by Harold Ward
His tongue lolled between his parted lips as the Zombi clamped its fingers tighter. His bulging eyes were fixed upon the gleaming knife—he saw the blood spots upon the blade and subconsciously wondered whose gore it was.
His left hand darted out and caught the Zombi’s right wrist. He struggled fruitlessly to tear the choking grip from his throat. Yet so weakened was he from his illness, that his strength was as that of a baby’s beside this monster that was bent upon taking his life. The knife slowly descended, pushing his own hand down with it. The point touched the flesh over his heart... cut through his pajama jacket...
It was at that moment that Jimmy Holm, racing through the corridor, thought of Ricks. His skin prickled as if from nettles. He knew—understood as well as if the words had been shouted to him, so highly attuned was his brain—that his friend was in danger. Ricks’ room was at the other end of the corridor and several doors away from the passage that ran diagonal to the one he was in.
He broke into a run, hurling himself against the door of the Inspector’s room with a force that almost tore it from its hinges. He took in the whole scene at a glance. With a wild cry, he crossed the room at a single bound. Leaning over the Zombi’s shoulder, he caught the knife arm and pulled it back with a motion that almost jerked it from its socket. He doubled it behind the dead thing’s back with the familiar lock known to every policeman.
But it was not a living man that he was battling. The Zombi had no sense of pain. Now, even though Holm heard the bones snap under the strain, its left hand continued the deadly pressure on the Inspector’s neck. Ricks’ florid face was growing blue and mottled. Holm knew that it was only a question of seconds before the breath would be squeezed out of the gigantic body. Even now Ricks’ legs were playing a tattoo on the bedclothes as he struggled for breath.
Holm was thinking fast. In vain was he, as Ricks had done, attempting to concentrate against this dead thing. But Death, peering into the room through the eyes of this weird mechanical cadaver, was witnessing the struggle, and against his powerful will that of the detective was of no avail at the moment.
AN idea came to Holm, born of another experience he had had long before when he and Ricks had first encountered the monster Death, and had not yet learned his diabolical methods. And it had been this same Ricks who had been the victim. Now, holding the Zombi’s right arm in the same twisted position with his left hand, he shoved his right hand into his pocket and found his knife. Carrying it to his mouth, he opened it with his teeth.
Then, leaning forward, he severed the dead fingers from the throat of the Inspector, one by one!
Even with its fingers gone, so powerful was the will of Death, that the animated corpse sought to grip the throat of its victim with the stumps.
Ricks was wheezing painfully as he recovered his breath. Now, the life of his friend saved, Jimmy Holm rushed at the Zombi again.
With its stumps of hands, it charged at Jimmy Holm, attempting to batter him down with its feet—to smash the life out of him.
Slowly, making each motion count—the bloody knife that he had retrieved from the floor in his hand—Holm commenced the horrible task of cutting the Zombi down. Bit by bit—because he was forced to dodge away from the dead thing’s mad rushes—he chopped it to pieces. Its head, severed from the shoulders at a single blow, dropped to the floor; the headless trunk charged in, the stumps of arms waving fruitlessly...
Then, evidently realizing that his task was useless, Doctor Death relinquished the hold he had on the awful thing.
It dropped to the floor, its labors ended forever.
Jimmy Holm was a fighter. He had been taught to battle from his boyhood. When he was still a youth attending public school the boys with whom he had associated had resented his father’s money. Later as a member of the police force, it had been necessary for him to render twice the service that others rendered to still the cry of “pull” that was constantly being raised.
Now, he was unable to locate the inlet to the swamp, and his small boats were damaged by the storm. Death, with his invisible barricade against aircraft, could hold him at bay in the air. Hence he ordered a general advance from the La Foubelle sector. His was the strategy of the French general, Foch. His little army was shattered, yet it was still fighting gamely. Now he had decided to carry the campaign into the enemy’s country.
The refusal of the government to hurry the robot steering devices hampered him. Again he radioed Washington. Someone in the comptroller’s office, entwined in a mass of “red-tape,” was holding up the order. Until the President, who was at the “summer White House,” could be contacted, nothing could be done.
Holm decided to carry on the fight by land.
There was wisdom in his plan. Death had won the preliminary skirmish. Now, thinking that his enemies were in confusion, it was like him to lie back on his laurels, resting during the day and preparing for the night. The time to strike was when he was least expecting it.
The sinister scientist was a nocturnal animal—habitué of caves and underground places, a human fungus—a dweller in dark, unfrequented corners far below the surface. Holm had noticed this habit growing stronger and stronger; in fact, Death had once remarked on it to him. There was a certain affinity between him and the earth; the minerals in the ground fascinated him, stepping his brilliant—even though perverted—mind up to unknown flights.
Like the vampires and other creatures of foulness, he was at his best alter the sun had set. Even moonlight jarred against his sensitive nerve centers. It was only natural, therefore, that he would be at his lowest ebb during the hours of daylight. That, then, was when the attack was to be made.
