TEXT:  
   
  TUNNEL TERROR 
  A Doc Savage Adventure By Kenneth Robeson 
   
  Originally published in DOC SAVAGE Magazine August 1940 
   
  A Complete Book-length Novel by KENNETH ROBESON 
   
  Death fog . . . a terrible new menace . . .  mummified 
  corpses . . . and more—all these can’t stay Doc Sav- 
  age and his pals from throwing their best punches! 
   
   
  Chapter I 
  STRANGE FOG 
   
  HARDROCK HENNESEY had once 
  been called the toughest little mucker who 
  had ever crawled through a river’s belly. It 
  was said that if a drill broke while he was 
  on a tunnel job, he could eat his way 
  through rock. He looked as though he had 
  been eating rock now.  
  He spat on the dusty highway, stared 
  up and down the deserted stretch of dark 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  2 
  road, and started swearing. He swore for 
  three minutes. He was just getting warmed 
  up. And then he shrugged disgustedly, spat 
  again. 
  He 
  murmured, 
  “Ah, 
  nuts!” 
  and 
  started hiking along the dusty road once 
  again. He wished to the blasted devil that 
  he had never left New York City. 
  But there were no tunnels being 
  constructed at the moment in New York, 
  and here—in the West—they were calling 
  for miners and muckers on the greatest 
  water tunnel ever built. A tunnel that was 
  going to convey nine hundred million 
  gallons of water a day a hundred miles into 
  a great city. 
  And Hardrock Hennesey needed a 
  job. He was broke. Like every mucker or 
  miner who had ever helped build a tunnel, 
  he was broke between jobs. Money came 
  fast in this game. And it was spent the 
  same way. It was a wild, reckless—and 
  dangerous—existence. 
  Thus he was bumming his way 
  through 
  the 
  country. 
  According 
  to 
  estimations, he had only about three more 
  miles to go. But on this out-of-the-way back 
  highway, a car hadn’t passed him in the last 
  hour. 
  It was some time after nine o’clock, 
  and the moon was just coming up when the 
  farmer came rattling along in his old flivver. 
  Hardrock Hennesey spun around. 
  His leathery, flint-hard features brightened. 
  That is, a few more wrinkles appeared on 
  his scarred, old-looking face. He hitched up 
  his trousers around his skinny waist and got 
  his thumb stuck out in a “how-about-a-ride” 
  gesture. 
  The farmer rolled his heap right on 
  past Hardrock Hennesey. 
  Hardrock swore. This time he wasn’t 
  very subtle about it. He jumped up and 
  down and kicked at the dust with his worn 
  shoes. He just wished he had his hands on 
  that blankety-blank so-and-so’s throat. He 
  wished— 
  Ahead, beyond a slight dip in the 
  road, there floated back the sound of worn 
  brake shoes chattering. The flivver was 
  stopping! The farmer must have decided, 
  after looking Hardrock over as he passed, 
  that it was all right to give him a lift. 
  Hardrock went into a sprint, his thin, 
  hard-as-nails legs carrying his tough little 
  body along furiously. He arrived at the dip 
  in the road, started to yell, “Hey—” 
  He skidded to a stop in the dust and 
  stared. 
  He gawked at sight of what might 
  have been ground mist ahead. The night 
  was warm enough, and this part of the road 
  in a hollow cool enough to cause slight 
  ground fog. 
  And yet what he saw wasn’t fog. He 
  could see through it. It was like the kind of 
  mirage effect you see coming off tarred 
  pavements on August days. It wasn’t quite 
  white, nor quite gray, and it seemed to float 
  and swirl up from the dust. 
  Yet it wasn’t this that held Hardrock 
  Hennesey spellbound. He rubbed his eyes, 
  deciding that he’d never drink any more of 
  that stuff that he’d bought last night. It must 
  have been distilled from coal. Perhaps he 
  was getting astigmatism. 
  Because he stared at the fog 
  ahead—the stuff that he was positive he 
  could see through—and he couldn’t see 
  what should be parked there. No car. No 
  farmer. 
  Hardrock Hennesey growled, “Say, 
  who’s kiddin’ who?” and stalked ahead 
  toward the vague stuff that was like mist. 
  He reached the spot. 
  And he let out a whoop of pain and 
  leaped backward as though someone had 
  hit him with a ten-foot pole. He jerked up 
  and down, waving his hands and blowing 
  on his fingers. He felt of his face, drew his 
  hands away quickly. 
  It was just as though he had been 
  burned by live steam! 
   
   
  THE 
  tough 
  little 
  tunnel 
  worker 
  backed off from the spot, squinting out of 
  his intense gray eyes. He got down on his 
  hands and knees in the dust. He stared. He 
  tried to see beneath the peculiar, wispy-
  gray stuff ahead. In a way, it made him 
  think of a huge spider’s web. 
  He got up again, walked cautiously 
  forward and stuck out a questing finger. 
  The finger felt as though he’d 
  plunged it into the spout of a hot teakettle. 
  “What the hell?” Hardrock Hennesey 
  asked himself, and started doing some 
  more enthusiastic swearing. 
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  3 
  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 
  DOC SAVAGE AND HIS AIDS 
   
  There is a fascination about Doc Savage, an attraction that draws men from all walks of life 
  to his remarkable personality. And it was from this selection of manhood that Doc Savage 
  picked his group of five remarkable aids. These five men lead an existence more perilous 
  than any other group of men. For around Doc Savage there is always danger; they travel 
  from one end of the earth to the other, righting wrongs, helping the oppressed, punishing 
  evildoers. That's a dangerous job—you can bet on that! 
   
  Each one of Doc's aids is a topliner in his profession: 
   
  HAM—Brigadier General Theodore Marley Brooks, swell dresser, tough fighter, the 
  shrewdest lawyer that Harvard ever turned out. 
   
  MONK—Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Blodgett Mayfair, one of the world's foremost chemists. 
  He's a fighter, too; in fact, he looks more like a fighter than he looks like a chemist. But he's 
  tops in both lines. 
   
  RENNY—Colonel John Renwick, an engineer whose counsel is sought on projects all over 
  the globe. 
   
  LONG TOM—Major Thomas J. Roberts, who knows about all there is to know about 
  electricity.  
   
  JOHNNY—William Harper Littlejohn, renowned geologist and archaeologist. 
   
  These men receive no pay, need none, for all are wealthy in their own right from the 
  earnings of their respective professions. 
   
  Probably never again will there be a group to equal this group of altruistic adventurers. They 
  can think fast, act fast—and fight hard! 
   
  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 
  He knew damned right well he wasn’t 
  drunk. He hadn’t had a drink all day. And 
  he didn’t have a hangover. 
  He moved to the side of the road, 
  climbed a fence that adjoined a farmer’s 
  field, started circling the funny gray stuff 
  that floated in the air in the dip in the road. 
  Hardrock Hennesey was certain he 
  could see through the stuff. And he knew, 
  absolutely, that he’d heard the old flivver 
  come to a chattering stop. But where was it 
  now? Where was the farmer? 
  Dammit, something was cockeyed 
  here and he was quite sure it wasn’t 
  himself. He edged toward the foggy stuff. 
  And got burned again. Howling with 
  pain, Hardrock Hennesey once more 
  backed off and sat down on a rock to watch 
  the stuff. He rubbed his eyes. He stared at 
  his raw-red fingertips. He couldn’t figure it 
  out. 
  He sat there for perhaps fifteen 
  minutes, and no other cars came along, 
  and the night was very quiet, with the moon 
  climbing up in the sky like a white, round 
  face. 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  had 
  once 
  whipped a dozen muckers in a tunnel riot. 
  For a small-looking man—who, from his 
  weathered features, could have been forty 
  or 
  sixty—he 
  was 
  about 
  the 
  hardest 
  individual on two feet. Nothing much ever 
  scared him. 
  But there was something uncanny 
  about this strange fog stuff that had 
  stopped him now. He put his head in his 
  gnarled hands and sat there thinking, and 
  he wondered if he was cracking up. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  4 
  Perhaps too many years of working “under 
  pressure” had caught up with him. Maybe. 
  He looked up, and the fog had 
  dispersed.  
  Hardrock 
  jumped 
  up, 
  started 
  carefully forward, stretching out his hands 
  in front of him. This time they didn’t touch 
  anything hot. There seemed to be nothing 
  ahead. 
  Nothing, that is, except the farmer’s 
  old car. He saw it clearly now, there in the 
  roadway. He gulped. He stood very still and 
  rubbed his eyes and swore. His fists 
  knotted, and he stalked furiously forward. 
  Somebody was damned well going to pay 
  for pulling this gag on him. And that 
  somebody was going to be that gangling 
  farmer, that guy seated behind the wheel. 
  But there was no gag about the dead 
  man slumped over the steering wheel of the 
  car. Hardrock Hennesey jerked back in 
  horror at sight of the withered features, and 
  skin that was like old, brown leather. He 
  stared at the man. 
  The corpse that was like a dried-up 
  mummy! 
   
   
  HARDROCK HENNESEY had, at 
  various times in his dangerous career, seen 
  men die. He had observed half a dozen 
  men buried—smothered beneath muck in a 
  tunnel cave-in; he had seen a giant Negro 
  shot through planking and sand and water 
  in a “blow” beneath the East River. He had 
  seen men crushed to death beneath tons of 
  falling rock. 
  But what he observed now sort of 
  sickened him. He took off his dusty old hat 
  and wiped at his perspiring brow. Then he 
  reached out an inquiring finger and touched 
  the corpse’s face. 
  The browned, dried skin literally 
  cracked beneath his touch. The entire face 
  was shrunken like something out of a tomb 
  thousands of years old. 
  Hardrock Hennesey shuddered. But 
  he got up nerve enough to reach inside the 
  car and push the mummified thing across 
  the seat. Then he climbed in behind the 
  wheel and started up the engine. 
  He had to get to the town that he 
  knew was ahead; he had to tell them of 
  what he had seen. He figured he might 
  have to bust a few noses before he got 
  anyone to believe his story. 
  The car ran forward perhaps a 
  quarter 
  of 
  a 
  mile 
  before 
  it 
  started 
  hammering 
  and 
  bucking. 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey could even smell the engine 
  heat. Then the motor stopped completely, 
  “froze up.” 
  Hardrock climbed out, looked into the 
  radiator. He stuck his finger in the top. Dry! 
  He raised the hood and tried the petcock 
  drain located at the bottom of the radiator. 
  No water ran out. 
  Puzzled, Hardrock recalled that the 
  car had been running all right when it 
  passed him on the road the first time. Even 
  though it had rattled considerably, there 
  had been no indication of its being without 
  water. 
  He noted the license number of the 
  old car, went back to take one look at the 
  mummified farmer. He’d have to walk the 
  remainder of the way into town. 
  He was standing up on the running 
  board, and just as he started to turn away 
  again something that was on the back seat 
  caught his eye. 
  It was a package, neatly wrapped 
  and apparently addressed for mailing. 
  Hardrock leaned over and looked at the 
  thing. He picked it up. 
  The package was about six inches 
  square and half an inch thick. It was very 
  light in weight. It was addressed merely: 
   
  To: 
  Clark Savage, Jr.  
  New York City  
  New York 
   
  Hardrock Hennesey stared. 
  “Hell’s fire!” he exploded, and got 
  down off the car and started running down 
  the road toward town. He had heard of 
  Clark Savage, Jr. In fact, he knew a fellow 
  who worked for him. What connection had 
  this mummy with the remarkable person 
  known as Doc Savage? 
  A mile down the road Hardrock came 
  to a roadside tavern from which was 
  coming enough racket to tell him a certain 
  fact. The racket from inside indicated either 
  a revival meeting or a riot. Ten chances to 
  one, it was the latter. Also, it was Saturday 
  night. 
  And that meant—tunnel mockers! 
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  5 
  HARDROCK 
  HENNESEY 
  hurried 
  inside and immediately big men lined up at 
  the bar turned and hailed him and started 
  yelling things like: 
  “Well, you old buzzard!” 
  “Hardrock! Line up, boy, and drink!” 
  “Say, boy!” another man yelled. “It’s 
  about time Hardrock showed up. Now you’ll 
  see some work on this new tunnel job!” 
  A new man among the muckers 
  asked a question of an old-timer. He was 
  told: 
  “Look, fella, Hardrock Hennesey’s 
  the greatest little mucker that ever ate 
  hardrock. He ain’t afraid of hell and 
  dynamite. He’s worked on every big job 
  from New York to Frisco, the South, 
  everywhere.” 
  Tunnel 
  workers—miners 
  and 
  muckers 
  and 
  hardrock 
  men—probably 
  make up the greatest fraternity of workmen 
  in the world. You’ll find the same gangs on 
  jobs from Boston to Alaska. You’ll find them 
  working like demons, drinking hard and 
  fighting on their nights off. And you’ll find 
  them sticking together. Hardrock Hennesey 
  was perhaps the best hardrock man in the 
  game. He was known everywhere. 
  Hands now slapped him on the back 
  and drinks were pushed in his face. 
  But suddenly, and strangely, other 
  muckers realized that their old friend was 
  not accepting the drinks or returning their 
  greetings. He was just standing there 
  staring at them oddly, his intense gray eyes 
  wide and bright. 
  “Look,” Hardrock demanded. “I’m not 
  drunk, am I? And—” 
  Someone laughed. “Hell, no! Maybe 
  that’s what’s wrong with you. Come on, 
  fella, catch up!” 
  “And I don’t look crazy, do I?” 
  Hardrock Hennesey managed to get in. 
  The men quieted somewhat. They 
  grouped around the hard little tunnel worker 
  and looked at him puzzledly. 
  Someone 
  in 
  the 
  group 
  finally 
  managed 
  to 
  describe 
  the 
  thing 
  that 
  everyone saw—but was afraid to admit.  
  “I’ll be damned!” the man exclaimed. 
  “Look at ‘im! Hardrock is . . . well, he’s 
  scared!” 
  Just about that moment someone got 
  a drink into Hardrock’s hand. It was a water 
  glass half full of whiskey, a hundred proof. 
  Hardrock Hennesey took the stuff down at 
  a gulp. 
  He grabbed the one who had called 
  him scared. His right fist traveled in a short 
  are. The fellow went down without even a 
  grunt. 
  Then Hardrock rapped, “Now, listen 
  to this.” 
  He started talking. He told about 
  walking along the road a mile or so back. 
  He mentioned the peculiar fog, the misty 
  stuff that you ought to be able to see 
  through—but somehow could not. 
  He said, “The stuff burned me!”  
  Someone asked, “You mean . . . the 
  fog?”  
  “Whatever was there around the car 
  that I couldn’t see,” Hardrock said. 
  Men stared. Someone laughed. 
  Hardrock grabbed the big man and 
  slapped his face, and the fellow’s head 
  jerked around on his neck. 
  “You ever see a man change into a 
  mummy?” Hardrock demanded. 
  Apparently no one had ever seen 
  such a phenomenon. Hardrock led the way 
  toward the door. 
  “You guys come along with me,” he 
  ordered, “an’ I’ll show you something that’ll 
  knock your ears down.”  
  He led the men back along the dusty 
  roadway. There were perhaps two dozen 
  tunnel workers in all. Big men. Hard men. 
  Guys who knew Hardrock Hennesey from 
  former jobs. They were now convinced that 
  hard-boiled little Hardrock Hennesey was 
  far from being drunk or crazy. 
  They were all now anxious to see a 
  farmer who had become a mummy. They 
  pushed past one another as they arrived at 
  the old battered car. 
  They stared. They turned and looked 
  at tough Hardrock Hennesey and their 
  faces were grim. 
  A worker said, “This ain’t a very 
  funny gag.”  
  “Let’s take him apart!” suggested 
  another. 
  But Hardrock elbowed them aside 
  and himself moved up to the car. 
  The 
  mummified 
  man 
  had 
  disappeared. 
  This wasn’t the only thing that held 
  him rigid. His gaze had jerked to the rear 
  seat, to the object that he had left there. It 
  was the one thing that might have 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  6 
  explained a part of this mystery. Hardrock 
  was thinking of the small package that had 
  been addressed to the man known as Doc 
  Savage. 
  The package, also, was missing. 
   
   
  Chapter II 
  CALL FOR HELP 
   
  THE free-for-all battle that followed 
  was somewhat of a honey. 
  It started when the fellow who was 
  new to the gang called Hardrock Hennesey 
  a liar. Hardrock climbed down off the old 
  car’s 
  running 
  board 
  and 
  commenced 
  throwing punches in various directions. 
  Several of the muckers had had 
  enough to drink to get sore about the whole 
  business. 
  They 
  joined 
  the 
  mêlée 
  enthusiastically. 
  Hardrock Hennesey knocked two 
  men down, swung on a third and growled, 
  “Now are you convinced, wise guy? I tell 
  you the fog burned me. It musta burned up 
  that farmer in the car!” 
  “Crazy as a loon!” said the big tunnel 
  worker, and that got him a bust on the 
  nose. He howled with pain and sailed into 
  tough Hardrock Hennesey. Others helped 
  out. They finally got Hardrock down in the 
  dusty road and tried to pound some sense 
  into his head. 
  But the more they pounded, the 
  more Hardrock Hennesey swore and kicked 
  and battered away at his opponents. 
  By the time several State troopers 
  arrived in their white-painted car, the battle 
  was really going great guns. And it was 
  fifteen minutes before Hardrock was finally 
  subdued and carried off toward the local 
  jail. 
  That was after Hardrock Hennesey 
  had tried to tell some of the troopers his 
  story. For now that they had enjoyed a 
  good fight, few of the tunnel workers 
  wished to see their old friend carted off to 
  the local hoosegow. And so they merely 
  suggested that Hardrock Hennesey repeat 
  what he had told them about the mysterious 
  fog and a farmer who became a mummy. 
  Hardrock was halfway through his 
  account when one trooper looked at 
  another. Then they grabbed Hardrock and 
  piled him in their car. 
  “Balmy!” was their opinion. 
  From conversation that Hardrock 
  Hennesey heard as they rode toward town, 
  he 
  gathered 
  that 
  the 
  troopers 
  had 
  recognized the old flivver. It appeared the 
  farmer’s name was Brown—Zeke Brown. 
  As one officer remarked, “Zeke’s so 
  damn’ tight he’s always running out of gas. 
  He must have run out again and walked to 
  the village.” 
  “That’s about it,” a second trooper 
  agreed.  
  Hardrock Hennesey started to put in, 
  “Listen, he didn’t walk nowheres. He’s 
  dead, I tell you! He’s as dead as—” 
  “Shuddup!” a trooper rapped, and 
  slapped him on the mouth. 
  Hardrock 
  subsided 
  again. 
  And 
  shortly the trooper car drew up before a 
  small building that bordered the town 
  ahead. In the distance, Hardrock Hennesey 
  could see a towering steel framework, 
  some buildings and the reflection of 
  floodlights against the night sky. That would 
  be Shaft 9, where he had been headed. 
  Shaft 9, one of the many units in the tunnel 
  project. 
  The troopers climbed out, stood 
  aside, motioned Hardrock Hennesey out 
  also. 
  Hardrock came out of the car in a 
  flying leap, bowled over two of the three 
  officers, clipped the third on the jaw, circled 
  the small jail, and took flight in the woods 
  that pressed up close behind the building. 
   
