fortress, was to be dismantled and the death-gun sent to Washington by plane where experts from the War and Navy departments were to work out some way of turning back its hellish rays.
“I succeeded in destroying the larger death-ray machines when I threw the bomb,” the young detective asserted. “But Death still has the little guns, such as are on his planes, for short range work. He probably has several small range finders. Be that as it may, with the small guns he can shoot us down—turning us to figurines, as it were—the instant we advance.
“But with some method of offsetting the rays at our command, we can attack at will. Meanwhile, our best bet is to keep him bottled up until we have made that discovery.”
One of the flying officers made a hasty suggestion which proved an excellent one and which Holm immediately ordered adopted.
“Why not have one of our ‘ears’ brought here and mounted?” he asked. “Regardless of how high these planes are, the mechanical listening devices with which the air corps is equipped will hear them and give us their approximate location. It will save us from taking to the air and being shot down by these devilish little outfits of his. Personally, I do not relish having all the juices sucked out of my body and my frame reduced to the size of a doll.”
FOR an instant Holm was silent. The sound magnifier with its transmitter and receiver! A gigantic microphone, as it were. He remembered, now, seeing them in use overseas, but had forgotten them. He turned to the young officer, his eyes beaming.
“Bully!” he exclaimed. “We’ll do it!”
Orders were hastily issued and the little command hastened to put them into execution. One platoon of soldiers under a competent officer was left at La Foubelle. A second, largely composed of men who had done sea duty or were acquainted with the swamps and bayous, was started at the work of patrolling the shore line in boats, while the third turned to go back to the island.
Meanwhile, what had happened to Le Grand? Holm asked himself the question again and again. Nor could any one answer it, least of all the constable’s badly worried wife.
The answer came unexpectedly. One of the flyers, returning to the rocky island ahead of the main body, suddenly swooped down over a little corpse a dozen rods or more from the palmetto-fringed trail. Flying in a circle, he attracted the attention of the men on the ground. An armed squad was hastily sent to search the bushes.
The little constable, his withered body riddled with bullets, was found where the poacher had dragged it. In a hole nearby was his tumbledown Ford. In his pocket was Jimmy Holm’s note to Blake.
Doctor Death was bottled up. Alone with Charmion in his island lair in the midst of the swamp, only a little group of animated dead men and anarchists for his assistants, his capture was almost inevitable. At last he had overstepped himself.
Chapter XI
Scourge of the Walking Dead
IN spite of all their precautions, Death struck first.
Holm, though enjoying the comforts of civilization again, was nervous. Returning to the island, he held a hasty consultation with the commandant, ordered the guards doubled.
“But with the range finding apparatus broken, as you say it is, how can Death know that we are located here?” demanded Darrow, one of the scientists who had elected to come to the fortress, rather than go into hiding elsewhere. A nervous man was Darrow, yet a brave one.
“It will be better if a few of us are really on the rocky island,” he had asserted when told of the edict. “He knows me; I was with the party in Egypt. And he has many ways of finding out what is going on.”
And in the end he had been allowed to go.
Holm shrugged his shoulders non-committally.
“There are a lot of things that Death does that are beyond my ken,” he responded. “Perhaps he reads our minds. Perhaps he has another range finder that he can put into use. It is not like the man to put all of his eggs into a single basket.”
Meanwhile, the work of carrying out Holm’s plan of campaign had been rushed. Every portion of the sea coast was guarded. Speedy little destroyers darted here and there, putting out smaller craft which probed every tiny gulf and inlet in the hope of discovering the secret entrance to the island.
La Foubelle took on a war-time aspect, for a tented city had suddenly sprung up along the edge of the morass with armed guards patrolling every foot of that portion of the swamp which jutted into the land.
A little distance away a dozen airplanes were lined up ready for action. Nearby several searchlights were mounted on great trucks; to one side were the delicate listening devices, looking like big horns grouped together. Beside them the muzzles of anti-aircraft guns pointed skyward, their gunners sleeping beside them.
And on the island every precaution had been taken to guard the pseudo scientists. Yet Jimmy Holm was frankly nervous.
It was still early in the evening. Dinner had been served and they were lingering in the big dining room. With the exception of Nina Fererra, her chaperone and her maid, but one other woman was present. She was the Secret Service agent made up to look like Madam Sorello, widow of the great Pierre Sorello, discoverer of the cosmoscope. Madam Sorello was on her way back to Italy, but it had been thought best to have some one impersonate her. This woman, whose appearance was so strikingly similar, had volunteered for the task. And so much like Madam Sorello did she look, that the majority of those present believed that she was the widow of the great scientist and, in her own right, a scientific worker of international reputation.
Nina Fererra shuddered. Like Jimmy Holm, she was exceptionally psychic.
“Something is wrong,” she said in an undertone to her fiance. “I—I feel it—sense it. Are you certain that nothing has been overlooked?”
Holm nodded.
“Nothing has been left undone,” he responded.
