Kenneth Robeson - The Man of Bronze

Haltingly, with the greatest of difficulty, the snake man began to speak Mayan. A large proportion of his words were so poorly uttered as to convey no meaning to his listeners. At such times the blank expression of the warriors warned him to go back and repeat. The snake man was plainly an outsider.

But the red-fingered men were completely under his sway.

"I am the son of Kukulcan, blood of his blood, flesh of his flesh," the serpent one told his awed audience. "Did you seize such of the white invaders as you could and throw them into the sacrificial well? Did you change the color of the white devils' blue plane, painting marks of the Red Death upon it? This I commanded. Did you do it?"

"We did," muttered a warrior.

The brain back of the snake mask sensed something wrong. The hideous head jerked, surveying the assembled Mayans. "Where is your commander, Morning Breeze?"

"He is imprisoned." The information came reluctantly.

A great rage shook the masked figure. "Then Savage and his men are still in the good graces of your people?" he grated.

Slowly the serpent one extracted the story of what had happened from the humiliated gathering. The information seemed to stun him. He sat in morose silence, thinking.

A warrior, bolder than the rest, inquired: "What, O master, became of the two of our number we sent with you into the outer world to slay this Savage and his father?"

That disclosed who the snake man was. The murderer of Doc Savage's father! The master of the Red Death! The brains behind the Hidalgo revolution movement!

Words of answer were slow coming from the evil mask. The fiendish brain was racing. It would not do to let these red-fingered men know their two fellows had succumbed to the power of that supreme adventurer, Doc Savage. It might wipe out some of their faith in the impostor who was pretending to be the son of the sacred Feathered Serpent.

He needed all his power now, did the snake man. His plane and pilot destroyed by Doc Savage! This was a blow! He had intended to use that machine-gun-equipped plane in his revolution against President Carlos Avispa's government of Hidalgo.

And Savage and his friends were soundly intrenched in the Valley of the Vanished. Soon all chance to secure the vast sum needed to finance the revolution would be gone.

"Has Savage gained access to the gold?" asked the snake man.

"No," replied a well-posted Mayan. "He does not know but what the pyramid contains all the yellow metal in the Valley of the Vanished. King Chaac has not told him the truth yet."

None of the red-fingered ones heard the words next breathed into the serpent mask. They were: "Thank Heaven for that!"

The collected warriors began to stir uneasily. This son of the Feathered Serpent had been full of egoism and orders on other occasions. Now he was silent. And he had not explained what had happened to their two comrades. One Mayan repeated the question about their two fellows.

"They are alive and well!" lied the snake man. "Listen! Hear me well, my children, for here are my words of wisdom."

The warriors came under the spell again.

"The Red Death shall strike very soon!" rumbled the voice back of the serpent mask.

Genuine terror now seized upon the Mayans. They shuddered and drew together as if for protection. Not a one voiced a word.

"The Red Death strikes soon!" repeated the snake man. "It is the way of Kukulcan, the Feathered Serpent, my father, to show you he will not have these white men in your midst. You have sinned grievously in letting them stay. You were warned to destroy them. I, the voice of my father, the Feathered Serpent, warned you."

A warrior began: "We tried — "

"No excuses!" commanded the voice from the mask. "By doing two things only can you avert the Red Death, or stop its progress after it has descended upon you. First, you must destroy Savage and his men. Second, you must deliver to me, son of the Feathered Serpent, as much gold as ten men can carry. I will see the gold gets to the Feathered Serpent,"

The Mayans muttered, squirmed, shuddered.

"Destroy Savage — and bring me all the gold ten men can carry!" repeated the one they feared. "Only that will cause the Feathered Serpent to take back his Red Death! I have spoken. Go."

With steps driven to haste by their terror of this feathered snake of a thing, the red-fingered men took their departure. They would sit in their huts and talk about it the rest of the night. And the more they talked, the more likely they would be to do as they had been commanded. For it is a strange fact that a crowd of men are less brave in the face of threat than a single individual. They add to each other's fear.

The snake man did not linger after they had gone. He quitted the rendezvous, walking furtively, wincing as his bare feet were mauled by the sharp rocks.

Reaching a low bush, he drew from under it two ordinary gallon fruit jars. One of these was filled with a red, viscous fluid. The other contained a much thinner, paler fluid.

On one jar was written:

Germ culture which causes Red Death

On the other was inscribed:

Cure for Red Death

These the man in the serpent masquerade carried most carefully as he made his way in stealth toward the gilded pyramid.

Without being observed or arousing any slumbering Mayans, the snake man reached the pyramid. As he came near the monster pile of fabulously rich gold ore, he could not control his breathing, so strong was his lust for the yellow metal. The noisy purling of the stream of water down the pyramid side eliminated any chance of his being heard, though.

Up the steps the man felt his way in the intense darkness. The water raced by at his side. He reached the flattened top of the structure. There he felt about in the sepia murk until he found what he sought — a small, tanklike pool.

It was this pool that fed the racing brook down the pyramid side. Just how the pool was kept continuously supplied with water, in spite of its position high atop the pyramid, the man did not know or care.

He furtively lit a match.

The contents of the jar labeled Germ culture which carries Red Death, he emptied into the pool.

From experience, the fiend in the serpent mask knew the deadly germs would be fed down the pyramid water stream for about two days. And the entire clan of Mayans obtained their drinking water from that stream!

Two days and every person in the valley would be a victim of the gruesome Red Death. Only one thing could save them — treatment with the stuff in the other jar. Previously — for he had obtained many offerings of gold from this valley — the man in the snake mask had administered the cure exactly as he had the disease, by dumping it into the Mayan water supply.

It was because he saw the end of the golden offerings once Doc Savage appeared on the scene that the man had sought to keep Doc from reaching the Valley of the Vanished.

Carrying the empty jar, and the full jar of the cure, the man retreated down the pyramid. He made his way in silence to the remote end of the valley, where he had his hiding place. It was here he had concealed himself alter his plane pilot had dropped him by parachute into the valley the previous night.

En route, the man paused to smash the empty jar.

The clatter of the breaking glass instilled an ugly thought in his brain. He toyed with it.

"I will never learn the source of this gold from old Chaac," he growled. "And no one else knows the secret. So why should I trouble with curing them after they get sick?"

He made angry noises with his teeth. "If all in the valley were dead, I could take my time hunting the gold. And there is a fortune in that pyramid for the taking."

A mean grin crooked the lips back of the snake-head mask. "They will make many gold offerings before they find out I am not going to cure them!"