   
  ANGRY bees arrived over his head. 
  The bees were bullets, and they were from 
  the troopers’ guns. They thunked into trees, 
  and were too close for comfort. Luckily, 
  Hardrock Hennesey got deep into the 
  woods, and none of the slugs found him. 
  He kept running. He ran for perhaps 
  a mile before he paused to listen. The 
  moon was overhead now, and it gave 
  enough light to help him find his way. There 
  was no sound behind him save the 
  occasional scurrying of some small animal 
  through the brush.  
  Hardrock made his way back toward 
  the highway again. A half hour later, 
  cautiously, he emerged on the roadway and 
  stared up and down. He was at a point 
  beyond the town, and in the distance he 
  could see the light of Shaft 9. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  7 
  The old fellow seated on the rock 
  beside 
  the 
  road 
  watched 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey’s cautious movements. Then he 
  asked: 
  “Reckon you saw it too, eh?” 
  Hardrock lumped. He had not seen 
  the old man. He gawked at him now. 
  The fellow was all of ninety years 
  old. He was bent over and withered. He 
  leaned on a cane that he must have cut out 
  of a gnarled piece of hickory. His withered 
  old skin looked like that of a— 
  A mummy! 
  The 
  thought 
  gave 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey a start. 
  But then this mummy was alive. 
  What was it he had said? 
  “See what?” Hardrock demanded 
  suspiciously. He looked up and down the 
  road, but he saw no one approaching. 
  “The thing that follows you in the 
  night,” said the old man. He sounded 
  worried. 
  “What thing?” 
  Something about the tone of the old 
  fellow’s voice made a chill slide down 
  Hardrock Hennesey’s spine.  
  “The thing that is like a ghost. I 
  reckon, mister, I’ve seen it a dozen times. It 
  almost got me tother night. Reckon it’ll get 
  me any time now, too. I’m too old to get 
  away from it.” 
  Hardrock swallowed. Maybe this old 
  geezer was nuts. And yet he remembered 
  the strange thing that had happened to 
  himself. Thinking of that, he recalled the 
  package. 
  The 
  package 
  that 
  had 
  been 
  addressed to Doc Savage, and which had 
  disappeared. 
  He suddenly grabbed the old fellow’s 
  arm and asked, “Maybe you can tell me 
  where I can find a phone.” And, as an 
  afterthought, “A phone where maybe there 
  won’t be too many people around listening 
  when I make a call?” 
  The oldster nodded. He almost 
  creaked when he moved, pointing toward 
  town. 
  “You foller this road a piece until you 
  come to Sam’s garage, and in there you’ll 
  find a phone, mister. Sam’ll probably be 
  across the road at his house. He only 
  comes over when someone honks for gas. 
  But you go right ahead and use the phone, 
  and he won’t mind a bit.” 
  “Thanks,” said Hardrock quickly, and 
  got away from there. The old fellow had 
  sort of got under his skin, what with all that 
  had happened to him in the past hour. 
   
   
  HE reached the garage without being 
  spotted by any troopers with guns, without 
  being seen by anyone.  
  A light was turned on above the 
  single gas pump outside the place. As the 
  old man had said, Sam was apparently 
  across the road in his house. There were 
  lights visible in the kitchen of the place. 
  So 
  much 
  the 
  better, 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey figured. He preferred that no one 
  know of the phone call he was going to 
  make. 
  Two minutes later, using the phone 
  he located inside the garage building, he 
  was 
  connected 
  with 
  the 
  New 
  York 
  headquarters of Doc Savage. Hardrock 
  made a single request. He would like to 
  speak to a man named Colonel John 
  Renwick, the engineer in the organization 
  of Doc Savage. 
  He got a break. Colonel John 
  Renwick happened, at that moment, to be 
  at the headquarters. 
  A great, booming voice came over 
  the wire. Hardrock yanked the receiver 
  away from his ear. It had been so long 
  since he had seen his old friend that he had 
  forgotten about the giant-sized fellow’s 
  bulllike voice. 
  “Yes?” said the man on the other 
  end.  
  “This you, Renny?” Hardrock asked. 
  “Yes. Who’s this?” the crashing voice 
  demanded.  
  Hardrock gave details about himself. 
  He finished with, “Remember that Hudson 
  River tunnel job where they called you in for 
  advice? Remember that fight one day up in 
  the heading?” 
  The man named Renny suddenly 
  laughed. Hardrock thought the receiver 
  diaphragm would split.  
  “Hardrock, you old buzzard!” Renny 
  said. “How’s everything? Where are you?” 
  Apparently the fellow named Renny 
  was glad to hear from his old friend. 
  Hardrock Hennesey said tensely, 
  “You, Renny, you gotta come here.” 
  “Where?” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  8 
  Hardrock 
  outlined 
  the 
  particular 
  section of mountainous country where he 
  was. He mentioned Yellow River Dam, a 
  mammoth storage shed that was being 
  constructed in conjunction with the one-
  hundred-mile long tunnel project. Yellow 
  River Dam was only a few miles above 
  Shaft 9, where Hardrock hoped to get a job. 
  “There’s something funny up here,” 
  Hardrock continued. 
  “What do you mean?” 
  “Well,” 
  said 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  worriedly, “there was a fella with a package 
  for Doc Savage. He died. He died, and he 
  looked like a mummy.” 
  The 
  man 
  named 
  Renny 
  said, 
  “Hardrock, you’ve been drinking again!” 
  The hard-boiled little tunnel worker 
  rapped, “Listen, Renny; this isn’t any joke. 
  An’ I’m cold sober. You just listen to this. 
  There was a peculiar sort of fog. It was sort 
  of transparent stuff, and again it wasn’t. 
  Well, this farmer—this fella that died—got 
  into the stuff and I couldn’t get near him. 
  He’s the one who had the package for Doc 
  Savage.” 
  “Have you the package now?” 
  “No, it’s gone. But about this fog—” 
  “Yes?” 
  Hardrock paused, wiping at his brow 
  with the crook of his arm. He realized that it 
  was a warm night, but suddenly he felt 
  unusually hot. 
  He continued: “This fog stuff was as 
  hot as a furnace. It burned like live steam. 
  Later, I found this farmer and he looked just 
  like a dried-up mummy!” 
  Renny said nothing for a moment. 
  Then he put in, “And he’s the one who had 
  the package for Doc Savage?” 
  “Yes. And, Renny, there’s something 
  else!” 
   “What?” 
  “It’s—” 
  This time, Hardrock Hennesey felt 
  the heat that seemed to crawl over him like 
  something alive and menacing. He turned 
  slightly away from the phone, staring over 
  his shoulder. 
  And he let out a yell as the 
  instrument slipped from his stiff fingers. 
  Because the fog stuff was right there 
  behind him; floating like tendrils of clawing, 
  ghostlike fingers through the open doorway. 
  Hardrock Hennesey could apparently see 
  through the strange stuff, and yet couldn’t. 
  It was uncanny. 
  He leaped out of the chair where he 
  had been seated, stared frantically around 
  the small space. His face already felt as if it 
  was frying in the steamy heat. The stuff 
  was slowly enveloping him with ethereal, 
  opaque fingers. 
  With a gasp of horror, Hardrock 
  Hennesey jumped toward the rear of the 
  room. He sought a window. But before he 
  could locate one, the floating, peculiar fog 
  was upon him. He sank down in a 
  shuddering heap, and as the strange veil 
  dropped over him he let out a frantic yell. 
  “Renny! Help! It’s got me!” 
   
   
  Chapter III 
  LIVING DEAD MAN 
   
  THE fast, streamlined plane came 
  down out of the night sky, circled the field, 
  landed and taxied to a stop not far from the 
  roadside gas station in the mountains. 
  The first person who stepped out of 
  the plane was indeed a strange-looking 
  individual. He was about as broad as he 
  was wide. All parts of his exposed body 
  contained bristly, red hair that looked like 
  stubby, thin nails. He had incredibly homely 
  features made to hold up traffic at street 
  corners. 
  In a squeaky, almost childlike voice 
  he piped, “Blazes! We oughta fumigate that 
  plane. Something’s been bitin’ me all the 
  way from New York.” 
  Without bending forward, the homely 
  one scratched at his leg, in the vicinity of 
  his knee. This was accomplished because 
  the man’s arms dangled well below his 
  knees. He was built like an oversized ape. 
  From the plane had followed a 
  slender, nattily dressed man with a waspish 
  waist. He carried a neat black cane. He 
  frowned in disgust at the apelike individual 
  and said, “Did you ever try soap and water 
  for that?” 
  Immediately, the hairy one made a 
  roundhouse swing at the dapper-looking 
  man. He glared and said, “That sounded 
  like a dirty remark.” 
  The slender one grinned. “It was 
  suited to the occasion, you hairy baboon!” 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  9 
  Just then, two queer-looking animals 
  scurried from the plane door. One was a 
  pig, a scrawny-looking pig with beanpole 
  legs and a snout made for rummaging 
  inside long tin cans. The other animal was 
  a runt-sized ape that looked suspiciously 
  like the hairy individual who spoke in the 
  childlike voice. 
  The runt ape moved toward the 
  person who looked not unlike himself, and 
  took a nip out of the man’s leg. The spot 
  where the animal took the bite was right 
  where the fellow had been scratching. 
  Abruptly, understanding leaped into 
  the hairy one’s eyes. 
  “Ye-o-ow!” he squalled. “It’s that 
  blasted Chemistry that’s been biting me all 
  the way up from New York!” 
  He made a dive for the chimp. The 
  tall, well-dressed man got in the way and 
  quickly swung the animal up in his arms. 
  Apparently Chemistry was his pet. 
  He kicked at the scrawny pig, 
  remarked icily, “Take that Habeas away 
  from here before I annihilate him! He must 
  have fleas!” 
  There threatened to be a riot 
  between the two men until the giant-sized 
  figure stepped out of the plane and said, 
  “We seem to be missing something.” He 
  pointed to the gas-station building down the 
  field.  
  The third arrival was the man whom 
  Hardrock Hennesey had phoned—Colonel 
  John Renwick, but better known as Renny 
  to his friends and the other aids in Doc 
  Savage’s organization. Renny was six 
  inches over six feet, weighed well over two 
  hundred pounds, and had hands like quart-
  size pails. He also had a gloomy-looking 
  face which reminded you of an undertaker 
  without clients. 
  When he spoke, his booming voice 
  shattered the summer night’s quietude. 
  It 
  was 
  the 
  hairy 
  fellow 
  who 
  demanded, “Missing what? Where?” He 
  squinted out of his small eyes toward the 
  spot that Renny had indicated. 
  “There seems to be some sort of 
  fight in progress,” Renny explained. He 
  turned to the well-dressed man who had 
  been ready to clout the apish fellow. “See it, 
  Ham?” 
  “Ham,” apparently, did. His face 
  brightened. He set down the pet chimp. 
   
   
   
  “Monk 
  must 
  be 
  slipping,” 
  he 
  remarked coolly. “First time he’s ever 
  passed up a fight in his life!”  
   
   
   
  Obviously 
  Monk 
  was 
  the 
  hairy 
  individual with whom he’d been arguing. 
  Monk let out a howl as he spotted 
  some sort of mix-up taking place over near 
  the gas station. His short legs took him in a 
  wild gallop across the field. 
  Renny and the one called Ham 
  followed along in time to enter into a 
  shambles that sounded like a dog fight with 
  a stray alley cat cornered in the middle. 
   
   
  BUT it was hairy Monk who was in 
  the center of the fight. Around him fists 
  swung and there were assorted kinds of 
  cursing. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  10 
  The faces of the fellows behind the 
  swinging fists looked like something made 
  to frighten small children. They were of the 
  thug variety. 
  A rotund, red-faced man was on the 
  outside of the mêlée, jumping up and down 
  and yelling. 
  “These men just broke into my gas 
  station!” he screamed. “Help!” 
  Giant Renny plowed into the group 
  and his fists started swinging. Men were 
  knocked sprawling. The sound the giant 
  engineer’s fists made as they hit various 
  individuals was like the noise a chunk of 
  cement makes striking soft leather. 
  Renny looked unusually gloomy—
  whereas he was probably enjoying himself 
  immensely. 
  As was the one named Ham. Instead 
  of using rough-house tactics, he merely 
  flicked at some of the battling men with 
  what appeared to be a slender sword. He 
  had drawn the sword from the black cane, 
  which was obviously some sort of sheath. 
  Two men sighed and lay down and 
  seemed to forget all about the fight. They 
  could hardly know that the end of the sword 
  cane contained a mild anaesthetic drug that 
  would hold them unconscious for some 
  time. 
  Three fellows broke loose of the 
  surging battle and took out for the nearby 
  woods. 
  It was hairy Monk who howled, 
  “What the blazes! I was doin’ fine all by 
  myself. What’s the idea of interrupting?” 
  He glared at well-dressed Ham. 
  Someone cracked Monk in the jaw during 
  this momentary intermission. Monk howled, 
  grabbed the one who had hit him, upended 
  him and started bouncing the fellow’s head 
  on the ground. 
  And all the time the plump gas-
  station owner hopped up and down outside 
  the fighting mass and yelled things like, 
  “Help! Murder! Police!” 
  The police arrived in the form of a 
  State-trooper 
  car 
  loaded 
  with 
  husky, 
  powerful young men in snappy uniforms. 
  But before they could swing into the battle, 
  three more men had ducked clear and 
  disappeared into the nearby woods. 
  All those that were left lay sprawled 
  in the dusty roadway. That is, all except 
  hairy Monk, smooth-looking Ham—whose 
  collar was not even disturbed—and giant 
  Renny. 
  Monk complained, “Blast it! An’ we 
  was just gettin’ started!” 
  A trooper rapped, “What goes on?” 
   
   
  THE red-faced station owner, now 
  that the law had arrived in force, stepped 
  forward and said, “There were half a dozen 
  tunnel 
  workers 
  passing. 
  I 
  had 
  just 
  discovered the crooks who broke into my 
  station. I yelled for help, and the tunnel men 
  were helping me out.” 
  He turned, indicated the three who 
  had arrived from the plane. “I don’t know 
  about these three. I don’t know whether 
  they were helping these tunnel men or the 
  crooks!” 
  It appeared that all six men lying on 
  the ground were tunnel workers. One at a 
  time, they started sitting up and rubbing at 
  bruised jaws. 
  The 
  thugs—the 
  ones 
  who 
  had 
  broken into the station—had disappeared to 
  parts unknown. 
  It was quick-thinking Ham who 
  asked, “Why did they break into your 
  station, mister?” 
  The fat owner apparently didn’t 
  know. 
  “The fight,” he said, “started before I 
  could investigate.” 
  The troopers were looking at Ham 
  and his partners suspiciously. Ham said, 
  “Perhaps we should explain.” He looked at 
  big Renny, and the engineer nodded. 
  “Explain what?” one trooper asked.  
  “About Hardrock Hennesey.” 
  There were seven State troopers. All 
  stiffened at Ham’s words. Because all knew 
  of the crazy story that had been told by 
  Hardrock Hennesey earlier tonight, 
  a 
  cockeyed yarn about a mummified man and 
  a fog that burned. 
  “What do you know about Hardrock 
  Hennesey?” one of the troopers demanded. 
  “This,” put in Renny. “He called me in 
  New York. He told us about some sort of 
  mystery taking place up here. Since he’s an 
  old 
  friend, 
  we 
  hopped 
  up 
  here 
  to 
  investigate. And we ran into this.” 
  Renny made no mention of Doc 
  Savage. He did not explain that Ham was 
  really Brigadier General Theodore Marley 
  Brooks, a well-known graduate of the 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  11 
  Harvard Law School, and the attorney in 
  the organization of Doc Savage. 
  Or that Monk, the hairy individual, 
  was really Lieutenant Colonel Andrew 
  Blodgett Mayfair, a renowned chemist—
  regardless 
  of 
  his 
  resemblance 
  to 
  a 
  belligerent gorilla. 
  The 
  two 
  pets, 
  Habeas 
  and 
  Chemistry, had scurried back to the plane. 
  The 
  troopers, 
  their 
  forces 
  augmented, were still seeking tough little 
  Hardrock Hennesey. Naturally they were 
  somewhat suspicious of Renny and his 
  partners. 
  “Where’s Hardrock Hennesey now?” 
  one inquired. 
  Monk stuck out his jaw. “Brother,” he 
  piped, “that’s what we come up here to find 
  out. Hardrock was talkin’ to Renny, an all of 
  a sudden he cut short his call and started 
  yellin’ for help. Something’s phony as hell 
  around here.” 
  One trooper stared curiously at 
  Monk’s ugly features and commented, 
  “Yes, I guess so.” 
  Monk was ready to take a poke at 
  the fellow when Ham suggested quickly, “It 
  might be a good idea to look around. There 
  must have been a reason for crooks 
  breaking into this man’s gas station. We 
  had Hardrock Hennesey’s call traced—and 
  it came from here.” 
  Everyone shoved inside the small 
  building, and it was in there that they found 
  the mummified corpse. 
   