With Death safely cornered in the swamp, as he believed, his first concern was to protect those on the island. Ricks was showing rapid recovery. Weak and emaciated though he was as a result of the attack of the Zombi, he was placed in command of the forces in the fortress and the plan of campaign laid out.
All of the pseudo-scientists and such soldiers as were to act as guards were gathered into the huge room with Nina Fererra second in command. Nor did the men-at-arms demur at taking orders from a woman. They had seen enough during the night to realize that they were helpless against the machinations of the heinous old madman. They were willing to submit to anything in order to save their lives.
In this room, fortified with plentiful supplies, they were confined. The walls on the side toward the island were lined with lead as a protection against the death-rays, should the sinister scientist get his apparatus to working successfully again. The planes had arrived from New York with as much sheet lead as could be gathered up in the short space of time.
For Jimmy Holm had demonstrated with the ray-gun taken from the prow of the ship he had captured from Death, that lead was a non-conductor of the death rays.
Just as it is necessary to confine radium in a leaden casket, so did lead hold powerless the rays thrown out by the sinister doctor’s apparatus.
He had hastily experimented. The battalion’s mascot, a small monkey, had been placed behind a thin lead barrier and the rays turned on it. The little animal had come through the ordeal with no bad effects save a vicious temper created by being tied.
MOVABLE barricades were hastily built out of the sheet lead brought by the planes from New York. These affairs, clumsy at best, were like the ancient shields used in medieval times, each built to shelter from two to four men, two to manipulate them, and two to fight. As high as a man’s head, with an overhanging top and extending to the ground, they were built in the shape of the letter “U” with the sides extending around so that only the rear was open. There was one tiny peep hole in each shield.
Holm’s idea was to charge straight at Death, braving the death-rays behind the leaden barriers and overcoming him by sheer force of numbers. Yet, not forgetting the experience of the night nor those of days gone by, he was taking no chances on the ancient’s ability to conjure the elementals from the air. Each leaden shield was made wi
th angle iron frames while the braces throughout were also of iron. Against them the horrible unborn creatures might hurl themselves again and again without avail.
The men—selected with the greatest care—both from the ranks of the Secret Service and the soldiers—were armed with revolvers with the exception of a squad of carefully picked sharpshooters from the military detail. By the side of each man hung a sword or cutlass with which to hew down the Zombi if they were used by Death as storm troops.
Each squad carried parts of a portable radio. So thoroughly trained were the men that they could assemble in an indescribably short time.
By daybreak Holm had completed his preparations. Airplanes carried the men across the bay. Holm and his advance party were taken on to La Foubelle, where the launch that Blake had ordered up the day before still remained. Others were dropped off at the little fishing village which was to be made the base of operations. Here trailers were hastily assembled and started to La Foubelle with additional launches and the other supplies.
It was Holm’s idea to take the lead into the swamp, marking the trail so that the others could find it. As fast as each launch was brought up and equipped, it was to follow until all were inside the morass. Each launch commander had his instructions so that he could act independently if necessary.
And the one order that was impressed upon every man stronger than any other was this:
“Get Doctor Death! Dead or alive, get Doctor Death!”
Chapter XIV
Cadaver Resists
TEARING through the water at a fifteen mile clip, Holm and his little advance guard, leaving La Foubelle by mid-afternoon, reached the end of the water trail by midday. It was then that the training of one of the government men, used to the swamps and bayous, came into good use. They were about to unload, marking the end of the trail as they had marked it all the way along, with white rags tied to the trees, when he called Holm’s attention to the current which flowed through the stagnant water.
Dipping into it with his hand, he caught a bit of it in his cupped palm.
“For some reason, this water is different from that of the swamp,” he remarked knowingly. “The swamp water, laden with filth and muck, is heavier than this. In other words, this is a stream which, lighter than the water through which it flows, circles around among these little swamp oases.
“I’m not chemist enough to tell you the reason,” he went on, “but it’s my opinion that it is because this water is salty from the tides that it refuses to mix with the stagnant swamp waters. In plain terms, it’s my idea that this is the same creek that has its outlet on the sea shore. Therefore, it flows past the island when the tide is coming in from the sea. By following it, we will come to the island much faster than by walking.”
Holm acted upon his suggestion. In less than an hour they were at the little village of thatched huts.
The shields held ahead of them to ward off the death rays, the intrepid little party dashed forward. Knowing the temper of the blacks from his recent experience with them, Holm expected a brush with them the instant they landed.
Instead, a funereal solitude hung over the little village. The men spoke in whispers, so ominous was the quietness. Approaching the first hut, Holm peered within. It was empty.
Suddenly one of the men exclaimed.
“Almighty God!” he said in a hushed, awed whisper.
Holm’s glance followed his pointing finger. Then he understood the reason.
The little fire still smoldered in the center of the public compound. Around it lay innumerable little black figurines—tiny ebony things that had once been Nebo and his followers.
Doctor Death, following his age-old policy of “Dead men tell no tales,” had stricken down every inhabitant.
The blacks would never bear witness against him.
