"What do you mean, Doc?" Ham barked.
"Let us drop that point until we have more information," Doc said.
Doc got up, went into the laboratory, and came back with the two animals, Habeas, the pig, and Chemistry, the questionable ape. Monk and Ham greeted the two animals with enthusiasm.
"Miss Davis," Doc said, "maybe you can help us."
MIAMI DAVIS had been silent. She sat on a large chair-a pert, dynamic girl, with copper-colored hair in a tangle, a haunted look in her large blue eyes.Her breathing was irregular, and often she was bothered by a convulsive affliction of her respiratory nerve centers which made it seem she was giggling-the after effects of the slight ga.s.sing she had received in the warehouse, at the beginning of the mystery. The dose she"d received hadn"t been enough to kill her like the other unfortunate victims.
Doc Savage went to her. "How do you feel?"
"Not so good," the girl admitted.
Doc asked, "What did you mean by inferring that perhaps you can help us?"
The girl bit her lips.
"I hate to say anything," Miami Davis said, "because I-well, I"m in love with him."
"That was why you ran away from the storehouse that night, wasn"t it?" Doc asked.
She nodded.
"You decided he had been in the storehouse, didn"t you?"
"Yes." Miami Davis nodded again. "He had been there, too. It was my watch. I had given it to him to have fixed, and he had lost it there in the storehouse."
Monk said, "I take it you"re talkin" about Hart."
The girl winced, bit her lips, looked down.
"Yes," she said.
"He"s the guy behind this," Monk insisted.
Doc Savage did not comment. Miami Davis apparently did not want to speak either, because she kept silent for a long time; then, finally, she doubled over in her chair and put her face in her hands, sobbing.
"Do you know the reason for this giggling mystery business?" Doc asked her.
The girl got out several wrenching sobs before she could answer. "No," she said. "No, I don"t know a thing about any ghosts."
Doc Savage showed no inclination to question her further. He got up, went out into the reception room, and worked the combination of his huge safe, leaving Monk and Ham and Miami Davis behind in the library.
Now Monk and Ham made two or three stumbling attempts to strike up a conversation with Miami Davis. They wanted to get her mind off William Henry Hart. They failed. She was so miserable that she even depressed Monk and Ham, so they fled into the reception room, where Doc had gone.
Doc Savage was before the huge safe, fingering through government bonds and gilt-edged securities.
He carried the securities over to the inlaid table and put them down.
"Ham," he said.
Ham-he was dapper again, his first act of freedom having been to change his clothes-came over and eyed the securities. Ham now wore immaculate evening dress, and carried one of his innocent-lookingblack sword canes, a supply of which he kept on hand.
Doc said, "Your legal training makes you the man to take charge of our next move."
"Charge of what?" Ham was puzzled.
"We are going into compet.i.tion," Doc Savage explained, "with the S.R.G.V."
"With the what?"
"The S.R.G.V.-the Society for the Relief of Gas Victims."
Ham frowned. "Compet.i.tion! But it strikes me that society is doing good work."
"Have you noticed prices they are paying for property?"
"No."
"If you had, it might change your ideas about the philanthropy of the S.R.G.V."
Ham frowned, rubbed his jaw thoughtfully and suddenly looked blank. The blankness was followed by an I-begin-to-see-through-this expression.
"Say!" he exploded. "Could it be that-"
"We had best not jump at conclusions," Doc Savage said. "But we will go into this ghost district and pay full value for any property that any victim wants to sell. Buy anything and everything offered. Do not let anybody rob you, but pay full prices."
"Right," Ham nodded.
"Also," Doc Savage added, "tell everyone who sells you property that he can buy it back for the same price at any time."
"Righto."
HAM went to work on the project at once. He sat down with a pencil and paper, composed handbills and newspaper advertis.e.m.e.nts and dispatched these; then, although it was late at night, he routed out a landlord near the gas area and rented a suite of offices.
Ham got painters at work putting a sign on the front of the building, by electric light: It read: DOC SAVAGE RELIEF AGENCY.
That was the name of the new organization. Ordinarily, Doc Savage did not permit his name to be used in connection with any public benevolencies, but this was different. It was believed that Doc"s name would draw, create confidence.
Ham maintained a law firm of his own that was so expertly staffed that it could run itself for months while Ham was off adventuring.
Ham supplied the new organization with employees from the law firm, and by ten o"clock the next morning, handbills were being scattered; newspapers carried half-page advertis.e.m.e.nts saying the "Doc Savage Relief Agency" would pay full price for all property in the ghost zone.Ham"s venture into real estate began to do a rushing business.
Ham did a landoffice trade all that day, and most of the night. His appraisers went around, wearing gas masks, and estimated the value of property being offered for sale.