   
  THE thing that had once been a man 
  was quite hideous. 
  The whole body had shrunken, as 
  though drained of every bit of moisture that 
  had ever been in it. Skin hung onto the 
  skeleton that was left like dried-up, dirty, 
  stiff cloth. The features of the face had 
  shrunken so that it was impossible to tell 
  whether the man had been young—or very 
  old. 
  One of the tunnel men had pushed 
  forward. A little while ago he had been 
  pretty drunk; now he was sober. 
  He murmured in awe, “It . . . it’s 
  Hardrock!”  
  Another mucker agreed. “Yep. Look 
  at his clothes. That’s what Hardrock 
  Hennesey was wearing when we saw him 
  tonight.” 
  The speaker’s voice grew hushed. 
  “And we didn’t believe Hardrock when he 
  tried to tell us about that farmer!” 
  A trooper had been going through 
  the mummified man’s clothing. He removed 
  a letter from an inside pocket, opened it, 
  read something. 
  Then he nodded. “It’s Hardrock 
  Hennesey, all right. This is a letter of 
  introduction to the super at Shaft 9.” 
  Everyone started talking at once. 
  During this, Renny stepped up to one of the 
  troopers and requested, “Mind if I just look 
  at him a moment? He was an old friend.” 
  Renny indicated the shrunken corpse on 
  the floor. 
  The trooper shrugged. “O. K. by me, 
  fella.” 
  Renny stooped down while Monk 
  and Ham were busy questioning the tunnel 
  men. No one could explain the mystery. But 
  for big men who pitted themselves against 
  constant dangers below the earth’s surface, 
  who were in the habit of treating life as 
  something that might be snuffed out at any 
  time, they now looked awed. 
  One said, “I wonder what Hardrock 
  meant about that fog.” 
  “What fog?” asked a trooper who, 
  apparently, 
  had 
  not 
  heard 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey’s story earlier.  
  Before anyone could answer, there 
  was a shout of excitement from outside the 
  small building. Monk and Ham were first 
  outside. 
  The stout man, Sam, who owned the 
  station, was indicating a large barrel that 
  was on a small platform beside the building. 
  “Look!” he cried. “It’s completely dry!” 
  Monk squinted inside the barrel, and 
  then at the fat man. 
  “So what?” he wanted to know. 
  “Listen,” the stout man went on, “that 
  barrel was almost plumb full of water a 
  couple of hours ago. It’s a rain barrel.” 
  “Maybe somebody dumped it,” Monk 
  said. 
  But the man shook his head. “How 
  could they?” he demanded. “It’s fastened 
  down!” 
  No one had an answer for that. 
  It was Monk who ambled inside, took 
  another look at the mummified man, then 
  came outside again and stood staring at the 
  empty rain barrel. But, for once, he kept his 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  12 
  mouth shut. Ham gave him a peculiar 
  regard. 
  While fat Sam was trying to figure 
  what had become of his rain water, Renny 
  drew his two partners aside and murmured. 
  “There’s 
  something 
  we 
  ought 
  to 
  investigate.” The powerful engineer had a 
  time trying to keep his voice down to a 
  whisper. 
  “Investigate what?” Ham queried.  
  “Hardrock Hennesey.” 
  “But he’s dead!” the dapper lawyer 
  insisted.  
  “Come on,” suggested Renny, and 
  he led the way as they slipped away from 
  the group. He said nothing until they had 
  returned to their plane. There, Renny 
  locked the cabin door. 
  The pets, who had been chasing 
  each other wildly around the field, joined 
  them. 
  Monk, puzzled, demanded, “What 
  are you gonna do, Renny?” 
  “Find Hardrock Hennesey,” the big 
  engineer said. 
   
   
  MONK pointed back toward the gas 
  station. “You mean that—” 
  Renny nodded. 
  He said, “You see, Hardrock, for a 
  tough little guy, was always somewhat 
  superstitious. He always carried a miniature 
  rabbit’s foot on a chain around his neck. 
  But the rabbit’s foot was not being worn by 
  that fellow who became a mummy.” 
  Ham had an answer for that. 
  “Someone could have removed it,” 
  he said.  
  “Naturally,” agreed Renny. “But they 
  couldn’t have removed the thing that was 
  on Hardrock’s chest. I recall it very well.” 
  “What?” 
  “Hardrock always figured that some 
  day he might die in a river tunnel. In water. 
  So he once had a mermaid tattooed on his 
  chest. He was a great one for doing crazy 
  things like that.” 
  “And there is no mermaid tattooed on 
  the man’s chest back there?” Ham asked. 
  “Correct.” 
  Monk’s small eyes brightened. “Then 
  Hardrock must still be alive!” 
  Ham gave his homely partner a sour 
  look. 
  “Sometimes,” the lawyer said icily, 
  “you almost show signs of intelligence!” 
  It looked, for the moment, as if there 
  was going to be a fight. For these two 
  unusual fellows liked nothing better than an 
  argument. 
  But Renny stopped it with the 
  remark, “The logical place to start would be 
  at Shaft 9, near here. That’s where 
  Hardrock was headed in the first place. 
  Well walk.” 
  They 
  started 
  out, 
  hairy 
  Monk 
  commenting in his squeaky voice, “I’m 
  gonna 
  enjoy 
  meetin’ 
  that 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey. Bet he’s a great fighter, from 
  what I’ve heard.” 
  Ham said, “You’ve got a one-track 
  mind, you hairy mistake. What we really 
  would like to learn is what was in that 
  package Hardrock mentioned. The package 
  addressed to Doc.” 
  Monk growled something. 
  “I’m still more interested in that little 
  tunnel mucker,” he insisted. 
  The hairy chemist was due for a 
  surprise when they got to Shaft 9. But 
  before that happened, they ran into 
  something else. 
  It was the excited, shoving, noisy 
  argument that was taking place near the 
  opening of the shaft. 
   
   
  Chapter IV 
  THE DISAPPEARING MEN 
   
  SHAFT 9 was only one in the series 
  of openings that formed a chain in the great 
  water-tunnel project. South of here there 
  were others; just north, a great dam that 
  was nearing completion. The dam would be 
  used as a storage shed for excess water 
  that came down out of the mountains. 
  Aboveground there were various 
  buildings. 
  There 
  was 
  a 
  powerhouse. 
  Another 
  smaller 
  building 
  housed 
  the 
  machinery for running the shaft lift that 
  plunged more than fifteen hundred feet into 
  the earth. Above all was the constant 
  throbbing of a unit that drove fresh air down 
  to the workmen far below. A pipe that 
  carried this air led to the shaft itself and 
  crawled down its sides. It looked like a fat, 
  black snake. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  13 
  Overhead were bright floodlights. 
  The shaft was using three shifts of miners 
  and muckers. The pile of rock that had 
  been carried up out of the new tunnel 
  looked like a small mountain beyond the 
  shaft buildings. 
  It was at the shaft opening that the 
  trouble was taking place. 
  Monk, Ham and Renny moved close. 
  The pets remained at a safe distance. 
  Monk grinned. His eyes brightened 
  hopefully. 
  “Let’s 
  join 
  the 
  fight,” 
  he 
  suggested. 
  “Let Renny handle this, dunce!” Ham 
  rapped coolly. 
  While they waited, big Renny moved 
  forward and talked to some of the grimy 
  workmen on the edges of the group. He 
  returned shortly. 
  “There’s been some kind of queer 
  accident 
  down 
  in 
  the 
  tunnel,” 
  he 
  announced. “Some of these fellows want to 
  quit. Others are trying to keep them on the 
  job. There’s liable to be trouble.” 
  “What happened down there?” Monk 
  demanded.  
  “From what I gathered,” Renny said, 
  “a man was found dead. Others are saying 
  they saw a queer fog. They’re afraid to go 
  back to work. There seems to be some sort 
  of jinx on the place.” 
  Ham said, “Let’s talk to them and 
  explain that Hardrock Hennesey is not 
  dead—as far as we know.”  
  As they moved up to the group of 
  arguing and struggling workmen, Renny 
  and Ham took it for granted that Monk was 
  right behind them. 
  He wasn’t. 
  Monk saw the thin, quick-moving 
  man in overalls, a fellow who was acting 
  suspiciously. The man had come out of the 
  surrounding 
  darkness 
  and 
  stepped 
  hesitatingly toward the circle of arguing 
  tunnel workers. For just a moment, light 
  from one of the floodlamps illuminated his 
  leathery, oldish features. It revealed the 
  open flannel shirt at the throat. 
  In that brief instant when Monk 
  turned, the strange-acting man was quite 
  close to him. And so the hairy chemist saw 
  the thing on the man’s chest when it was 
  exposed, momentarily, to the light. 
  A tatooed mermaid, as large as your 
  hat! 
  Instantly the fellow had swung back 
  and disappeared in the shadows. With 
  Monk taking out behind him! 
  The trail led wide of the shaft 
  buildings and several huge Mack trucks 
  parked nearby. It led beyond the small 
  mountain that was broken-up rock taken 
  from the tunnel bore. 
  Monk 
  saw 
  the 
  wiry 
  little 
  guy 
  disappear toward a square, steel building 
  set well apart from any others. A big red 
  sign on the side of the building warned: 
   
  DYNAMITE 
   
  Monk ducked behind a truck in order 
  to watch. In doing so, he momentarily lost 
  track of the fellow he was trailing. He 
  waited 
  several 
  moments, 
  not 
  certain 
  whether his quarry had gone into the 
  dynamite storage shack or not. 
  Hairy Monk was not one to wait long 
  on anything. He came out from behind the 
  truck and hurried up to the small building. 
  He saw that the door was ajar. 
  Damned funny, he thought, that the 
  guy was coming here. And that Hardrock 
  Hennesey should be that strange-acting 
  fellow! Hardrock Hennesey, with a mermaid 
  tattooed on his chest! 
  Monk slammed into the building. 
  And a small hard fist slammed into 
  his face, while another got hold of his 
  stubby, bristly hair. 
  The 
  girl’s 
  voice 
  snapped 
  out, 
  “Brother, you sure got one hell of a nerve!” 
   
   
  MONK stared. 
  The girl had been standing to one 
  side of the door, just inside the building. 
  There was a dim light glowing, and now it 
  revealed her quite plainly. Abruptly, the girl 
  was staring with as much open-mouthed 
  amazement as was the homely-faced 
  chemist.  
  The girl said, “Maybe I should 
  scream!” as she looked at Monk. 
  Then Monk grinned. He grinned 
  because he liked what he saw, because the 
  chemist had a fondness for the ladies—
  especially pretty ones—and this girl here 
  had features and a shape that contained 
  just about everything. 
  Her 
  slender, 
  boyish 
  form 
  was 
  startlingly 
  outlined 
  by 
  the 
  whipcord 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  14 
  breeches that she wore. Her flannel shirt, 
  open at the throat, emphasized the lovely 
  curve of her throat. 
  She had fine, smooth features, and 
  Monk 
  thought 
  that 
  her 
  eyes 
  were 
  aquamarine. 
  She also had red hair. And a temper. 
  She took an angry step toward the 
  hairy chemist and rapped, “What are you 
  staring it?” 
  Monk grinned. Strangely the chemist 
  always went over big with the ladies. 
  Perhaps it was because of his utterly 
  homely face and nerve. 
  He said, “Put you in a silk dress and 
  a picture hat, and you’d have Dietrich 
  backed off the boards.”  
  The girl’s trim, taut figure relaxed a 
  bit. There was no woman that could hear 
  that kind of flattery without reacting to it. 
  She asked, “Just who are you?” 
  Monk liked the way she held her chin 
  and the manner in which her hands were 
  clenched at her sides. He was willing to bet 
  she could well handle herself. 
  “I was lookin’ for a fella named 
  Hardrock Hennesey,” he said. “Thought I 
  saw him come in here. I was gonna—” 
  The girl gasped. “Hardrock? You . . . 
  you’ve seen him?” 
  “If he’s a bird with a tattooed 
  mermaid on his chest—yes,” offered Monk. 
  Suddenly the girl’s firm hand was 
  gripping his powerful arm. Her green eyes 
  were bright with worry. 
  “Then you’ve got to help me,” she 
  blurted. “You’ve got to help me locate 
  Hardrock. He can help us. I’ve been trying 
  to find him.” 
  “You know him, lady?” 
  “Of course. For years. He’s the only 
  one that can explain.” 
  “Explain what?” 
  Caution came into the girl’s eyes. 
  “You haven’t yet answered my 
  question,” she reminded. “Just who are 
  you?” 
  “Ever hear of a man named Doc 
  Savage?” the chemist asked. 
   
   
  THE 
  girl’s 
  eyes 
  narrowed; 
  she 
  seemed to give a slight start. She said 
  carefully, “Yes, I have. Why?”  
  “Well,” Monk went on, “Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  found 
  something 
  that 
  was 
  addressed to Doc Savage from a man up 
  here. A guy who got killed strangely. That’s 
  why I want to find Hardrock Hennesey.” 
  Monk then went on to explain how he 
  was 
  the 
  chemist 
  in 
  Doc 
  Savage’s 
  organization. His chest swelled a little, as 
  he added: “There are a few men in the 
  world who consider themselves greater 
  chemists—but that’s only 
  because of 
  professional jealously. I’m broad-minded 
  enough to overlook—” 
  Beside 
  them, 
  from 
  outside 
  the 
  doorway, Ham’s cutting voice said, “Only 
  reason this baboon is broadminded is 
  because he was dropped out of a tree 
  when he was very young. On his head. 
  You’ll note that it is almost flat—” 
  Monk let out a roar and swung on his 
  nattily attired partner. 
  “Listen, shyster—” he started. 
  But Ham was smiling gallantly at the 
  red-haired girl. He introduced himself. He 
  pushed between Monk and the girl, then 
  used his most effective manner. 
  As a famous Harvard Law School 
  graduate, Ham was an orator when it came 
  to talking. It was also his ambition to take 
  any girl away from hairy Monk. 
  He was saying now, “Perhaps I can 
  help you, my dear girl. You see, I am an 
  accomplished—”  
  “—father!” Monk added. “He’s got 
  thirteen funny-faced kids, all kept locked up 
  in the Bellevue psychopathic ward!” 
  Ham swung on the chemist. The two 
  pets, Habeas and the runt ape, appeared 
  behind them. They started glaring at one 
  another like their masters. For Monk’s 
  favorite gag was to tell pretty young girls 
  that his partner had thirteen, children, 
  whereas Ham was a bachelor. 
  It was the girl who stopped the 
  argument. She moved between the two, 
  knotted her fists, said coolly, “Are you two 
  going to stop acting like boys, or do I have 
  to slap one of you down?” 
  She sounded as though she could 
  really do it.  
  Monk gulped. Ham stared. For such 
  a lovely-faced girl, there was something 
  about her attitude that said she had spent 
  much time around construction workers—
  and could handle herself. 
  Both 
  Ham 
  and 
  Monk 
  grinned 
  sheepishly. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  15 
  “Guess we better start lookin’ for 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey,” 
  suggested 
  hairy 
  Monk. 
  The girl nodded. “That’s better. And 
  now, if you say you saw him, there’s one 
  place to start.” 
  She had locked the shed door 
  behind them; they were returning toward 
  the spot where tunnel workers had been 
  staging a near riot. 
  “Where?” Ham wanted to know. 
  “The shaft. That Hardrock will want 
  to see some of his old pals, if he is here. 
  He’ll be down there in the tunnel, first 
  chance he gets. Try to keep him out!” 
  The two Doc Savage aids learned 
  that the girl’s name was Chick Lancaster. It 
  appeared her brother was one of the chief 
  engineers on this tunnel project. She, 
  herself, was a graduate civil engineer. 
  Monk and the lawyer immediately 
  had deep respect for Chick Lancaster. She 
  was apparently a very capable young 
  woman. 
  Through the night, a booming voice 
  crashed out and reached them. Chick 
  asked, “What in the world is that?” 
  “That’s Renny,” said Monk. 
   “Renny!” 
  Ham explained that Renny, the 
  engineer in Doc’s crowd, was making a 
  speech to the tunnel men. He was trying to 
  keep them on the job. He was explaining 
  that he was an old friend of Hardrock 
  Hennesey’s, and that he believed the little 
  mucker still alive. He would do all he could 
  to solve the mystery that had killed a tunnel 
  worker and a farmer who was well known to 
  everyone at the shaft. 
  The big workers were listening 
  quietly, convinced that here was a giant of 
  a fellow who got results.  
  Suddenly the girl gripped Monk’s 
  arm. 
  “Look!” she cried. 
  Monk 
  and 
  Ham 
  stared. 
  They 
  followed the girl’s pointing finger. All they 
  saw was the platform built at the opening to 
  the deep shaft going below ground. 
  “Look at what?” Monk queried. 
  “Hardrock. He just went below in the 
  bucket!” 
   