Shuddering with horror, Holm ordered a general advance across the fields to the little mountain range. Ten minutes’ walk brought them to their destination.
The cavern entrance, ominous and gloomy, loomed up before them. The great door was invitingly ajar.
Holm advanced into it, Blake on one side of him, David on the other, pushing the little shield, while Tony Caminetti brought up in the rear.
Again a premonition of danger flashed over Jimmy Holm. He fought it off.
The entire party was inside the cavern and half way to the door which opened into the second compartment when one of the men in the rear suddenly gave the alarm.
Holm whirled.
In the entrance—emerging from some hiding place outside—was a Zombi.
His arms were filled with bombs.
He raised his hand, one of the little cylinders of death gripped in his fingers.
His arm was drawn back ready to toss it into the midst of the little band.
Jimmy Holm fired from the hip.
The bullet was aimed, not at the Zombi, but at the pile of bombs he carried in his arms.
The ground seemed to come up to meet them as the bullet struck its mark.
Then the roof came down!
Again that ability to think rapidly that was his birthright had saved not only Holm’s own life, but the lives of the men under his command. Had the bomb been hurled into their midst, it would have slaughtered them all. And had he shot at the Zombi in panic the bullet would have been of no avail. Instead, thinking lightning fast, he had fired into the pile of high explosive, shattering the animated dead man before he could toss his bomb.
Were they any better off? To Jimmy’s way of thinking, they were. There could be no retreat. Nor could the men in the launches that were following be of any assistance, since the entrance to the cavern was blocked. There was only one thing to do. They must advance. They must fight their battle alone.
And ahead of them—lurking somewhere in the darkness—was Doctor Death. He was waiting to conjure up from the depths of his cunning brain some new engine of destruction.
THE shutting off of the entrance to the cave had blotted out all light from outside. The darkness was Stygian. To the little group huddled behind their leaden shields awaiting with baited breath for something to happen, it was hellish.
Their imaginations conjured up weird, formless bulks out of the blackness—eerie, crawling things of the night. The fact that it had been bright and sunny outside and that the light had been cut off in the twinkling of a second made the total absence of it now the harder to bear.
Holm sensed the feeling of his men—knew that they were on the verge of panic, expecting with each tick of the clock to feel the touch of some slithering thing against their bodies—the pressure of cold, dead fingers against their throats. Or, perhaps, the rush of elementals from the air, striving to lap the vitality from them, leaving their forms twisted, wrinkled, and contorted like deflated balloons.
Even worse, as they crouched behind their lead barriers, they could imagine the air about them filled with the deadly rays from some unseen gun—the rays that sapped men of their moisture, condensing them down to the solids within them.
Holm had the same feeling himself. He conquered it. The sound of his own voice as he bade his men keep calm quieted his own nerves as much as it did theirs.
He searched his pockets for his flashlight. He remembered, too late, that he had neglected to bring it. He whispered to Blake. The government man was already getting his electric lamp in readiness. At a word from Holm he pressed the button.
A look at the white, strained faces of the men around him told the detective that all were there. He ordered the other flashes out. Then, with a part of the beams playing to the front to guard against surprise from that direction, he ordered the others turned onto the pile of rock that had fallen.
A single glance showed him that their exit was blocked. Thousands of tons of stone had been dropped from the roof by the explosion. It would take days for an army equipped with dynamite to tunnel through.
There remained only the other way and in that path was Doctor Death.
Slowly—w
atching every minute detail—seeing that every man was safely behind his leaden shield, Holm led the advance on the door which opened into the other cavern. He opened it cautiously, holding the others back while he advanced into the room alone, the beam of the flashlight borrowed from Blake playing into every corner.
The place was a wreck. It took him but an instant to figure out what had happened.
Death had again retreated, burning his bridges behind him.
On the floor lay a group of men—or what had once been men—their bodies shriveled to the tiny, indescribable things that the death-rays brought about. Holm recognized them as the Russian anarchists under Death’s command.
Killing off every living witness, even to the blacks on the island, Death had completely destroyed what was left of the workshop established in the cave and had retreated, taking Charmion and his Zombis.
But, gazing out at the world he hated through the range-finder, before he had destroyed the delicate apparatus, he had doubtless seen Holm and his men advancing through the swamp. He had left one Zombi to—as he believed—strike them down, implanting within the dead, vacuum-like brain the suggestion that it was to wait until they were within the cavern before throwing the bomb.
Again Holm had thwarted him.
Yet Death, knowing that there was a possibility of some of the party escaping the bomb, had even guarded against such a contingency.
The steel door which led onto the passageway opening into the airplane room was closed. A hurried examination showed that it, like the fallen rock in the other entrance, could be broken down only with dynamite.
There was only one other possible way out.
That was through the tunnel which led onto the shelf of rock back of the waterfall.
Holm put a group of his men to work extemporizing a ladder with which to negotiate the perpendicular shaft. A second group mounted guard—for he was taking no chances against a surprise. The third group hastily connected the various parts of the portable radio together.
An instant later they were in communication with the island fortress, warning them to be prepared for an attack.