Kenneth Robeson - Quest of the Spider

Doc Savage, striking as a mighty bronze statue, occupied a chair near the window. Sunlight slanted against his remarkable features. An unending play of tiny flickerings came from his eyes, as though they were pools of flake gold being continually stirred.

Big Eric, Edna, and Ham lounged in chairs. None of the three were more than an arm's length from the bronze giant. Ham had recovered his sword cane from where he had lost it during the attack of the swamp men at Big Eric's mansion. He twiddled it idly in his fingers.

The group talked in low voices. Big Eric and Edna were giving Doc details about the Gray Spider—details which there had been no time to deliver before. They were also discussing peculiar phases of the situation.

"Horace Haas has not been attacked by the Gray Spider, as I understand it," Doc suggested.

"Not a single time," admitted Big Eric.

"If you and your daughter should meet death, control of the company would fall into the hands of Horace Haas. Is that right?"

Big Eric looked like he had been slapped. His vast face purpled.

"Now, listen here!" he grumbled: "Horace Haas may be a fop and a spendthrift, but I'll stake my life he wouldn't lay a finger on Edna or me! He's not the Gray Spider!"

"You're jumping to conclusions," Doc said dryly. "What I was getting at is this—the Gray Spider may be trying to kill you two so control of your concern will go to Horace Haas. The Gray Spider could then terrorize Haas into doing his bidding. I think you will agree with me that Haas does not seem to be a man of particularly strong character. The Gray Spider could control him, I'm afraid."

Big Eric was thoughtful. Then he muttered: "I’ll bet that's it!"

Again the gritting sound of gnashed teeth came from the silk-masked man hunkering at the keyhole in the adjacent office.

The Gray Spider swiftly opened the new, cheap hand bag. He wore pale-gray gloves for this work.

The bag contents consisted of a strong but small steel tank, to which was attached several feet of tough hose somewhat smaller than a lead pencil.

"Poison gas!" gritted the Gray Spider, stroking the steel tank. "The same kind they managed to escape when my plane released it ahead of their craft. But they will not evade it this time! The slightest breath of it is death! Even its touch brings a terrible fate."

He inserted the hose end in the keyhole. He turned on a valve at the tank. With a shrill squeal, gas began escaping. The stuff was under high pressure.

The Gray Spider scuttled out of Horace Haas's office.

THE squeal of the liberating gas seemed to increase its note. So great was the velocity with which it left the hose that it was thrown completely across the office in which the four intended victims sat.

Luckily, the gas cloud did not blow directly against Doc and his friends. But it made a barrage between them and the other door—a barrage which it would be death to penetrate.

The only other means of exit was the window. And below that was a death-fall of ten stories.

Doc Savage's amazing muscular development gave him the ability to ascend or descend the average brick wall as easily and rapidly as a lesser man would dash up a flight of stairs. But the Danielsen & Haas building had been constructed of white marble blocks polished to a glassy luster, and fitted together with joints that were hardly visible to the naked eye. Even Doc could find no handhold on that sheer wall!

Nevertheless, the window was the only escape.

Sinewy bronze arms wrenched up the window a chip part of a second after the gas began to whistle.

"Outside!" Doc's powerful voice crashed. "Stand on the sill!"

Big Eric and Edna hastily scrambled out. Ham followed. The window sill was hardly six inches wide. They were forced to grasp every handhold that offered to their finger tips.

"No use!" Big Eric wailed. "The infernal gas will seep around the window edges and get us! These sashes don't fit tight! I've often felt a draft when they're closed!"

It was Doc Savage's keen brain that solved the problem.

A small pot of ordinary white paste stood on Big Eric's shabby desk. Doc scooped this up. He joined the others outside on the window sill. He closed the window.

With quick strokes, Doc strung the gummy white paste around the window, effectively sealing all cracks.

"That's what I call quick work!" Big Eric said admiringly. "But why couldn't we have dashed through the gas cloud to the door?"

"The stuff is not only deadly if inhaled, but fatal if it touches the skin, unless I am mistaken," Doc explained. "I believe it is closely akin to the terrible mustard gas used in the World War."

Doc sidled swiftly to one end of the window sill.

The next window was half a dozen feet distant. The wall between was every bit as smooth as glass.

But Doc Savage, employing the springy tendons of his legs, and the balancing effect of his strong arms, leaped side-wise from the window sill. It seemed an impossible feat to accomplish without falling outward from the sheer building.

His great bronze frame appeared to skid a rising arc along the wall. He reached the next window. His powerful fingers grasped and held.

He was safe!

It had happened before the others could as much as emit a gasp of amazement.

"Stay where you are!" Doc commanded them.

A FRECKLED stenographer strangled on the gum she was chewing as the big bronze man appeared like magic in the window beside her desk. She was still coughing when Doc crossed the room and entered the corridor. She had received the shock of her gum-chewing career.

Doc watched the building entrance several minutes. He saw no one leave in a suspicious manner.

Returning upstairs, he noted that old Silas Bunnywell, the bookkeeper, occupied a tiny cubicle from the door of which the entrance of Horace Haas's office could be seen. Old Bunnywell was stooped over his ledgers.

"Have you noticed Horace Haas leave his office recently?" Doc inquired.

The old man took off his glasses and rubbed his reddened eyes. "No, sir. I'm quite sure I haven't. Mr. Haas must be in his office now. Only a few minutes ago, I saw two men hand a bag through his door."

"Describe them!" Doc commanded.

Elderly Silas Bunnywell gave an accurate description of Lefty and Bugs.

Doc recognized the pair from what Big Eric had told him of them.

"And Horace Haas is in his office now?" Doc said grimly.

"I am not sure. But he must have been there a few minutes ago. I am not able to observe all who enter, because of my work."

Doc swung to the door of Haas's office. He opened it. He was cautious, not knowing what form of death might lurk within for him. But he need not have been careful.

The office was empty, but Doc saw the gas contrivance.

He turned off the petcock on the tank of gas in the hand bag. Then he got a rope, went to the roof, and rescued Big Eric, Edna, and Ham from the window sill.

They held a serious council in Haas's office.

"It looks bad for friend Horace!" Ham said, tight-lipped.

"You mean you think Horace Haas turned that gas on us?" Big Eric muttered.

"What do you think?"

"I don't know," Big Eric replied, a long hesitation between each word. "I hate to think he'd do such a thing. But there's no reason why he should go out."

At this juncture, Horace Haas came into the room. His step was not as jaunty as usual. He looked like a fat, overfed pup somebody had just kicked. He gave a distinct start at sight of Doc and the others.

"I—er—hello," he said uncertainly.

Big Eric got to the point without delay.

"Where in thunder have you been?" he roared.

Horace Haas reddened angrily. "Since when was I tied to your apron strings? None of your business—where I've been!"