   
  THE “bucket,” the girl explained, was 
  like a giant pail that could accommodate 
  about eight workmen. It was lowered down 
  the fifteen-hundred-foot shaft at the end of 
  a steel cable. 
  As Chick explained, “In a few days, 
  they’ll have the regular elevator car 
  installed. But, at first, we always use one of 
  these until the shaft walls are lined with 
  cement and rails for an elevator cage.” 
  Monk stared over the railing into the 
  black pit. Far, far down he saw a vague 
  light glowing, one of the few electric bulbs 
  strung up and down the seemingly endless 
  shaft leading into the earth. 
  “Whew!” he murmured. 
  “There’s nothing to it,” the girl 
  explained. “I’ll go with you.” 
  That 
  made 
  Monk 
  feel 
  sort 
  of 
  sheepish. He grinned. 
  “I’ll go for you,” he said. “Soon as 
  that blasted bucket returns.” 
  They waited. Something seemed to 
  be wrong, for the bucket did not return. A 
  workman, seeing the girl, came running 
  over and explained. “Pete—the operator—
  is over there at the meeting listening to a 
  fellow named Renwick. There’s no one to 
  run this equipment.” 
  That did not seem to stop quick-
  thinking Chick Lancaster. She indicated the 
  building 
  nearby, 
  where 
  the 
  hoisting 
  machinery was located. “I’ll run it,” she said. 
  A few moments later the bucket was 
  at ground level again. Monk climbed in, 
  feeling funny as the steel, barrel-shaped 
  thing swayed beneath his feet. Swayed 
  over a hole fifteen hundred feet deep! 
  Ham, grinning, announced, “I’d better 
  stay with the girl. She might need me.” 
  Monk 
  exclaimed, 
  “Dangit, 
  I’m 
  gonna—” 
  But at that moment Ham gave the 
  girl a hand signal from where he stood. She 
  threw a lever and the bucket started down. 
  Monk, with a start, clutched at the 
  sides of the makeshift car. His breath 
  whistled through his teeth as the shaft 
  walls, black and menacing, zoomed past 
  his gaze. 
  For Chick Lancaster had failed to 
  mention that the bucket traveled at a speed 
  approaching six hundred feet per minute! 
   
   
  MONK never 
  quite remembered 
  climbing out of the bucket at the base of the 
  shaft. This was all a dream; soon the thing 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  16 
  would crash and he would be somewhere 
  in China. He was still so dizzy from effects 
  of the hurtling descent that he staggered 
  around in circles. 
  Massive rock walls swayed before 
  his vision. Stretching out endlessly to right 
  and left, was the eighteen-foot bore that 
  was the greatest water-carrying project 
  ever constructed. 
  And here at the base of the shaft, the 
  tunnel proper widened in a mammoth 
  chamber where machinery could be moved 
  and rock that was brought out of the tunnel, 
  unloaded. 
  It was just as the hairy chemist was 
  regaining his equilibrium that he saw the 
  walking mummy. 
  He gulped, stared. 
  “I’m in hell, sure!” Monk gasped. 
  The man looked like something 
  ageless. He was so thin that it seemed he 
  surely must break in two as his spindle legs 
  moved. A tunnel overhead light revealed 
  his cracked, brown face, that was like 
  withered parchment. 
  Monk frowned. He had come down 
  here seeking Hardrock Hennesey. He had 
  also expected to find a few muckers or 
  miners down here in the tunnel. But 
  apparently all were above at the meeting 
  led by Renny. 
  But this fellow, this mummified 
  apparition— 
  The figure said in a strange voice, 
  “Come! Follow me!” 
  Monk gave a start, for that voice was 
  like something from the dead. 
  But he followed. That was his 
  mistake. 
  Four individuals moved out from 
  concealment against the rock walls. They 
  piled on hairy Monk. The mummified man 
  disappeared. 
  Monk swung into action, his powerful 
  fists slamming at ducking heads. Gone was 
  his amazement. These four big men with 
  the ugly faces were something real. They 
  were something you could fight, and so the 
  chemist went to work on them joyously.  
  Heads snapped on assorted necks. 
  There were grunts of pain. Cries like: 
  “Ouch! Call for help!”  
  Monk was just getting unlimbered 
  when the four took out in a furious race 
  through 
  the 
  half-dark 
  tunnel. 
  Monk, 
  disgusted, followed. 
  His short, bowed legs were not quite 
  fast enough to keep up with the escaping 
  four. But he managed to keep them in sight. 
  From his pocket the chemist removed one 
  of the spring-generated flashlights that all 
  the aids of Doc Savage carried. 
  He switched on the light and could 
  see the running men plainly. And then, 
  abruptly, he couldn’t. They had dived into a 
  slight hollow that was a part of the tunnel 
  rock wall. 
  Monk barged in after them. 
  And his head slammed against 
  granite and he went down in a heap. Stars 
  exploded. His skull felt like it was split wide 
  open. 
  Dazedly, Monk felt of the walls. 
  There was nothing except rough rock. No 
  opening. No hide-out. Nothing. 
  Monk perceived this in the racing 
  seconds before unconsciousness overtook 
  him. The slam of his head against solid 
  rock had been too much for even his tough 
  skull. He sat down and went temporarily to 
  sleep. 
  But something peculiar, a certain 
  warmness, woke him up. He was wet with 
  perspiration and his lungs felt as though 
  they had inhaled burning, scorching hot air. 
  He swayed to his feet, gasping. He 
  recalled that as he had chased the four 
  through the tunnel, he had passed a bucket 
  of water placed there for workmen, or 
  perhaps overlooked by a water boy. 
  He staggered through the oppressive 
  heat, located the bucket, bent down to pick 
  it up—then stared. 
  The 
  water 
  bucket 
  was 
  empty, 
  whereas a few moments before it had been 
  practically full. 
  Monk 
  started 
  to 
  mutter, 
  “Gollywockus! Maybe I’m seein’ things! 
  Maybe that bucket didn’t stop . . . an’ I’m 
  dead!” 
  He couldn’t figure it out. 
  But what he could understand was 
  the thing he saw when his gaze went 
  beyond the water bucket and along the 
  shadowy tunnel. He saw the stuff that 
  trailed slowly toward him like seeking 
  tentacles of doom. 
  Fog! 
  Grayish, sort of transparent stuff that 
  spread quickly and silently. 
  Monk gulped. He recalled Hardrock 
  Hennesey’s excited words to Renny over 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  17 
  the phone. Fog that burned. Fog that made 
  mummies of men! Hardrock had screamed 
  something about it just after he’d mentioned 
  the package addressed to Doc Savage! 
  Monk, held petrified for a moment, 
  stared at the opaque, misty stuff. Then he 
  started backing up slowly. A thought hit him 
  even as he did so. If he backed up like this, 
  how would he ever get out of the tunnel?  
  While he was worrying about this, 
  the masked figure came plunging out of the 
  misty substance and raced toward Monk. 
  He was a man giant in stature; the fact 
  became obvious as he approached. And 
  the mask over his face was some sort of 
  breathing apparatus. 
  From behind it, a compelling, deep-
  timbered voice ordered, “Put on this mask. 
  Hurry!” 
  It was the unusual voice of Doc 
  Savage! 
   
   
  Chapter V 
  MESSAGE FROM CHICK 
   
  SOMEHOW, Monk got into the 
  protective head helmet that was shoved 
  into his hands. 
  Then Doc Savage was urging him 
  toward the shaft, the single outlet from the 
  tunnel. From behind the mask, he ordered, 
  “We have about one minute to escape with 
  our lives.” 
  Monk started running. But he was 
  still groggy from the crack on his head. He 
  thought he was making good time, but 
  apparently Doc Savage saw need for 
  greater haste. He scooped powerful Monk 
  up in his arms and ran with him. Ran 
  through the hazy gray stuff that seared the 
  hands, that felt like a puff of breath from a 
  dragon’s lungs. 
  Doc Savage carried heavily-built 
  Monk as though he might have been a 
  child. Standing alone, Monk looked like a 
  pretty powerful fellow. But compared to Doc 
  Savage, he now seemed almost puny in 
  stature. 
  For the bronze man was a physical 
  giant. Veins in his bronze-hued hands 
  stood out like taut cords. The muscles in his 
  neck showed a remarkable strength found 
  in few men. Though his face was shielded 
  by the breathing mask, a glass front 
  showed the unusual bronze features. Doc’s 
  hair was of the same color, only somewhat 
  darker. 
  He ran as easily and as swiftly as 
  though he might have been carrying a rag 
  doll. 
  They reached the wider opening at 
  the base of the shaft. Doc set Monk down, 
  whipped off his mask.  
  He 
  said 
  briefly, 
  “That 
  stuff 
  is 
  spreading. Climb into that thing.” 
  Doc had indicated the huge bucket 
  which was used to carry workmen up and 
  down the fifteen-hundred-foot shaftway. 
  Monk tumbled into the thing, pulling off the 
  protective mask, at the same time bubbling 
  over with questions. 
  “Doc!” he piped in his squeaky voice. 
  “How in blazes did you know I was down 
  here? How did you get here?” 
  “No time for questions,” Doc Savage 
  said swiftly. He was in the elevator device 
  beside hairy Monk. He reached out a 
  bronze hand and pulled on a cable that was 
  a signal to those aboveground. 
  They waited. But nothing happened. 
  And out of the tunnel behind them 
  something opaque and hazy floated. It 
  appeared 
  like 
  a 
  giant 
  spider’s 
  web 
  creeping. 
  Doc indicated the masks. Monk 
  yanked his back on. From behind his own, 
  Doc Savage said, “The girl—the one 
  named Chick Lancaster—is operating the 
  elevator machinery. She was to wait for the 
  signal.”  
  Monk shuddered, watching the gray 
  stuff that was swiftly floating toward them. 
  Already his hands were seared from 
  passing through just a part of the stuff. He 
  could imagine what would happen if they 
  were completely enveloped by it! 
  “I hate to admit it,” he blurted from 
  behind the mask, “but maybe that girl is 
  crooked!” 
  Doc said nothing. 
  And then, without warning, the 
  bucket started upward suddenly. It swiftly 
  hit maximum speed. It almost took the hairy 
  chemist’s breath away. 
  He looked at Doc Savage. But the 
  bronze man was standing as though he 
  might be merely riding in a building elevator 
  to the second floor. His features were calm. 
   
   
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  18 
   
  The giant masked figure came plunging out of 
  the misty substance and raced toward Monk! 
   
  The dizzy flight upward took two and 
  a half minutes. Monk’s eardrums cracked at 
  the changes in pressure. His head whirled. 
  And then they were climbing out of 
  the thing. It had come to an automatic stop 
  as a “trip” shut off current at the surface 
  landing. 
  There was no one around. Doc 
  hurriedly led the way to the building that 
  contained the machinery which operated 
  the bucket lift. It, too, was deserted.  
  Chick 
  Lancaster, 
  the 
  girl, 
  was 
  missing. 
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  19 
   
   
   
  IT was Doc who found the note that 
  the girl had left for them. It was tucked 
  beside the switchbox located on the wall, 
  and it read: 
   
  We think we have located Hardrock 
  Hennesey. If you find this message, follow 
  to the Yellow River Dam, two miles north of 
  here. We’ll be at the superintendent’s home 
  there. Ham is accompanying me. 
   
  The hastily written note was signed 
  “Chick Lancaster.” 
  Monk looked upset. 
  “That shyster Ham sure works fast!” 
  he blurted. “No tellin’ what he’ll tell her 
  about me.” 
  Doc Savage did not comment. His 
  metallic features were expressionless. 
  Monk 
  suddenly 
  remembered 
  something else. “Where’s Renny?” he 
  asked. “He was talkin’ to some of the tunnel 
  workers just before I went down in that 
  blasted elevator thing—” 
  “Renny is still with them,” Doc 
  advised. “They have gone to the home of 
  the girl’s brother, one of the engineers on 
  this project. It is important to keep the men 
  on the job—regardless of whatever mystery 
  has happened here tonight.” 
  Monk described the mummylike old 
  man he had seen down in the tunnel. He 
  told about the dead man back in the gas 
  station, and of what had been reported 
  before their arrival by Hardrock Hennesey. 
  Something about a farmer who had 
  become a mummified corpse. 
  The hairy chemist’s eyes were wide. 
  “Doc! What the blazes has all that got to do 
  with this tunnel job? Certainly there’s no 
  connection!” 
  The bronze giant was leading the 
  way toward a big limousine parked near the 
  shaft buildings. It was Doc’s specially 
  equipped car, a machine that contained 
  bulletproof armor and various scientific 
  devices of the bronze man’s own invention. 
  For a moment after Monk spoke, Doc said 
  nothing. 
  Then he said quietly, “There might 
  be more connection than you think.” 
  Monk puzzled over that for a while. 
  They were in the car now, and Doc took the 
  only road that led north. They passed a 
  road sign that indicated they were on the 
  route to Yellow River Dam. 
  Monk had imagination. He suddenly 
  blurted, “Doc, you think maybe this tunnel 
  work, this business of boring down there 
  into the earth, might have unearthed some 
  ghosts?” 
  The bronze man’s gaze remained on 
  the road ahead. 
  “Ghosts?” he prodded. 
  “Yeah. You take them guys that dig 
  up old tombs and pyramids . . . something 
  always happens to them. They die . . . or 
  get some danged funny disease that 
  nobody can cure. Maybe this is something 
  like that! Goshamighty, there’s sure some 
  kind of mystery here at this—” 
  “The mystery at present,” Doc put in, 
  “is what was in the package addressed to 
  us. The package Hardrock Hennesey saw 
  in the farmer’s car.” 
  “The girl told you when you arrived 
  here?”  
  Doc nodded. 
  “Then,” Monk said confidently, “as 
  soon as we find Hardrock now, at the dam, 
  we’ll know all about it.” 
  “I wonder if Hardrock is the one we’ll 
  find,” finished Doc, and he lapsed into 
  silence as he drove through the warm night. 
  The chemist looked at the bronze 
  man swiftly. Doc’s comment puzzled him. 
  He could not see where they were going to 
  have any trouble meeting up with Hardrock 
  Hennesey. The girl’s note had said she 
  knew where he now was. It was all very 
  simple. 
   
   
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  20 
  BUT there was nothing simple about 
  the carefully arranged trap awaiting Monk 
  and Doc Savage at Yellow River Dam. 
  The gigantic unit in the water tunnel 
  system sprawled like a black, bottomless 
  crater in the night. For two miles, the dam 
  spread up and down the mountain valley in 
  which it had been built. A great wall had 
  been completed at the lower end of the 
  dam. Across this was a roadway for 
  automobiles; the road was already in use, 
  though the dam itself was not quite 
  completed. 
  It was beyond this roadway, atop a 
  hill overlooking the dark, gloomy void of 
  concrete and steel framework, that the 
  superintendent’s house stood. It was the 
  house that had been mentioned in Chick 
  Lancaster’s note. Lights burned on the first 
  floor behind drawn shades. 
  Inside, in the basement of the house, 
  a group of individuals who appeared like 
  anything but tunnel workers were holding a 
  consultation. 
  One man consulted his watch. He 
  said, “Doc Savage and that funny-looking 
  guy left the shaft five minutes ago. They’re 
  due here any minute.” 
  The speaker had a hawklike face 
  and nervous hands. He looked toward a big 
  man who seemed to be in charge of the 
  group. Other eyes followed his own.  
  “Everything’s set?” the big man 
  asked. 
  There were affirmative nods. 
  “Then this’ll take care of that Savage 
  guy,” said the leader. He grinned. 
  The leader had a blocky face, big 
  hands and black, piercing eyes. The thing 
  that made him appear twice as big was the 
  long, bulky raincoat which he wore. There 
  seemed to be no logical reason for the 
  raincoat, except that it was black, and 
  perhaps 
  offered 
  a 
  good 
  means 
  of 
  concealment outside in the dark. 
  The fellow also seemed to be 
  troubled with indigestion. 
  He was frequently addressed by the 
  others as Pinky. He was about six foot two. 
  A man suddenly appeared at the top 
  of a flight of stairs that led down into the 
  basement. 
  “They’re here!” he announced in a 
  hushed voice.  
  The announcement seemed to be a 
  signal for everyone to move toward the 
  stairs. But instead of going up to the first 
  floor, all gathered in a tight knot just below 
  the door leading to the rooms above. 
  Pinky said, “You’ve got the super 
  and Hardrock Hennesey all fixed?” 
  “And how!” replied the one who had 
  joined them. “Both on the living-room floor. 
  Both out cold. Doc and that assistant of his 
  will think they had a fight, and when they go 
  to help them—” 
  “All right,” Pinky rapped. “Quiet!” 
  Two moments later, a doorbell rang 
  somewhere in the house. It was repeated a 
  moment later. 
  Then, shortly, there was the sound of 
  footsteps as two men entered the front 
  hallway above. The door behind which the 
  waiting group crouched was right at the end 
  of the hallway, a dozen feet or so from the 
  entrance to the living room. 
  The footsteps paused in the hallway. 
  Then there came the sound of an 
  exclamation. Monk’s words.  
  “Doc! Lookit! Two guys out cold on 
  the parlor floor!” 
  After that the waiting group heard 
  footsteps moving into the living room. There 
  followed a sharp crackling sound. A 
  moment later, heavy bodies struck the 
  living-room 
  rug, 
  threshed 
  around 
  a 
  moment. Then—silence. 
  Pinky grinned. “That’s what I call 
  neat,” he said. “Taking that bronze guy with 
  his own tricks. We planted them little glass 
  vials in the rug. We’ll wait two minutes for 
  the knockout gas to evaporate, then we’ll 
  go up.” 
  They waited, each man with a gun in 
  his fist. Though apparently there was going 
  to be no trouble from above, none took 
  chances. As one man said: 
  “You never can tell about that Doc 
  Savage guy. Wish I had a tommy gun 
  instead of this gat!” 
  Pinky laughed softly. He belched. 
  “Them two birds will be out cold for an 
  hour,” he said. 
  A moment later, at his signal, all 
  proceeded to the upper hallway. They flung 
  into the living room.  
  It was deserted. 
   