The abrupt entrance of the officer of the guard put a halt to further conversation. Every eye was turned upon the big, khaki-clad man as he wended his way through the innumerable tables, his sabre jingling, and sought out that at which Jimmy Holm and the members of the Secret Twelve present were seated.
“Pardon the interruption, sir,” he hastened to apologize, bringing his hand to his vizor in a smart salute. “But you instructed me to inform you if anything out of the ordinary had transpired. A few minutes ago our delicate listening apparatus detected faint vibrations in the atmosphere. From indications, it was a plane at an extremely high altitude directly overhead with motors shut off—coasting.
“I immediately sent out half a dozen ships. They have just radioed back that they have found nothing, although one of them—Captain Barrett—has climbed to the height of almost a mile. Meanwhile the vibrations continue off toward the north in the direction of the swamp.”
Jimmy Holm toyed with his glass.
“None of them have returned?” he asked.
The officer shook his head.
“None, sir,” he responded. “I told them to remain aloft until I radioed them down. Meanwhile—”
The words died on his tips. From the darkness of the night outside came the rattle of shots! The shouts of men! Then a shriek of a man in mortal agony.
“God! Oh-o-o-o-o-o, God I’m dying! I’m burning up! Oh, God!”
The wail, echoing through the great vaulted passages of the gloomy old fortress, was suddenly chopped off in the middle as if by a strangling hand.
“Oh-h-!” the pseudo Madam Sorello shrieked, leaping to her feet, her black eyes filled with terror. She turned to Nina Fererra.
“For God’s sake, what was it?” she demanded.
Chairs had been overturned as men sprang from their tables, their faces white and blanched. A general rush started toward the door. Jimmy Holm halted it.
“Stop!” he commanded. “You, Colonel Braig, put a guard at the door of this room and hold everybody inside except those that I personally say may be released. Hold them here until I give the word, even though it be all night.
”
The officer of the guard had already plowed his way through the mêlée like a football player in his rush to take command of his men. Holm hastily indicated such of the other officers and members of the Secret Twelve as he wished to accompany him and dodged through the door after him.
IN spite of the absence of a moon, the grounds were as light as day, the result of the great battery of arc lights that were scattered here and there. Men were hurrying around toward the rear of the gloomy fortress. As Holm and his group joined them, they saw, far down at the bottom of the hill, a little group of khaki-clad men standing around something.
“What happened?” the detective demanded, as he hastened up.
Then, as his eyes fell upon the thing upon the rocks, he darted forward and gazed down upon it.
It was a parachute!
The officer of the guard turned to him, his dark eyes blazing with excitement.
“In spite of all our precautions, sir, some one managed to make a landing from the gliding plane that I just mentioned to you. Johnson, here—” he indicated a man in private’s uniform, rifle under his arm—“saw it coming through the air and fired. Casey, the man on post number eight, also saw it and shot at it. Johnson is certain that he struck the fellow—”
“Let Johnson tell his own story!” Holm snapped. “Let’s hear it, my man!”
The guard shifted the quid of tobacco that he had been masticating.
“The lieutenant, sir, told us to exercise unusual vigilance because they thought that they had detected something through the ‘ears.’ I was walking my beat when I heard Casey shout. Then he fired. I had my back turned at the time. I whirled. There, coming down through the air was what looked for a minute like a great black bat—the ’chute’s black instead of white, as you’ve noticed, sir. A guy was hanging to the end of the ropes with something that looked like a small air gun in his hand.
“I emptied my rifle at him. I know that I hit him, sir; I was on the regimental team at Sea Girt last year and I’m not apt to miss.
“Nevertheless, even before be landed, Casey let out that ungodly yell. It was sort of dark down here in spite of the lights. You know how it is just outside the circle of light. Then I could see Casey drop his gun and just stand there. The guy in the ’chute had his gun pointed at him, but he wasn’t shooting; at least, I didn’t hear a report.
“I dropped to my knees and reloaded. Meanwhile the fellow on the ’chute had landed and was dodging away—up through the shadows of the fortress. I fired at him again and challenged. I guess that you know the rest, sir, except—except Casey.”
Holm whirled to where the other guard stood motionless a little distance away. A single glance told him the truth.
An army uniform lay upon the ground just as it had fallen from its wearer. Upon it was a shriveled thing—a horrible little caricature of a man. Little more than a foot in length, its tiny body was perfect in every detail. It was like a carving of a man made out of stone by a master craftsman.
“The devil!” the officer of the guard ejaculated. “The devil!”
Jimmy Holm shuddered.
Was Doctor Death on the island? Had he succeeded in landing in spite of all their precautions?
He turned to Johnson again.
“This man who made the parachute landing?” he demanded. “Did you get a glimpse of his face?”
Private Johnson nodded.
“That I did, sir. I saw him as plain as I’m seeing you now the minute that he landed inside the lighted area. He was tall and skinny, his face as white and pasty-looking as a sheet, sir. His eyes seemed to stare straight to the front, and when he moved it was slow and mechanical-like—like an automatic doll if I may venture the suggestion, sir.”
“Zombi!” Jimmy Holm snapped. “An animated dead man!”