Such was the reputation of Doc Savage-as the wrong fellow to try to pull any crookedness on-there were few attempts to get half a dozen prices for property. In fact, such was the bronze man"s name for fairness, the appraisers were often permitted to set a price, which was at once accepted.
All sellers were promised that they could buy the property back any time they wished, for the same price.
It was mid-afternoon on the second day after the establishment of the Doc Savage Relief Agency, when Birmingham Lawn put in an appearance.
Birmingham Lawn came into Ham"s office jauntily, his round melon of a stomach jumping up and down as he walked. He was whistling something.
"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Lawn," Ham said.
"You know me?" Lawn exclaimed.
"I"ve heard you described," Ham told him. "What can we do for you?"
Birmingham Lawn seemed to have something very pleasant on his mind. He perched on a chair, folded his hands over his tummy, and changed his tune.
"Look," he said. "I have a remarkable idea!"
"Yes?" Ham was interested.
"The newspapers," Birmingham Lawn pointed out, "are full of this great work you are now doing, buying up this property."
Ham did not comment, but it was a fact that the newspapers were giving Doc Savage"s relief agency considerable s.p.a.ce.
Lawn continued, "I have become very interested in this project, and I want to help." He repeated the last for emphasis. "I want to help!"
"Help-how?"
"I want to put my own money into your project. I am quite wealthy, you know."
"You mean," Ham demanded, "that you want to help us see that the gas victims don"t lose anything?"
"Exactly."
Ham was amazed. He was accustomed to gestures of grand philanthropy on the part of Doc Savage, but it was rare enough elsewhere and Ham was inclined to be bowled over.
Birmingham Lawn became, for such a lugubrious-looking man, extremely businesslike. "I will place unlimited cash at your disposal," he said, "and I will also put part of my own real estate office force to helping you. Will you accept?"
Ham considered the proposition. He called Doc Savage on the telephone, explained Birmingham Lawn"sproposal, and asked advice.
"Take him up," Doc said.
So Ham accepted Birmingham Lawn"s offer to join the Doc Savage Relief Agency.
THAT evening, fireworks began. A tabloid newspaper, which had never been particularly friendly to Doc Savage, was first to make insinuations.
The story was played up under front-page headlines, and evidently the newspaper"s phalanx of lawyers had gone into a huddle over the item, because it was cleverly worded. It said everything it was intended to say, but left no cracks through which the spear of a libel suit could be rammed.
The yarn took the form of several questions: WHERE IS DOC SAVAGE?.
WHAT COULD DOC SAVAGE TELL ABOUT THE MYSTERIOUS GIGGLING GHOST IN.
NEW JERSEY?.
WHY IS DOC SAVAGE BUYING UP PROPERTY IN THE GAS DISTRICT?.
SAVAGE IS REPORTED TO BE A HUMAN BENEFACTOR, BUT WHY DOES HE.
SURROUND HIMSELF WITH MYSTERY?.
These thinly veiled insinuations created a stir and comment, favorable and unfavorable.
Monk became extremely angry. The homely chemist called up the newspaper and went into detail about what he thought of the sheet. They were not impressed.
"We smell a rat in this property buying," the editor said.
"You smell yourself!" Monk snarled at him.
The homely chemist went looking for Doc Savage.
Doc Savage had been dividing his efforts. Part of the time he sought some trace of Renny, Long Tom and Johnny, and the rest of the time he devoted to the gas victims.
The bronze man"s skill in surgery and medicine was probably the greatest training he possessed; it had been his first application, his most intensive. Although he was skilled in many items, it was in surgery and medicine that he excelled.
AT odd times, Doc Savage made furtive expeditions on which he did some things that seemed senseless.
For instance: The sole object of the secret trips seemed to be to climb on top of factory buildings and apartment houses and look at smokestacks. Not only did he look at smokestacks, but he wore a gas mask while he was doing so; and sometimes he spent as much as an hour around each smokestack, making chemical tests.
He did not seem to be interested in any smokestacks except those in the gas zone.Doc told no one of these trips; but the results must have satisfied him, because on a number of occasions he made the strange, low, exotic, trilling sound which was his characteristic sound in moments of excitement, mental stress, or satisfaction.
Monk found Doc in a Jersey hospital, where the bronze man was working as a volunteer surgeon. Doc had managed somehow to keep his ident.i.ty unknown.
Monk explained about the tabloid newspaper insinuation.
"I saw it," Doc Savage admitted. "It is one of those things."
"But they"re insinuatin" there"s somethin" dirty about your relief agency!" Monk yelled.
"Do not let it bother you," Doc said.
Monk sighed disgustedly. When anybody stepped on the homely chemist"s toes, his impulse was to kick shins and knock heads together.
"O. K.," he grumbled. He changed the subject. "You doing any good helping these giggling victims?"
"Some," Doc said. "At least, we do not think there will be any more deaths. And in time, we will undoubtedly get a cure."