   
  ONE of the gunmen started to 
  exclaim, “Say! What the hell happened—” 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  21 
  And 
  then 
  the 
  sharp 
  sputtering 
  sounds came from beneath his feet, from 
  beneath the shoes of his companions. They 
  were firecracker noises followed by puffs of 
  yellow, bilious-looking gassy stuff. 
  Big Pinky and the others started 
  choking. A couple of the gunmen fell down. 
  Another happened to stare toward a 
  far corner of the large room. His eyes 
  goggled. He let out a cry of terror. 
  It was the first time the fellow had 
  ever seen Doc Savage. He was never 
  going to forget it in all his shady life. 
  At first, the bronze man did not seem 
  unusually large. It was only when he moved 
  toward the confused, staggering mob of 
  gunmen that he seemed to grow in stature. 
  This was made more noticeable when the 
  apelike fellow appeared beside the bronze 
  man.  
  Compared to Monk, Doc suddenly 
  became a giant. A giant who was perfectly 
  proportioned. The protective head mask 
  that Doc Savage was wearing made him 
  the more startling. 
  The helmet contained a glass front, 
  and behind this the unusual eyes of Doc 
  Savage seemed to have a compelling, 
  hypnotic effect. Even as the staring 
  gunman swayed before falling, as a result 
  of breathing the anaesthetic gas, he was to 
  long remember those hypnotic eyes. Of a 
  strange flake-gold quality, they seemed to 
  move restlessly, as though continually 
  stirred by tiny winds. 
  Others saw Doc and the hairy fellow 
  who was beside him. They tried to get up 
  their guns, to fire at the two. But their arms 
  were suddenly sluggish with leaden weight, 
  and the guns sagged and they all started 
  falling down. 
  Only Pinky, the big leader in the long 
  raincoat, had had presence of mind enough 
  to leap backward when the gas pellets 
  started exploding beneath his feet. 
  He 
  streaked 
  through 
  the 
  front 
  hallway, reached the outer door and 
  slammed out into the night. Monk followed, 
  looking like some sort of apish monster in 
  his face mask. 
  But by the time Monk reached the 
  front porch, the big man had faded into the 
  gloom somewhere along the walls of the 
  mammoth dam. The purpose of his long, 
  dark raincoat was obvious. It blended 
  perfectly with the night. 
  Monk yanked from beneath his coat 
  a peculiar-looking automatic pistol with a 
  drumlike magazine. It was one of the mercy 
  pistols that all Doc Savage aids carried. 
  The weapon made bull-fiddle roars in the 
  quiet night as Monk pressed the trigger. 
  He aimed the gun in the general 
  direction that the escaping man had taken. 
  Beside him, his mask now off, Doc 
  Savage 
  said 
  quietly, 
  “He’s 
  probably 
  escaped. We’d better take care of these 
  others.” 
  But the assorted thugs lying on the 
  living-room floor seemed to be well taken 
  care of. All but one were asleep. The man 
  who wasn’t was out in the hallway 
  staggering around. He stared out of bleared 
  eyes as Doc and Monk came back into the 
  house. 
  He tried to blurt, “What . . . how—” 
  Doc said, “You fellows should have 
  checked more carefully on the girl’s 
  handwriting before leaving that note.” 
  Monk indicated a room across the 
  hallway. The door to the room was closed. 
  “We’d 
  better 
  see 
  if 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  is 
  all 
  right,” 
  the 
  chemist 
  suggested. 
  He and the bronze man had not put 
  on their gas masks again, for the yellowish 
  substance 
  had 
  now 
  disappeared. 
  Its 
  effectiveness only lasted a moment or so. 
  Doc nodded, glancing at the fellow 
  who was still swaying on his feet before 
  them. 
  Monk grinned. He said to the man, 
  “Planting them danged gas pellets was a 
  bright idea, fella. Only we just changed 
  them around a little bit so you’d get them 
  instead of us!” 
  Then he let go with a fist that put the 
  man asleep temporarily. Monk carried the 
  man into the living room and dumped him 
  beside his pals. 
  From the doorway of the room that 
  had been closed across the hall, a thin, 
  leathery-faced man with intense gray eyes 
  appeared. His jaw stuck out like a block of 
  cement and he looked like a taut length of 
  tough piano wire. 
  Hardrock Hennesey! 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  growled, 
  “Where’s the damned cuss who slugged 
  me?” 
   
   
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  22 
   
  They tried to fire at Monk and Doc—but their arms were suddenly 
  sluggish   with   leaden  weight,  and  they  started  falling  down! 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  23 
  Chapter VI 
  “J. L.” 
   
  HARDROCK HENNESEY was the 
  sort of individual who had knocked around 
  the universe long enough to become 
  accustomed to surprises. 
  And so he looked Monk over briefly. 
  He made no comments about the chemist’s 
  homely features. Hardrock, himself, would 
  have taken no beauty prizes. 
  He did, however, stare at Doc 
  Savage for a moment. The bronze man’s 
  remarkable physique caused Hardrock 
  Hennesey’s intense gray eyes to widen 
  imperceptibly. But all he said was: 
  “Thanks for the help, Doc Savage. 
  How the hell did you guys work it?” He 
  waved a hand toward the living room. 
  “Those  birds  had a nice  trap all set  for  
  you. “ 
  “That,” the bronze man explained, 
  “was 
  quite 
  evident 
  from 
  the 
  forged 
  handwriting in Chick Lancaster’s note. So 
  we merely rearranged the gas pellets that 
  had been planted in the rug. We put you 
  and the other man in a safe spot, and then 
  waited for results after pretending we had 
  fallen down and been knocked out.” 
  Hardrock shook his head. “Not bad, 
  not bad,” he commented. 
  He led the way back into the room 
  from which he’d appeared. It was a dining 
  room in which Doc and Monk had placed 
  Hardrock and the dam superintendent upon 
  finding them unconscious in the living room. 
  The superintendent was a tall, wiry 
  man with sunburned features. He was just 
  struggling to his feet when they came into 
  the room. 
  Hardrock explained that the two 
  persons with him were Doc Savage and a 
  fellow named Monk. It appeared the super’s 
  name was Flynn, and he was still mystified 
  as to why he and Hardrock Hennesey had 
  been seized by the gunmen. 
  Doc directed the tying up of the 
  unconscious men while he made a brief 
  explanation. 
  “It 
  is 
  obvious,” 
  he 
  said, 
  “that 
  someone has an idea that Hardrock 
  Hennesey, here, knows something about a 
  mystery which seems to be centered with 
  this tunnel project.” 
  The hard-boiled little tunnel worker 
  straightened up from where he was tying up 
  a man. 
  “The hell you say!” he blurted. His 
  eyes were puzzled. “Sure, some damn 
  funny things happened tonight, but that 
  doesn’t say they have anything to do with 
  this tunnel job. If they do, I don’t know what 
  it’s all about.” 
  “The package might explain a whole 
  lot of things,” said Doc. 
  “Package?” 
  “The package you found in the 
  farmer’s car, addressed to me.” 
   
   
  HARDROCK jumped. “That’s right. 
  Almost forgot about it. But it was gone 
  when I came back!” 
  “Any idea where it might be?” 
  The mucker’s ageless, leathery face 
  was thoughtful.  
  “Hell, no!” 
  Flynn, the superintendent, also had a 
  question.  
  “How,” he wanted to know, “do you 
  happen to be involved in this thing, Doc 
  Savage?” 
  Monk, too, had a question. His small, 
  bright eyes swung on the bronze man. 
  “Blazes, Doc!” he piped shrilly. 
  “That’s something I was gonna ask you, 
  too? How did you know what was going on 
  up at this blasted place?” 
  For a brief instant, the bronze man’s 
  flake-gold eyes met Monk’s. The others 
  missed the glance. But the chemist 
  suddenly understood that there would be 
  an explanation later, when they were alone. 
  Doc said, “The first thing to do is lock 
  these captives up. We will question them 
  later.” 
  Tall, bony Flynn stepped to a phone, 
  put through a call to the special police. It 
  was this division of the police that did patrol 
  duty on the various shafts in the great 
  tunnel project. 
  Leaving Flynn to take charge of the 
  trussed-up captives, Doc led the way back 
  to where he had parked his car. He and 
  Monk were accompanied by tough little 
  Hardrock Hennesey. 
  Hardrock rapped, “By damn, I’m 
  mad!” He massaged a bruise that was on 
  the side of his protruding jaw. “Wait’ll I get 
  hold of the geezer that conked me!”  
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  24 
  Monk had opened the car door. He 
  turned. 
  “While you’re waiting,” he remarked, 
  “maybe you can tell us some more about 
  what happened?”  
  Hardrock Hennesey had suddenly 
  stiffened. “Say!” he exploded. 
  “Well?” Monk prodded, watching the 
  tunnel man.  
  Hardrock was tugging at something 
  in his pocket. “Here’s something I did find.” 
  His gaze swung to the bronze man. “Maybe 
  you’ll be interested in it, Doc Savage.” 
  Monk had opened the rear door of 
  Doc’s sedan, and the man squatted on the 
  floor there raised up and shoved the gun 
  muzzle in the hairy chemist’s face.  
  “Let’s get interested in this!” he 
  snarled. 
   
   
  IN the moment that the shadowy 
  figure spoke, Doc Savage whirled into 
  blinding motion. His swinging arm knocked 
  Monk to one side. His left hand caught 
  Hardrock Hennesey in the same instant 
  and pushed him into a tumbling heap down 
  beside the car.  
  The gun blasted almost in the bronze 
  giant’s face.  
  But in reality, the shot was lower 
  than that, and the slug hit the bulletproof 
  garment that Doc Savage was wearing 
  beneath his clothing. It merely staggered 
  Doc Savage a little. 
  Astounded, the gunman within the 
  car had been disconcerted for a moment. In 
  that second Doc Savage slapped the gun 
  from the man’s fist, seized him by the neck, 
  dragged him out onto the ground. 
  Monk, howling with rage, took over. 
  Though the captive was well over six 
  feet, solid and as strong as a bull, hairy 
  Monk slapped the man around until he was 
  weaving on his feet. 
  The fellow fell down. Monk picked 
  him up, hit him again, held him from falling 
  and snorted, “Brother, now you’re gonna 
  answer a few questions!” 
  The car headlamps were turned on 
  and the captive dragged around in front of 
  the machine. 
  Monk swore. “You!” he piped. 
  It was Pinky, the big fellow in the 
  long raincoat. He glared at the chemist, 
  then belched. 
  Hardrock Hennesey let out a yell and 
  leaped for Pinky. 
  “That’s the punk who slugged me!” 
  Hardrock said. “Let me—” 
  Doc Savage warned, “Wait! Perhaps 
  this fellow can answer some of our 
  questions.” 
  The bronze man’s unusual eyes 
  were trained on the captive, who stood a 
  little apart from them, distinctively revealed 
  by the headlamp glare. 
  His lips curled. “Nuts!” he said.  
  Monk grinned. 
  “Wait a minute, Doc,” he started to 
  say. “I’m just gonna—” 
  The shot from up the hillside beside 
  them was a flat, menacing sound in the hot 
  night. Everyone whirled, but above them 
  there was only the uncertain gloom of the 
  embankment that rose for perhaps a 
  hundred feet above the newly constructed 
  dam. 
  It sounded like the crack of a rifle, 
  and it was not repeated. But all knew that 
  anyone could have hidden up there at the 
  top of the embankment, fired the shot, then 
  slid off into the night. 
  Each had jumped clear of the 
  headlights’ revealing glow. Monk and 
  Hardrock Hennesey had started to dive 
  toward the hillside. Then they drew up short 
  at the sound that suddenly floated in the 
  night air. 
  It was a trilling—soft, almost musical; 
  it was difficult to locate the source of the 
  unusual tone. 
  But Monk recognized it. It was an 
  unconscious thing the bronze man did in 
  moments of mental stress—or perhaps 
  surprise. 
  Monk 
  whirled 
  toward 
  Doc—and 
  stared. 
  Their captive, the big, sneering fellow 
  known as Pinky, was swaying back and 
  forth like a man dizzy with the heat. Even 
  as Monk watched, Pinky’s legs seemed to 
  give out beneath him and he collapsed to 
  his knees. He was clutching his stomach. 
  From his knees he lurched forward onto his 
  face, groaned once, then lay still. 
  Doc Savage bent forward. Light 
  revealed the red liquid on the fallen man’s 
  back. The rifle slug had entered there, gone 
  clean through the big man’s body. He was 
  dead. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  25 
  Doc Savage straightened, ordered, 
  “Monk, carry him back to the house. Tell 
  Flynn what happened. Then hurry back 
  here.” 
  A quick search of the dead man’s 
  pockets revealed that he carried nothing 
  that would identify him—or show for whom 
  he was working. 
  While Monk was gone, Doc Savage 
  and 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  climbed 
  the 
  hillside, searched for any clue to Pinky’s 
  slayer. Fifty feet back from the top of the 
  embankment, they found where a car had 
  been parked. The tire marks of the machine 
  showed that the rubber was too well worn 
  to leave any kind of identifying tracks. 
  There was no trace of the car or the one 
  who had driven it. 
  Five minutes later, when Monk had 
  returned, they were driving back toward 
  Shaft 9. 
  Doc, at the wheel of the car, turned 
  to Hardrock Hennesey. “You said there was 
  something you had found,” he prodded. 
  “What?” 
  Hardrock nodded, reached into his 
  pocket. 
  What 
  he 
  brought 
  out 
  was 
  something embedded in a piece of rocklike 
  substance. It was quite hideous. 
  It was the shape of a hand, and it 
  had claws. 
   
   
  DOC 
  had 
  stopped 
  the 
  car 
  momentarily. He was examining the object 
  as Hardrock explained. 
  “Found that down in Shaft 9,” 
  Hardrock said. “It’s a claw that can be used 
  to slip over the hand. Like brass knuckles, 
  in a way, but damned if I ever seen 
  anything quite like that.” 
  It was Doc who said, “A form of 
  fighting weapon used hundreds of years 
  ago.” He looked briefly at Hardrock. “You 
  say you found it down in the tunnel?”  
  The tough little mucker jerked his 
  head. 
  “Damned right I did. An’ something 
  else.”  
  “What?” Monk demanded. 
  “Evidence that the new tunnel has 
  passed 
  through 
  something 
  damned 
  peculiar down there!” Hardrock offered. 
  “Something that looks like an old ocean 
  floor. People must have lived down there 
  thousands of years ago.” 
  Monk scratched his head. “You been 
  drinking?” he prodded. 
  Hardrock snorted. 
  “Wish I had!” the mucker exclaimed. 
  “Wait’ll I show you some other stuff I 
  found.” 
  They proceeded to Shaft 9. They 
  located 
  Renny, 
  and 
  the 
  giant-sized 
  engineer reported, “I think I’ve got the 
  workmen talked into returning to their jobs. 
  But not until morning. They’re all upset by 
  what’s happened tonight.” 
  Monk stared around. “But where are 
  they now?”  
  Renny looked worried. 
  “Searching 
  for 
  the 
  girl,” 
  he 
  announced in his booming voice. “She’s 
  missing.” 
  Hardrock Hennesey stuck out his 
  jaw. “If anything happens to Chick, I’ll cut 
  the throat of the guy—” 
  Monk’s eyes had narrowed. “Hey!” 
  he exclaimed. “Is Ham still with her?” 
  “He was,” Renny replied. 
  Hardrock frowned. “Who’s this guy 
  Ham?” he demanded. 
  “A shyster!” hairy Monk announced. 
  “Betcha he’s already got that girl Chick 
  convinced—” 
  Doc Savage interrupted with, “Renny 
  can stay up here and operate the lift 
  machinery. Also, he can watch for the girl 
  or Ham. We’d better get started.” 
  Just as they reached the huge 
  bucket that would lower them swiftly below 
  ground, Monk remembered the mysterious 
  gray stuff that was like fog, the thing they 
  had encountered down in the tunnel. 
  He mentioned it to Doc. 
  But Doc Savage indicated the masks 
  he had brought along from his car. “We’ll 
  have to take that chance,” he said. 
  Hardrock was already in the bucket 
  with Doc Savage. Monk followed, looking 
  somewhat worried.  
  He said, “Doc, I think we’re taking an 
  awful—”  
  The 
  bronze 
  man 
  had 
  just 
  straightened up from picking up something 
  off the floor of the shaft lift. What he held 
  was a girl’s small handkerchief. In one 
  corner were the two initials, “J. L.” 
  “Jane!” Hardrock Hennesey cried.  
  “Jane who?” Monk asked. 
  “Lancaster. 
  That’s 
  Chick’s 
  handkerchief. Her correct name is Jane!” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  26 
  Monk 
  grinned. 
  He 
  no 
  longer 
  appeared worried about going below. 
  “Come on,” he piped, “I just want to 
  see that blasted shyster Ham!” 
  But what they were to find was 
  something else again. 
   