HE issued a hasty order. As men rushed away in every direction to obey—to make a search of the entire island—he turned to the other members of the Secret Twelve, his clean-cut face white.
“Death has stolen a march on us,” he said, his voice dry and husky. “He has managed to land one of his Zombi here, armed with a small ray-gun. That’s why bullets from Johnson’s rifle were of no avail against him. There’s nothing that we can do, gentlemen—nothing except to use cold steel.”
He turned to the commanding officer.
“Arm all of your men with sabres, colonel. Bullets will not stop a walking dead man. As long as he is animated by the intelligence of Doctor Death, he will continue going, even though we make a sieve of him.
“There’s only one way to stop him, gentlemen; he must be chopped to pieces—his arms and legs lopped off. Meanwhile—”
He halted as a quick challenge came from another part of the island. Then came another rattle of musketry. A man shrieked horribly, then was quiet.
They ran around the huge fortress.
Even before he reached the little pile of clothing that lay upon the ground, Jimmy Holm knew what he would find upon it.
Another sentinel had been struck down.
This time the sight was even worse. The Zombi had not remained to complete his job. The man had not shrunken to the full extent. It was apparent that the Zombi had been frightened away, leaving his victim to die in horrible agony.
Holm cast a quick glance to either side.
Even now the animated dead man might be training his horrible weapon on him from some dark shadow.
Chapter XII
Hurricane of Horrors
THEN hell descended on that rocky little island in the midst of the dark waters of the gulf. Death—a madman now, his face still stinging from Jimmy Holm’s blows, his pride injured by the coup that the young detective had engineered—again conjured up his elementals.
From every quarter of the globe they came, whirling, dancing, bounding, shrieking—strange, weird things from beyond the veil—horrible creatures in the form of vortices neither spirits nor men, neither gods nor devils—malevolent things that had never been born, hating mankind with a diabolical jealousy, living upon vitality as vampires live upon the blood of their victims.
They stirred the water into great, white-capped waves, overturning the boats that were searching the shore for the hidden entrance to the swamp. Upon the army camp at La Foubelle they swooped down, killing, destroying, sapping the vitality from the soldiers, picking them up and hurling them against the ground with such terrific power as to break every bone in their bodies.
Over the island they swooped, coming out of the blackness like a hurricane. The lights were extinguished as the smaller buildings were blown down, twisted, thrown in a thousand directions—hurled into the sea. In the darkness they settled upon the little group of officers and men, scientists and members of the Secret Twelve who stood outside the grim fortress. They attacked the guards, smashing them down, sapping them of their vitality, then casting them aside.
The night was hideous with the shrieks of the dying men—men who were suffering the tortures of the damned with no way to fight them off. The island shook beneath the force of the assault; the great stone fortress trembled as from an earthquake.
And through all the pandemonium a grim-faced dead man stalked through the night adding to the butchery. In his hands was the hellish contrivance of the mad scientist—the gun which sapped men of their vital fluids, reducing them to the solids that were in their bodies. Lurking in the shadows, he shot his diabolical rays here and there, striking down all with whom he came in contact, leaving them lying where they fell, tiny figurines of what had once been men.
Again and again they saw him. Volley upon volley was fired at him, for the men in their wild panic forgot Holm’s admonition that bullets were of no avail against him. They saw the leaden slugs strike him—hurl him back—only to see him continue on his devastating way again.
The fact that they could not stop him with their guns added to their panic. They were fighting a dead man—a grim spectre. They became hysterical, getting out of hand. Vainly did their officers
strive to control them.
Only Jimmy Holm retained his self-possession. It was he who, yelling above the noise of the whirlwinds and the horrible, rodentlike squeaks of the elementals, issued his commands like the barking of a machine gun. It was he who rallied the men into a semblance of order, forming them in a solid mass.
“The rifles!” he shouted. “Pass them out to the men in front so that a wall of metal may be built up against them!”
Because they realized that he, alone, knew how to cope with these things, the soldiers listened to him. The steel rifles and bayonets refined from iron—still a form of this element—were passed up until a wall of metal was raised against the diabolical things.
For iron, as all mystics know, is the one metal that elementals fear. They shrink back from it like things accursed.
Inside the fortress all was likewise confusion. The lights were out and pandemonium reigned. Men fought each other in an effort to leave the room in which they were confined—a room filled with terror and dread—to get away, they knew not where. The little ring of khaki-clad soldiers, standing like a stone wall in the doorway, held them back.
It was Nina Fererra who shrieked above the noise and Bedlam for the chaplain to pray. Little necessity for that. The good man was already upon his knees, his rosary in hand, calling for divine assistance. It was she who rallied the others around the crucifix and commanded them to lift their eyes up to God, the existence of whom many of these stolid men-at-arms had often denied...
Suddenly—as suddenly as it had arrived—the devilish saturnalia died down. Leaping across the waters of the bay, churning them into great, foam-capped waves, the vortices disappeared in the direction of the swamp—back to the man who had conjured them out of hell.