   
  Chapter VII 
  STRANGE WORLD 
   
  AT the base of the great shaft, they 
  stood listening a few moments. They had 
  seen no trace of the peculiar grayish fog 
  upon stepping from the steel bucket. 
  There was something awesome, 
  something tremendous, about being down 
  here fifteen hundred feet beneath the earth 
  surface. Curved walls hemmed them in. 
  The tunnel stretched right and left like the 
  yawning, dark mouth of a Gargantuan 
  serpent. 
  Except for the distant whisper of air 
  being pumped down through the ventilating 
  system, there was an abysmal silence, 
  profound, sort of chilling. 
  Monk 
  shrugged 
  off 
  the 
  creepy 
  feeling, grinned and said, “Well, Hardrock, 
  where do we start looking for the rest of this 
  antique claw of yours?” 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  had 
  been 
  listening intently. He moved to the tunnel 
  wall, pressed his ear flat against the 
  surface for a moment. His leathery face 
  screwed up and he appeared thoughtful. 
  “Funny!” he commented. 
  Monk watched him. “What’s funny?” 
  “I don’t think there’s anybody down 
  here,” Hardrock said. He looked at Doc 
  Savage. “And yet there was Chick’s 
  handkerchief!” 
  Monk muttered, “Wait’ll I get that guy 
  Ham!”  
  Doc said nothing for a moment. 
  Then, quietly, “Why would the girl come 
  down here?” 
  Hardrock Hennesey shrugged. “She 
  has the run of this place. Maybe she and 
  that Ham discovered something. Or”—
  Hardrock’s 
  intense 
  gray 
  eyes 
  looked 
  worried—”maybe they’ve been tricked!” 
  “That occurred to me,” was Doc’s 
  significant remark. 
  It was a toss-up as to which way they 
  should go. As Hardrock explained, “I was 
  talking to one of the miners earlier. The 
  south bore from here extends three miles; 
  the north bore almost four. If they are down 
  here, they might have gone either way.” 
  Doc nodded. “Which way to the 
  place where you found this?” 
  The bronze man indicated the hand 
  with the claw, which the little tunnel worker 
  had turned over to him. 
  “Back 
  here,” 
  Hardrock 
  said, 
  indicating the north extension of the tunnel 
  behind them. 
  Doc suggested that they might as 
  well proceed that way first. At least, they 
  would 
  investigate 
  the 
  thing 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey had located. 
  The bronze man was using one of 
  his flashlights, though the tunnel itself was 
  dimly lighted by the electric bulbs. Doc’s 
  eyes explored the floor of the big tunnel as 
  they walked along. 
  Behind them and before them, their 
  footsteps made weird sounds as they 
  echoed and reverberated through the 
  tunnel. When anyone spoke, the words 
  went trailing away into the distance, 
  echoing like strange voices from a nether 
  world. 
  Each man carried a gas mask, held 
  ready in case the uncanny-looking fog 
  should be seen again. But they saw no 
  trace of it. 
  As Hardrock explained, “Dammit, I’ve 
  been working in tunnels for thirty years. 
  Never saw anything quite like it either 
  above or belowground. You could see 
  through it, and yet you couldn’t. You just 
  imagined you could!” 
  Doc Savage said nothing. His alert 
  eyes were constantly probing ahead. His 
  ears were sharp for the slightest foreign 
  sound. 
  Once Monk exclaimed, “Blazes! This 
  looks about where I slammed my head into 
  that blasted wall. Wait a minute!” 
  The chemist moved to the side of the 
  tunnel, started a search. He remembered 
  where he had seen the running thugs. He 
  looked around for several moments as Doc 
  and Hardrock Hennesey waited. 
  Scratching his head, he joined them 
  again. “Maybe I was having hallucinations!” 
  Monk remarked.  
  They 
  continued. 
  They 
  covered 
  perhaps 
  a 
  mile 
  of 
  underground 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  27 
  passageway. They saw nothing, heard no 
  one moving ahead. 
  It was just about this point that Doc 
  Savage picked up the object off the tunnel 
  floor. 
  Monk 
  stared. 
  “Gollywockus!” 
  he 
  piped.  
  Hardrock Hennesey squinted and 
  couldn’t believe his eyes. 
  What Doc Savage held was a 
  spearlike weapon that was like nothing 
  Monk had ever seen. It was made of stone 
  that was harder than flint. It was crude. It 
  looked like a weapon that might have been 
  used in the era of cliff dwellers. 
  Doc held the spear up before the 
  flashlight glare, and all saw what he 
  indicated. 
  There was blood on the head of the 
  spear, and it was still moist. 
   
   
  DOC SAVAGE stood looking at the 
  strange weapon, his eyebrows slightly 
  knitted together. It was Hardrock who said: 
  “Somebody’s been struck—and with 
  that!” His eyes were wide. “But who—what 
  kind of person would use an implement like 
  that?” 
  Monk 
  blurted, 
  “Maybe 
  a 
  cave 
  dweller!” 
  “Don’t be crazy!” Hardrock started to 
  say. And then he stared, his eyes getting 
  wider. “Say! Do you really think—” 
  Doc interrupted them. 
  “Perhaps we should look farther into 
  the tunnel,” he suggested. 
  Monk was first to lead the way. His 
  homely features were worried-looking. He 
  piped shrilly, “Blast it! Maybe Ham and the 
  girl are hurt!” 
  That appeared to be the thought of 
  all as they quickened their pace and hurried 
  through the seemingly endless eighteen-
  foot bore that passed through the earth. A 
  muck-car track stretched through the entire 
  length. 
  Even at the fast pace they were 
  traveling, it was some time before they 
  reached the northern end of the bore. Then 
  they came upon the mucking machines and 
  equipment near the tunnel head. There was 
  evidence that the miners and muckers who 
  had worked here had walked off the job in a 
  hurry. A “powder monkey” had left a case of 
  dynamite lying dangerously in the open, 
  near the tracks where the muck cars 
  passed. Drills and jackhammers had been 
  dropped and lay carelessly about. 
  In the tunnel head itself, work had 
  been hastily stopped, and the huge 
  platform where the drillers had been 
  working was strewn with tools. 
  Strangely, they had passed no one, 
  seen no moving thing. 
  Monk stared at Doc Savage. He 
  exclaimed, 
  “Goshamighty, 
  somebody 
  musta got hurt with that spear. But where is 
  he? An’ who did it?” 
  Apparently there was no answer for 
  that. 
   
   
  DOC SAVAGE moved among the 
  machinery and equipment located here at 
  the tunnel head. His eyes flashed over 
  things briefly. He obviously found nothing 
  that startled him. 
  Doc’s eyes were thoughtful, though, 
  when he came back to Hardrock and Monk. 
  He looked at the little tunnel worker. 
  “You were going to show us where 
  you found that hand with the claw,” Doc 
  reminded. 
  Hardrock gave a slight start. “That’s 
  right!” he exclaimed. “Forgot all about it 
  when we found that spear. Come on.” 
  He led the way back through the 
  tunnel bore. Following him, Monk gave the 
  bronze man a questioning glance. The 
  glance said that perhaps this Hardrock 
  Hennesey was not a person to be trusted. 
  But the expression in the bronze 
  giant’s eyes told Monk nothing. 
  A quarter of a mile back through the 
  tunnel, Hardrock paused, studying the rock 
  walls. This was a section that had not yet 
  been cemented over, as the entire tunnel 
  would be before completion. 
  “Let’s have that light,” Hardrock 
  asked, indicating Doc’s flashlight. 
  Taking it, he sprayed the powerful 
  light ray up along the curved wall. About on 
  a level with his head, he held the light beam 
  steady for a moment on the wall surface. 
  Then he moved it back and forth slowly in a 
  horizontal plane. 
  “Do you see that?” he prodded. 
  Doc Savage had stepped closer. He 
  was examining the vein of earth revealed 
  by the moving light. Then he was digging 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  28 
  into the rock substance with his powerful 
  fingers. 
  A piece of stuff that looked like sand 
  turned to rock came loose. The bronze man 
  studied it intently. A bit of substance 
  crumbled beneath the great strength of his 
  crushing fingers. Something like a small, 
  petrified shell dropped into the bronze 
  giant’s palm. 
  Doc said thoughtfully, “It appears 
  that, hundreds of years ago, this level down 
  here was originally the earth’s surface. This 
  was the original sea level.” 
  Hardrock Hennesey jerked his head. 
  “That’s what I figured!” he cried. “And this is 
  just about where I found the claw thing.” 
  Monk 
  was 
  a 
  chemist, 
  not 
  an 
  archaeologist. 
  He 
  stared, 
  blurted 
  a 
  question. 
  “Doc! You mean people used to live 
  here in this blasted place?” 
  “When it was the earth’s surface,” 
  Doc said. “That was before the Glacial 
  period, before this whole area was changed 
  by some earth movement.” 
  Monk breathed, “Golly!” 
  Hardrock put in, “They’ve found such 
  a situation on other water-tunnel jobs. On 
  one leading into New York City, down about 
  a thousand feet they found where elm 
  trees—or trees like them—had once been 
  growing. People must have lived there at 
  one time.” 
  Monk looked at the clawed-hand 
  thing protruding from the bronze man’s 
  pocket, and his little eyes bulged. 
  “Kind of spooky!” he said. 
  But not more spine-chilling than the 
  horrible, 
  weird 
  cry 
  that 
  came 
  from 
  somewhere ahead of them. Drifting through 
  the miles of underground tunnel, it gained 
  volume, was magnified into a dreadful 
  scream of terror. 
  It was Hardrock Hennesey who said 
  in almost a whisper, “It . . . it sounds like a 
  guy . . . dying!” 
   
   
  THEY ran for ten minutes toward the 
  source of the cry. The sound came once 
  again, closer this time. There seemed to be 
  more of a dreadful wail to the sound. 
  Monk was sweat-soaked. He wiped 
  at his brow as he ran. “Whew!” he 
  complained. “Thought it was cool down 
  here a little while ago. But I’m dang-blasted 
  hot now!” 
  Even the bronze man’s metallic 
  features 
  were 
  beaded 
  with 
  moisture, 
  though Doc showed no other effect of the 
  race through the tunnel. He was well ahead 
  of the others. And thus it was that he was 
  first to draw up short and call out a warning. 
  “Watch out!” Doc Savage rapped. 
  Monk 
  and 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  shortly flung to a stop behind him. Both 
  stared ahead. 
  Monk, puzzled, piped shrilly, “What is 
  it? I don’t see anything.” 
  “Watch!” said Doc. 
  And then, slowly, the thing became 
  obvious to the others. Monk squinted, and 
  Hardrock Hennesey seemed to give a slight 
  shudder. 
  He cried, “The fog!” 
  It didn’t look like a fog, at first. 
  Drifting slowly, sort of translucent, the stuff 
  might have been a mirage. It floated like 
  thin morning mist on a mountain top. 
  Monk’s small eyes were straining. He 
  suddenly yelled. “Doc! There’s somebody 
  moving in that stuff!”  
  But Doc Savage had already seen. 
  He whipped out an order. 
  “Hold your gas masks in readiness!” 
  The bronze man, his own mask in his 
  hand, moved forward with blurred speed. 
  And as suddenly he stopped, as 
  though he had smashed into a solid wall of 
  rock. He backed up slowly. Ahead of him, 
  the opaque substance slowly became a 
  solid mass of grayness. 
  Doc motioned Monk and Hardrock 
  Hennesey back. All were aware now of an 
  extreme heat that beat against their faces, 
  that caused their hands to smart. The heat 
  fast grew more intense. 
  They kept moving backward, staring, 
  and Monk understood why he had been 
  perspiring so a moment earlier. It was 
  this—some 
  uncanny 
  thing 
  that 
  was 
  unapproachable. 
  Hardrock cried, “It . . . it was like that 
  where the farmer died. It’s the same thing!” 
  Doc Savage’s eyes were intent. They 
  tried again to locate the object that he had 
  seen moving within the mass. But he could 
  not see beyond the gray pall.  
  They all heard the scream. 
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  29 
   
  The  opaque  substance  became  a  solid  mass  of  grayness—and 
  intense heat beat against the faces of Doc and Monk and Hennesy! 
   
  Frantic, utterly terrible, it held them 
  rigid a moment. And then the stuff was 
  pressing closer, driving them still farther 
  backward. They were helpless before its 
  searing heat. 
  They were helpless to aid whoever 
  was within that death fog. 
  It was Hardrock Hennesey who 
  yelled. “Somebody’s dying in there!” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  30 
  Doc did not answer. He made an 
  attempt to move forward, but was literally 
  hurled back by the fiery heat that lay ahead. 
  And then, for the first time, Hardrock 
  Hennesey showed fear. He grabbed the 
  bronze man’s arm, pointed toward the gray 
  wall that blocked them off. 
  “Listen!” he screamed. “What’ll we 
  do. That’s the only way out of here!” 
  Monk rapped, “As if we don’t know 
  it!”  
  It was obvious that they were 
  trapped. 
   
   
  Chapter VIII 
  ESCAPE 
   
  THE 
  gray-looking 
  substance 
  continued to spread, and Doc Savage, 
  Monk and Hardrock Hennesey were forced 
  to keep retreating. But after a while the fog 
  stopped moving, remaining motionless in 
  the air. It hung there like smoke trapped in 
  a small pipe. 
  The bronze man’s eyes flickered. 
  “Perhaps now,” he said quietly, “we can 
  escape.” 
  Monk gulped. “Escape! How? Not 
  through that stuff!” 
  Doc directed that the two were to 
  wait for him. They were to remain clear of 
  the death fog. He would return as quickly 
  as possible. 
  Doc left them, running back toward 
  the northern end of the tunnel. 
  “What’s he going to do?” Hardrock 
  Hennesey asked, worried. 
  Monk shrugged. “No tellin’ what 
  Doc’s ever going to do. We’ll just have to 
  wait.” 
   
   They waited in grim silence, their 
  eyes on the motionless gray fog, a hundred 
  feet down the tunnel away from them. 
  Once Monk remarked, “I’m gonna 
  blast that guy if we ever get outta here!” 
  “Who?” 
  “Ham. Betcha he’s already got a date 
  with that Chick Lancaster!” 
  Hardrock said nothing. He looked at 
  Monk, scowled. They sat there with their 
  chins cupped in their hands and thought 
  about dying. Neither could see how they 
  could possibly escape from here. 
  Doc Savage’s return gave them both 
  somewhat of a start. 
  It did not seem possible that the 
  bronze man could have run to the tunnel 
  head and back so swiftly. Doc was not even 
  breathing hard. 
  But a rigid, two-hour daily set of 
  scientific exercises kept the bronze giant in 
  perfect condition at all times. The exercises 
  had been followed since childhood. In fact, 
  the bronze man’s entire life was the result 
  of scientific training. 
  Hardrock Hennesey jumped up and 
  stared at the object the bronze man was 
  carrying. “What’re you going to do with 
  that?” he prodded. 
  For answer, Doc passed a length of 
  wire to the hard-boiled little tunnel man. 
  “Get this ready,” he directed swiftly. 
  What Doc held was a stick of 
  dynamite. Hardrock was preparing the fuse 
  and wire that would be strung to that single 
  piece of dynamite. 
  Monk looked worried. 
  “Blazes!” he piped. “You’ll blow us to 
  hell and gone, Doc!” 
  “There’s hardly enough here for 
  that,” explained Doc. 
  Ordering them to stand back, and 
  putting on his mask, Doc ran forward 
  toward the fog screen that blocked them in 
  the tunnel. He approached as close as 
  possible to the stuff, set the dynamite stick, 
  played out the wire as he returned. 
  Then he ordered, “You’d better lie 
  down.”  
  In the next moment, Doc set off the 
  blast. 
  For seconds afterward, Monk was 
  certain that the tunnel walls were smashing 
  down all around them. But then he 
  discovered it was only the terrific racket 
  shattering 
  against 
  his 
  eardrums. The 
  detonation went rolling back and forth 
  through the bore. Dust blinded their eyes. 
  And then, finally, there was silence. 
  They stared toward the fog stuff. It 
  was gone. The tunnel was clear. 
  Doc Savage led the way. They 
  passed what had once been the body of a 
  man. Doc Savage motioned them on, as he 
  paused momentarily to examine the victim. 
  There was not the slightest chance 
  of recognition. The man’s head, legs and 
  arms were missing as a result of the 
  explosion. But there was enough of his 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  31 
  clothing left to reveal that he must have 
  been a tunnel worker, probably sent down 
  here to look for them, but who had been 
  caught in the death mist. 
  Ten 
  minutes 
  later 
  they 
  were 
  aboveground. 
  And there, with giant Renny, they 
  found Chick Lancaster and well-dressed 
  Ham. 
   
   
  MONK howled with rage. 
  “You blasted shyster! What’s the 
  idea of walking out on me?” 
  Ham smiled coolly. With him were 
  the two pets, Habeas and Chemistry. 
  “Who 
  ran 
  out 
  on 
  who?” 
  Ham 
  demanded. He smiled fondly at the girl. 
  “I’ve been helping Chick, here, search for 
  Hardrock.” 
  The girl’s pretty blue-green eyes, 
  seeing Monk’s frown, looked worried. She 
  touched Ham’s arm.  
  “Careful,” she cautioned. “He has a 
  mean look on his face!” 
  The lawyer grimaced. “That’s no 
  mean look,” he said, “that’s his face!” 
  Doc Savage had been talking to 
  Renny and Hardrock Hennesey. He left 
  them to come over to the girl. 
  Chick Lancaster’s pretty face was 
  suddenly flushed, and she was looking at 
  the giant bronze man out of admiring eyes. 
  All women fell hard the first time they ever 
  met Doc Savage. All learned, later, that 
  Doc avoided falling in love with a girl. 
  It wasn’t because he wasn’t human, 
  or because he didn’t have a heart. For Doc, 
  with all his scientific training, had as much 
  feeling as the next man. But he controlled 
  those emotions. He believed that because 
  of his dangerous career—that of righting 
  wrongs and punishing evildoers—he should 
  never ask a girl to share that existence with 
  him. 
  And so, now, he merely nodded to 
  lovely Chick Lancaster and said, “We have 
  been trying to find you. There is something 
  which you can explain.” 
  The red-haired girl gave a little sigh. 
  She felt suddenly somewhat self-conscious 
  standing before this unusual person. 
  “Explain?” 
  she 
  asked. 
  “Explain 
  what?” 
  “Why you wrote to the governor of 
  this State?”  
  Monk and Ham looked quickly at the 
  bronze man. This was the first they had 
  heard about Doc Savage having previous 
  information about Chick Lancaster. 
  The girl was startled. 
  “You . . . knew . . . that?” she said. 
  Doc nodded. He turned his steady 
  gaze to Monk. “That’s why the phony note 
  from Pinky and his gang did not fool me. It 
  was not in this girl’s handwriting.”  
  Monk looked puzzled. 
  “But how did you get hold of her 
  letter, Doc?” he asked. 
  “From the governor of the State. It 
  was sent to me.” Doc looked back at Chick. 
  “You wrote to the governor telling him of 
  trouble that was happening here. You 
  hinted at something mysterious.” 
  Monk got in another question before 
  the girl could reply. 
  “Doc, you mean the governor asked 
  you to investigate?” 
  Doc nodded again. “The request,” he 
  said, “was sent to me several days ago.” 
  It was something that surprised 
  everyone. It convinced them that there was 
  something of utmost importance connected 
  with the mystery. But what, they did not yet 
  know. 
  Doc was waiting for the girl’s answer. 
  She suddenly stared past them all, looked 
  at the man who was approaching. She said: 
  “Perhaps my brother can explain 
  better than I.” 
   
   
  RAYMOND LANCASTER was a man 
  about 
  forty, 
  with 
  flame-red 
  hair 
  and 
  freckles, and eyes that were as sharp as 
  flint steel. For obvious reasons, he was 
  usually called Reds. He was one of the 
  leading engineers on this new water-tunnel 
  job. 
  Reds Lancaster had already met big 
  Renny, who literally towered above the 
  man’s small, wiry figure. Lancaster was 
  introduced to the others, informed of Doc 
  Savage’s request. He suggested that all 
  adjourn to one of the nearby buildings. 
  A few moments later, he was 
  explaining: 
  “Trouble started as soon as we 
  began work on the dam.” 
  “What dam?” Monk put in. He was 
  holding Habeas in one arm, scratching the 
  pig’s ear with his hand. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  32 
  “Yellow River Dam. There were 
  accidents. More than the usual amount.” 
  Reds Lancaster, as he talked, played with 
  some sort of chain that held an engineering 
  society key. The chain dangled from the 
  pocket of his expensive whipcord breeches. 
  He was dressed in similar fashion to his 
  sister, Chick Lancaster. “But accidents are 
  a thing you can try to prevent. They are 
  something real.” 
  He stopped jiggling the chain, and 
  the 
  key 
  on 
  it 
  hung 
  straight 
  down, 
  motionless. 
  “But 
  this 
  mystery 
  that 
  happened tonight, this other thing . . . well, 
  it’s uncanny. How can you fight a thing like 
  that?” 
  Doc asked: “Have you any theories 
  at all?” 
  The wiry, alert little engineer was 
  thoughtful a moment. Then he jerked his 
  head. “Yes.” 
  “What?” 
  “I think it is a direct blow at the 
  governor of this State. I think the whole 
  thing has something to do with him. Call it a 
  menace against his career. Someone is 
  trying to ruin him.” 
  Ham, Monk, Hardrock Hennesey and 
  big Renny stared at the red-headed 
  engineer. 
  Ham said sharply, “That doesn’t 
  make sense! What has the appearance of a 
  mysterious fog, the finding of mummified 
  men got to do with the governor?” 
  “That,” said Reds Lancaster quietly, 
  “is what we have to figure out.” His eyes 
  looked suddenly tired. “This stuff about 
  mummies and weird fogs is nonsense. It 
  has to be!” 
  Monk snorted suddenly. “Yeah?” he 
  demanded shrilly. “Well, brother, just wait 
  until you get into some of that stuff!” 
  Someone 
  looked 
  at 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey. “How about it, Hardrock? You 
  had a narrow escape?” 
  All had heard by now about the 
  tough little tunnel worker being trapped by 
  the fog at the gas station. Hardrock had not 
  explained how he had escaped death at 
  that time. 
  He took a hitch at the overalls that 
  were too large for him, said, “Pinky and 
  those mugs of his grabbed me just before I 
  almost burned up from the heat of that stuff. 
  They put my clothes on that dead farmer’s 
  body and left him there in my place. They 
  wanted to make it look like it was me.” 
  He indicated the clothes he was 
  wearing. “That’s why I’m wearing that dead 
  guy’s clothes.” 
  “Why did they want you?” Ham put 
  in. 
  “Because they thought I had a 
  package that had been addressed to Doc 
  Savage.” 
  Monk frowned. “Didn’t they have it?”  
  Hardrock shook his head 
  “Hell, no! It’s just disappeared, and 
  no one knows where it is.” 
  Everyone 
  had 
  suddenly 
  started 
  talking at once. It was the bronze man’s 
  voice that halted them.  
  “Just a minute,” he said quietly. 
  He looked at Renny. “Monk and Ham 
  will remain with you. Get all workmen back 
  on their jobs first thing this morning. You 
  might call in the mine police to help patrol 
  the tunnels and shafts. Hardrock can help. 
  Perhaps he can learn something.” 
  Doc looked at the engineer, Reds 
  Lancaster. “You’ll co-operate?” 
  “Certainly. We’re losing thousands of 
  dollars a day on this job. We’ve got to find 
  out what’s wrong!”  
  Renny said in his booming voice, 
  “What are you going to do, Doc?” 
  “It appears,” said the bronze man, 
  “that an interview with the governor might 
  be advisable. I should be back here by 
  tomorrow.” 
  Doc explained a few more things he 
  wished his aids to do. He started for the 
  door. 
  Someone exclaimed, “Where’s the 
  girl?” 
  Chick Lancaster, it turned out, had 
  left. No one knew where she had gone. 
  Doc Savage went out into the cool, 
  damp air of early morning. Gray sky was 
  showing in the east, beyond the buildings of 
  Shaft 9. 
  He went back to his big limousine 
  and swung open the door. He had a long 
  drive ahead, and there was need for hurry. 
  Chick Lancaster, looking bright and 
  excited, sat in the front seat of the bronze 
  man’s car. 
  She said, “I’m going with you. 
  There’s something you should know about.” 
   
   
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  33 
  Chapter IX 
  TRAIL TO TROUBLE 
   
  APPROXIMATELY five miles north 
  of Yellow River Dam, Doc Savage became 
  aware that another car was following him 
  and the girl. 
  For the past mile they had been 
  winding through the narrow, steep grades 
  that passed over mountainous country 
  which cut off a valley beyond. It was 
  necessary to reach that valley before the 
  main State road would be encountered. 
  Once reached, the main highway should 
  take them to the capitol in two or three 
  hours. 
  But now, through the trees behind 
  them, Doc caught an occasional glimpse of 
  the trailing car. He picked up speed. The 
  other car did likewise. He slowed down. 
  The trailing car fell back. 
  Doc looked at Chick Lancaster and 
  said quietly. “We might have a little trouble, 
  unless you can stand a lot of speed.” 
  “Trouble?” 
  The bronze man nodded to the rear-
  view mirror. “We are being trailed.” 
  For two long moments, the girl’s 
  blue-green eyes watched the mirror. Then 
  she spoke quietly. 
  “I think you’re right.” 
  Threat of danger didn’t seem to 
  terrify this girl as it might some women. 
  “We can get away from them,” Doc 
  said confidently, and he opened the car up. 
  And what Chick Lancaster observed 
  in 
  the 
  next 
  few 
  moments 
  was 
  a 
  demonstration of driving that astounded 
  her. The road wound and reversed and 
  dipped up and down steep grades. Doc 
  drove almost with relaxation, and yet at 
  speeds that were terrific.  
  Ten minutes later, the girl looked 
  across at him, grinned and commented, 
  “That’s that. We’ve lost them.” 
  They 
  were 
  now 
  climbing 
  an 
  unusually steep grade that swung over the 
  last remaining hillside before the valley 
  beyond. 
  Doc 
  started 
  to 
  say, 
  “Someone 
  apparently—” 
  He paused, his gaze flicking to the 
  dashboard of the car. The car was slowing. 
  It sputtered, came to a stop part way up the 
  hill. 
  Chick Lancaster’s eyes were wide. 
  She had followed the bronze man’s gaze to 
  the dashboard needle indicator. 
  “We’re out of gas!” she exclaimed. 
  “It 
  seems,” 
  Doc 
  added, 
  “that 
  someone figured it out carefully. They left 
  just enough gas in the tank so that we 
  would get stalled in this hilly country.” 
  Behind them, at the start of the hill, a 
  car motor roared. It was the sedan that had 
  been following them.  
  Doc, tense, was suddenly giving 
  swift directions to the girl. As he talked, he 
  yanked up door handles that locked the 
  doors from inside. He did this to all but the 
  door beside him. 
  “You’ll remain in the car,” Doc said 
  hurriedly. “There is no possible way they 
  can reach you. You’ll be safe.” 
  “But—!” 
  “I’ll be back.” 
  Doc 
  Savage 
  reached 
  into 
  a 
  compartment that was located in the dash. 
  He removed a package that was about the 
  size of a one-pound box of chocolates. 
  Slipping the package beneath his coat, he 
  stepped out of the car. 
  For the first time, the red-haired girl 
  looked scared. 
  “Please!” she exclaimed. 
  Doc’s words were clipped. “Lock the 
  door after me!” he ordered. “You’ll not be 
  harmed. Don’t try to leave the car.” 
  He slammed the door behind him, 
  heard the door handle lock as the girl 
  pushed it up from inside. 
  He also heard the slugs that whined 
  close 
  as 
  he 
  disappeared 
  into 
  the 
  surrounding woods. 
  Heads were protruding from the big 
  sedan. A man was aiming a pistol and firing 
  in the direction the bronze giant had taken. 
  The driver of the trailing car—a beefy 
  fellow with a heavy, unshaven face—
  brought the machine to a stop fifty feet 
  beyond the bronze man’s car. 
   
   
  HE said, “What the hell!” 
  There were four other men in the 
  machine beside the driver. They looked like 
  the kind of individuals employed in dock 
  strikes. 
  All were carrying guns, and all raced 
  toward the bronze man’s car. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  34 
  The beefy man laughed harshly. 
  “Some guy, this Doc Savage. He ran off 
  and left the dame!” 
  He grabbed the car-door handle. 
  Then he stared. The handle would not 
  budge. 
  He rapped on the window, glaring at 
  the girl seated inside the machine. “Open 
  up!” 
  For answer, Chick Lancaster coolly 
  thumbed her nose at the big fellow who 
  needed a shave. 
  With a snort of rage, the big man 
  backed off, raised his gun and fired at the 
  car window. He fired high enough that the 
  shot would go over the girl’s head, but at 
  least it would scare her into unlocking the 
  car doors. 
  Instead, the five thugs themselves 
  got a shock. The tiniest of marks appeared 
  on the window as a result of the slug 
  striking. The glass did not even web.  
  The big leader tried shooting at 
  another window. He got the same results. 
  With a curse, he waved a fist at the 
  girl inside the car. 
  She merely returned his glare. 
  Suddenly, one of the other men 
  grabbed the burly fellow’s arm. “Hey!” he 
  yelled. “Maybe this is a trick. They say that 
  Doc Savage is pretty smart.” 
  That seemed to hold them all rigid. 
  They swung, stared toward the woods 
  where Doc Savage had vanished. 
  “Spread out!” the leader rapped. 
  “That bronze guy’s in there some place. 
  Get him!” 
  With guns held ready, all five men 
  advanced on the woods across the road. 
  Shortly they disappeared beneath the 
  enshrouding foliage. 
  From behind the protection of the 
  bulletproof car windows, Chick Lancaster 
  watched. 
  And five minutes later she heard the 
  roar of guns and the yelling and the wild 
  trampling 
  of 
  underbrush. 
  Men 
  came 
  tumbling out onto the road, piled back into 
  the sedan parked behind Doc’s car. The 
  burly-looking fellow was last to appear. He 
  leaped behind the wheel of the car, got the 
  motor started, and almost yanked out the 
  clutch as he sent the car racing up the hill. 
  None of the men seemed any longer 
  interested in Chick Lancaster. The only 
  thing that apparently worried them was to 
  escape with their lives. 
  A moment later, black, dense smoke 
  billowed out of the woods at the point 
  where the five men had emerged. It was 
  blinding stuff that shut off Chick Lancaster’s 
  view of the spot. 
  As she stared, a figure appeared out 
  of the black cloud. 
  It was Doc Savage. 
  The girl opened the car door, 
  exclaimed. “Mercy! What has happened?” 
  “They thought the smoke things were 
  bombs,” Doc said. “We have succeeded in 
  reversing the game of trailing one another.” 
  “Trailing?” The girl’s pretty eyes were 
  puzzled. “You mean you are going to trail 
  them?” 
  Doc nodded. He was now busy 
  taking a two-gallon can from the rear 
  section of the limousine. It was a can of 
  gasoline. 
  Chick Lancaster climbed out and 
  watched Doc Savage as he dumped the 
  gas into the tank. 
  “But how?” she demanded. “How do 
  you ever expect to trail them? They’ll be 
  miles from here by the time we get to the 
  State road and get more gas.” 
  Doc finished dumping in the gas, put 
  the can away, climbed behind the wheel. 
  From beneath the dashboard of the car he 
  swung out what looked like a small aërial 
  direction-finder. He turned a switch, waited 
  a moment, then said, “Listen.” 
  The series of signals came from a 
  small boxlike affair located near the small 
  aërial. As Doc Savage started up the car he 
  explained: 
  “Those signals are coming from a 
  small short-wave transmitter placed in their 
  car. We should be able to trail them.” 
  Amazement was mirrored in the 
  blue-green depths of the girl’s wide eyes. 
  “But how in the world did you work 
  that?” 
  “While they were trying to get into 
  this car, the device was planted in their 
  own. In the trunk on the rear.” 
  Chick 
  Lancaster 
  recalled 
  the 
  package Doc had removed before leaving 
  the car. 
  “The candy box?”  
  “Yes.” 
  Chick Lancaster sat back on the seat 
  and heard the steady signals coming from 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  35 
  the car far ahead and decided that this 
  bronze man was a fellow worth knowing. 
   
   
  FACTORY whistles were blowing for 
  the noon lunch hour when Doc Savage 
  passed through the outskirts of the State 
  capital. The steady stream of signals were 
  still coming from the small box located in 
  his car. 
  Chick Lancaster said, “Why would 
  they be coming here?” 
  “It might be interesting to find out,” 
  offered Doc.  
  They had seen no trace of the car, 
  and yet, by following the signals emanating 
  from the device which the bronze man had 
  placed in the trunk of the other car, they 
  had been able to keep the other machine 
  within reach. From the intensity of the 
  signals, Doc Savage judged that the other 
  machine was not more than a mile ahead of 
  them. 
  They passed through city traffic, 
  came to a wide boulevard that led into the 
  heart of the city. Far down its length was 
  the golden, shining dome of the capitol 
  building. 
  The girl’s eyes widened. “Do you 
  think,” she asked, “they would be going 
  there?” 
  Doc’s eyes were thoughtful. “We’ll 
  see.” 
  For a moment, the signals faded. 
  Then they picked them up again. The 
  bronze man frowned slightly. At the next 
  intersection, he swung right, proceeded for 
  three squares. The signals were stronger 
  again. Doc turned left on a through highway 
  that passed out of the city. 
  “I guess those men aren’t stopping 
  here after all,” the girl said. 
  Doc drove in silence. Shortly they 
  were passing an exclusive section of large 
  estates. Houses became more scattered. 
  What few there were appeared only briefly 
  through the trees of broad, sweeping lawns. 
  The road curved. High stone walls 
  replaced 
  hedges 
  and 
  lawns. 
  It 
  was 
  impossible to see the homes now. 
  The signals suddenly became very 
  strong in their ears. Doc’s unusual flake-
  gold eyes were sharp. When the signals 
  suddenly started to fade again, he slowed 
  the car and turned around in the roadway. 
  The girl looked at Doc. 
  “What is it?” she wanted to know.  
  “We have passed the other car.” 
  “But there was no side road, no 
  place where they could have turned off!” 
  the girl exclaimed. 
   
   
  DOC was proceeding slowly along 
  the road. Directly before the entranceway of 
  a 
  huge 
  estate, 
  the 
  signals 
  became 
  strongest, Doc noted the name of the 
  estate as he swung the car into the 
  graveled drive that wound beneath old 
  elms. 
  Chick Lancaster suddenly gave a 
  start. 
  “Do you know what place this is?” 
  she exclaimed.  
  Doc nodded. 
  “The home of Governor Bullock,” 
  said the bronze man quietly. 
  “But—” 
  Doc held up his hand, indicated the 
  huge house of block stone ahead. The 
  gravel drive swung beneath a porte-
  cochere of the house. The signals were still 
  plain in Doc’s car. 
  But there was no sign of a machine 
  parked before the governor’s mansion. 
  Doc drew up, stepped out of the car 
  and mounted the steps. There was a 
  screen door; beyond this a door which 
  stood open. The man lying on the hall floor 
  behind the screen door was moaning and 
  trying to get to his feet. 
  Doc Savage flung the door open, 
  hurried into the hall, was quickly helping the 
  heavy man to his feet. The costume of the 
  man showed that he was a butler. 
  There was a nasty red welt on the 
  butler’s forehead. For a moment he stared 
  dazedly at the bronze giant. Then his gaze 
  sharpened and he exclaimed: 
  “You’re Doc Savage! You’re the man 
  Mr. Bullock was expecting!” 
  Doc said, “What has happened?” 
  The butler was trembling. “Some 
  men, some ugly fellows, were here just a 
  few moments ago. They struck me when I 
  told them Mr. Bullock was missing since 
  last night. They wouldn’t believe me!” 
  Doc’s eyes flashed. “Missing? How 
  do you know?”  
  “Mr. Bullock left here for an important 
  conference at his executive office last night. 
  He has not been seen since!” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  36 
  “And the men that were here a few 
  moments ago?” 
  “Gone!” 
  Doc swung toward the doorway. 
  “You’d better bathe that head,” he said, and 
  started out. 
  “Wait!” the butler called, and he was 
  suddenly handing a long white envelope to 
  the bronze man. “Mr. Bullock left this last 
  night, saying to give it to you if you called 
  while he was out.” 
  Doc started to open the envelope, 
  remembered the signals that they had still 
  heard as they drove into the estate. There 
  was still the trail of the five men to follow. 
  He put the envelope in an inner 
  pocket, hurried back to the car and got the 
  machine started. He followed the drive that 
  circled the mansion and cut down through a 
  wooded lane beyond the estate. 
  The signals were abruptly very loud 
  again. 
  Chick Lancaster cried, “They must 
  be very close!”  
  Doc rolled to a stop a dozen feet 
  before a rustic wooden bridge. The bridge 
  formed part of the roadway, and spanned a 
  brook that was part of the estate.  
  The girl was suddenly out of the car 
  beside Doc Savage. Through the open side 
  window of the bronze man’s car, the 
  transmitter signals were very loud. 
  Frowning, the girl said, “That’s queer! 
  How can the signals be so strong when 
  their car is not even in sight!” 
  They were at the bridge. Suddenly 
  Doc’s gaze veered off to the side. In the 
  next split second he had shouted the 
  warning. 
  “Look out!” 
  With blurred speed, Doc swung the 
  girl’s trim figure into his arms and leaped 
  backward. 
  The bridge before them went up into 
  the air in a shuddering, earth-rocking blast. 
   
   
  Chapter X 
  THE BIG PEOPLE 
   
  THE house was one story high, 
  badly in need of paint, and looked like 
  something 
  ordered 
  from 
  a 
  mail-order 
  catalogue. The name on the tin mailbox 
  outside the gate said: 
   
  ZEKE BROWN 
   
  Reds Lancaster, engineer, pointed at 
  the house and said, “This is where he lived. 
  Alone. He must have learned something, 
  and because of that he died.” 
  Monk and Ham had stepped out of 
  the engineer’s car. Learning that both were 
  interested in all movements the farmer, 
  Zeke 
  Brown, 
  had 
  made 
  before 
  his 
  mysterious 
  death, 
  the 
  girl’s 
  engineer 
  brother had obligingly offered to show Monk 
  and Ham where the man had lived. 
  It was four o’clock in the afternoon, 
  and the day was hot. The two pets, Habeas 
  and the runt ape, had climbed out of the car 
  and were lying down in the grass, to cool 
  off. 
  Monk, frowning, muttered, “Blast it! 
  I’d like to know what Zeke Brown had in 
  that package for Doc.”  
  Reds Lancaster was swinging his car 
  around in the roadway. He leaned out and 
  said, “There’s a new shift going to work at 
  the shaft at five. I’ll have to get back. I’m 
  putting Hardrock Hennesey in charge as 
  walker.” 
  Ham ignored some remark that Monk 
  was making, looked at the engineer and 
  asked, “Walker?”  
  “Superintendent 
  in 
  the 
  tunnel,” 
  Lancaster explained. Sweat stood out on 
  his freckled face. The collar of his flannel 
  shirt was open and his necktie pulled down, 
  a wet, tight knot over his chest. 
  He added: “If I can be of any help, let 
  me know.”  
  He left them there and headed back 
  toward Shaft 9. 
  Monk had started toward the house. 
  Habeas got up out of the grass and ran 
  after him. 
  Ham and the pet chimp followed. 
  The lawyer was saying, “I don’t see where 
  you expect to learn anything here, dunce?” 
  Monk had found the kitchen door 
  open, was pushing inside the house. 
  “Listen,” Monk rapped, swinging on 
  his partner, “we’ve checked on all Zeke 
  Brown’s movements on the day he died, 
  haven’t we?” 
  Ham frowned. “I hate to agree with 
  you, ape, but the answer is yes.” 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  37 
  “And we learned, as far as everyone 
  knows, that he didn’t leave his home all 
  day?” 
  Ham nodded. 
  “And yet,” continued Monk, “Zeke 
  Brown had a package which he was gonna 
  mail to Doc. He went out last night to mail 
  it. And half an hour after he left this house 
  he was dead. Maybe we can find some 
  blasted thing here that will show us what he 
  was gonna mail.” 
  Ham shrugged. He started to say, “I 
  might as well humor you. Otherwise—” 
  He paused, listening. Monk, too, was 
  peering curiously toward a hallway that 
  divided the house. They were standing in 
  the kitchen, and the sound came from 
  across the hall, from what was apparently a 
  bedroom. 
  It was a creaking; steady, frequent. 
  Monk suddenly swung toward the 
  hall. Ham held his sword cane in a ready 
  grip as he followed. 
  In the doorway of the other room, 
  hairy Monk drew up short, craned his short 
  neck, exclaimed, “Well, I’ll be a ring-tailed 
  baboon!” 
  The old fellow sitting in the creaky 
  chair, rocking, must have been all of ninety 
  years old. He had skin like leather that has 
  been in a fire. 
  He looked up at the homely chemist 
  and said, “Have you seen them?” 
  “Seen what?” Monk demanded  
  “The people?” 
  “What people?” 
  “The people that lived here in the 
  ground. The big people looking like giants.” 
  Monk gulped. “What the blazes!” he 
  piped shrilly. 
  The old fellow kept on rocking in the 
  creaky chair. 
   
   
  HAIRY Monk stood staring at the old 
  fellow in the chair. 
  Ham did likewise. 
  The two pets, the pig and Chemistry, 
  stuck their heads between Monk’s bowed 
  legs and looked also.  
  “Crackpot!” was Monk’s comment, 
  looking at his partner. 
  “Crazy as a bedbug,” agreed Ham. 
  For the moment, they forgot that they 
  were mad at each other. 
  The old brown-looking fellow stopped 
  his rocking, glared at the two and said, 
  “Maybe you’d like to see one?” 
  “See what?” 
  “One of the big people.” 
  Monk 
  looked 
  at 
  Ham, 
  grinned, 
  whispered, “We’ll humor him.” 
  They stood aside while the bent old 
  fellow got out of the chair, led the way 
  through the kitchen and out of the house. 
  He followed a path that led to the old barn. 
  The barn, which had once been red, looked 
  so decrepit that it was about ready to lay 
  down on its side. 
  The old man went inside. The place 
  was 
  shadowy, 
  smelled 
  of 
  old 
  hay. 
  Somewhere a bee buzzed listlessly in the 
  heat of late afternoon. 
  The old man proceeded to a pile of 
  straw in the back of the barn and started 
  shoving some of it to one side. Suddenly 
  the pig, Habeas, let out a snort and backed 
  away. Chemistry scrambled up a nearby 
  ladder. 
  Monk said shrilly, “Blazes!” 
  The skeleton was about eight feet 
  long. The size and shape of the bone 
  structure indicated that the skeleton’s 
  original owner must have been a person at 
  least nine feet tall. 
  The skeleton had been carefully 
  concealed by the straw. 
  “You see?” the old fellow said. 
  Monk stared. “Whew!” he whistled. 
  “I’m glad that guy ain’t alive!” 
  Ham was bending down, examining 
  the skeleton.  
  “I can show you another one,” 
  abruptly put in the old man. 
  Monk 
  was 
  interested. 
  He 
  was 
  thinking of the thing they had seen down in 
  the tunnel—evidence that, centuries ago, 
  there had been another form of life in this 
  locality. A coastal region that had been 
  fifteen hundred feet below where they stood 
  now.  
  “Where’s 
  this 
  other 
  one?” 
  he 
  prodded. 
  “You come with me,” the withered old 
  man suggested. 
  Ham was still bending over the 
  skeleton. He looked up at Monk. “I thought 
  we were going to look over the house,” he 
  said. “You wanted to find out about that 
  package Zeke Brown was going to mail to 
  Doc.” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  38 
  “I’ll be back,” Monk said. “First, I’m 
  gonna find out what else this old geezer 
  has found.” 
  Monk followed the old fellow out of 
  the barn and across a field. They reached a 
  wooded area beyond, and the old man kept 
  on going, following a trail that led deeper 
  and deeper into the woods. It was cooler in 
  here, and the sun was kept out by the 
  heavy top growth of the trees, which made 
  the place look as though the sun had gone 
  down. 
  Later, the sun had gone down and 
  the old fellow was still walking, setting a 
  good pace for one so old.  
  Monk complained, “Hey, grandpop! 
  When are we gonna reach this other guy?” 
  “Soon now,” the old man said, and 
  he kept plodding ahead. 
  It grew darker. Silence lay like a 
  heavy blanket over the wild section. Monk 
  was about ready to say the hell with it, and 
  return, when the old man paused and 
  pointed ahead. 
  “This is the place,” he said. 
  It was a small clearing. Evening dusk 
  made everything shadowy and vague. The 
  old man pointed to a pile of carefully placed 
  rocks that looked not unlike an altar. On 
  this rested the indistinct, long form. 
  Monk stalked across the clearing and 
  bent down to examine this second skeleton, 
  and the thing got up and took hold of the 
  hairy chemist’s neck. 
   
   
  IT occurred to Monk, in the next wild 
  moment, that what had hold of him was no 
  skeleton. It was a human figure, about the 
  biggest the chemist had ever tackled, and 
  the fight that followed was terrific. 
  The big man bounced the chemist on 
  the skull with something that felt like a 
  large, round rock. But it proved to be a fist. 
  With a roar of rage—Monk always 
  made bull roars when really mad—the 
  chemist tore free of the fellow’s powerful 
  hold and started swinging his fists. 
  He slammed into his assailant and 
  let go with smashing rights and lefts. 
  And the big man merely let the blows 
  roll off his barrel chest and laughed. He 
  laughed harshly and bounced another fist 
  off Monk’s head. 
  Monk sat down on his hind quarters. 
  He leaped up again. 
  And was immediately knocked off his 
  feet. 
  The chemist spun around, dived 
  behind the rock pile and got two good-sized 
  rocks in his fists. He let them fly. The big 
  fellow got back in the shadows and ducked 
  low, but Monk kept picking up the rocks and 
  hurling them in the general direction of the 
  fellow’s indistinct form. 
  Somewhere back in the woods there 
  sounded a cackling laugh. The old geezer! 
  Wild with rage at being tricked like 
  this, Monk let a couple of rocks fly toward 
  the source of the sound. 
  A rock came back and hit him in the 
  chest, knocking him flat. Monk crawled to 
  his feet dizzily, stayed in a crouch behind 
  the rock pile and was more careful from 
  then on. Nevertheless, he kept up his 
  barrage of hurtling rocks. He kept it up until 
  his arms grew weary and he was forced to 
  stop for breath. 
  And then, puzzled, he listened. 
  There was no sound in the dark 
  clearing. No rocks were flying back at him. 
  He was, apparently, alone. 
  He crept forward cautiously, hoping 
  he might find an unconscious form. A 
  moment later, Monk swore.  
  For all he found was a large rock pile 
  across the clearing. He had practically 
  moved the stone pile from one spot to 
  another, in his wild barrage. 
  Monk stood there swearing for two 
  minutes without repeating himself once. 
  And then the light hit his homely 
  features and Ham’s voice said: 
  “I always figured you were crazy. 
  Now I know it!” 
   
   
  HABEAS, the scrawny pig, raced 
  across the clearing ahead of Ham. He 
  leaped up into the chemist’s arms and 
  licked his face. 
  Ham said, “For once, you hairy 
  mistake, that ungainly animal showed 
  sense. He got worried right after you’d left 
  and kept pestering me. So I followed.”  
  Monk exclaimed about the fight. 
  “The guy musta been a mate to that 
  one back in the barn!” he muttered. 
  “You mean—” 
  “Like a giant,” Monk continued. He 
  picked up two large, round stones and 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  39 
  glared off into the woods. “Come on. We’ll 
  find them.” 
  Ham said, “Wait! We’ve got to hurry 
  back.” 
  “Why?” 
  In the flashlight glow, Ham’s face 
  was suddenly worried. 
  He said, “Reds Lancaster called that 
  farmhouse. Renny heard something from 
  the State capitol and asked him to get us as 
  soon as possible. Lancaster is going to 
  meet us back there at the farm.” 
  “What’s 
  the 
  trouble?” 
  Monk 
  demanded. 
  Ham was already leading the way 
  back through the woods. There was anxiety 
  in his words as he went on, “I don’t know 
  what it is. But that girl’s brother seemed 
  mighty worried about something.” 
  They set a fast pace, the two pets 
  running along behind them. The moon was 
  up by the time they returned to the dead 
  farmer’s house. They saw the red-headed 
  engineer’s car parked in the roadway in 
  front of the place. 
  Lancaster hopped out at sight of 
  them. His wiry, alert form was tense. 
  “We’ve got to hurry!” he said. 
  “It’s something about Doc?” Ham 
  prodded. 
  The engineer nodded, motioning 
  them toward his car. 
  “Chick called from the capitol. It 
  seems she and Doc Savage were almost 
  blown up near a bridge on the governor’s 
  estate. She was knocked out by the blast.” 
  “And so?” 
  “When she woke up, Doc Savage 
  was missing.” 
   
   
  Chapter XI 
  THIRD DEGREE 
   
  THE hotel room was stifling hot, and 
  for a good reason. All windows of the large 
  room had been closed tight and the shades 
  drawn. 
  Outside 
  in 
  the 
  night 
  the 
  thermometer registered eighty. Inside the 
  stuffy room, with the lights turned on, it was 
  well over ninety. 
  Pretty Chick Lancaster sat tied in the 
  straight-back chair and perspiration dripped 
  off her smooth, high forehead. Her auburn-
  red hair was moist against her forehead; 
  little curls of it clung damply against her 
  neck. 
  But her blue-green eyes were bright 
  and blazing.  
  She glared at the circle of men 
  grouped around her and snapped, “For the 
  hundredth time, you can go to hell!” 
  “Little spitfire!” one of the men said 
  wearily. 
  The fellow’s shirt was open at the 
  neck and his sleeves were rolled up. The 
  shirt stuck like wet sheeting to his 
  shoulders. He had a hard, cruel face. 
  The other four men with him were 
  equally 
  as 
  hard-looking. 
  They 
  also 
  appeared disgusted. 
  They all stared at Chick Lancaster, 
  and one said, “Maybe she doesn’t know 
  where the bronze guy is. Maybe she’s just 
  givin’ us a stall.” 
  For 
  several 
  hours 
  now, 
  the 
  questioning had been going on. The men 
  took turns firing questions at the girl. They 
  were pretty good at it. 
  They should be. At various times in 
  their questionable careers they had all been 
  in police line-ups and been given the third 
  degree. 
  A bridge lamp had been tilted so that 
  the bright light hit Chick Lancaster in the 
  face. Her features were flushed from 
  concentration of the light. A tiny vein in her 
  smooth throat throbbed. 
  But her chin was held high and her 
  gaze was fiery. She had steadily refused to 
  answer any questions hurled at her by the 
  five thugs. 
  One man snapped, “Dammit, we 
  gotta find Doc Savage. That was the big 
  boy’s orders!” 
  “Maybe you can make her talk?” 
  someone asked.  
  “Maybe I can,” said the man in a 
  quiet, flat voice. 
  Heads turned to look at him. The 
  fellow had an ax-shaped jaw and there was 
  something about his eyes that made you 
  uneasy. 
  Chick Lancaster, hearing the tone of 
  his voice, stiffened imperceptibly. She saw 
  the man stare at his fingernails, then polish 
  them on his shirt sleeve. He looked at his 
  nails again and then up at the others. 
  “I got some pliers down in the car,” 
  he said significantly. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  40 
  He held his fingers up to the light and 
  looked at the nails again. 
  Chick Lancaster shuddered. She had 
  heard of torture methods used by crooks. 
  She had heard of pliers being used to pull 
  out fingernails. 
  Horror took hold of her. She was 
  terrified because she did not know what 
  she would do if they tried such methods. 
  She did not know where Doc Savage was! 
  For when the blast had demolished 
  the small bridge on the governor’s estate, 
  she only remembered being swept up into 
  the bronze giant’s arms, as he made an 
  attempt to pull her clear of the danger. And 
  then the blast had knocked them both flat 
  and she had recalled nothing more. 
  Nothing, that is, until she woke up in 
  the sedan with these five thugs. And now, 
  for hours, they had been questioning her 
  about the bronze man’s whereabouts. After 
  dark, she had been carried, gagged, up a 
  fire escape of this hotel. She had screamed 
  once the moment they had taken the gag 
  out of her mouth. And a man had laughed. 
  “Yell your head off, baby,” someone 
  had said. “No one in this place is gonna ask 
  questions. They know better.” 
  And now— 
  The hatchet-jawed man who had 
  mentioned the pliers started toward one of 
  the windows. It was one containing a fire 
  escape outside. He turned back and said, “I 
  left the car down back in the alley. I’ll be 
  right back.” 
  His 
  companions 
  waited 
  quietly, 
  staring at the girl. 
  She felt suddenly faint, thinking of 
  what was going to happen when the cruel-
  faced man returned. But she gritted her 
  teeth and sat there with her hands clenched 
  behind her back, where the wrists were tied 
  tightly together. 
  “Better decide to talk, babe,” one 
  man said. Sweat made his face appear like 
  pasty dough. 
  “Joey doesn’t fool,” put in another. 
  Joey was apparently the one who 
  had gone down the fire escape. He had not 
  bothered to close the window, merely 
  pulling the shade down to the sill behind 
  him. 
  It rustled slightly in a hot, languid puff 
  of breeze that drifted in from the night. The 
  men continued to sweat as they watched 
  the girl. One swore. 
  The shade rustled again and a man 
  looked up and started to complain, “What 
  the hell kept—”  
  Various things then happened, none 
  of them expected. 
  Standing just inside the window, Doc 
  Savage, looking like a great bronze statue, 
  said, “You should have kept Joey inside.” 
   
   
  THE four men dived for guns at the 
  same instant the bronze giant dived for 
  them. They would never be able to 
  understand how Doc Savage moved a 
  dozen feet while their hands were only 
  moving inches.  
  Doc hit the group before the guns 
  were clear of shoulder holsters. Furious 
  action followed. Two men fell down. They 
  didn’t get up again. 
  A third tried to slug the bronze fellow. 
  He never saw the fist that lifted him off his 
  feet as it cracked beneath his jaw. He 
  landed in a heap beside the first two. 
  The fourth man tried to dive for the 
  hall door. Fingers seized his throat, and 
  pressure touched a certain nerve. He went 
  quietly to sleep. 
  Doc Savage turned his attention to 
  the red-haired girl. Untying her, he said 
  quietly, “You should have stayed at the 
  shaft with your brother.” 
  The girl stood up from the chair, 
  moving her slender arms to restore 
  circulation. She smiled fondly at Doc 
  Savage, 
  exclaimed, 
  “I 
  wouldn’t 
  have 
  missed this for the world!” 
  The bronze man made no comment. 
  His metallic features were expressionless. 
  He had already turned to start tying up the 
  four men with the cords that had been used 
  on herself. 
  Chick Lancaster shrugged and gave 
  a little sigh. This bronze fellow was certainly 
  different from most men. She couldn’t figure 
  him out. 
  She asked, “What happened back 
  there by the bridge? All I remember is—” 
  “We were knocked down,” Doc 
  explained. “You were merely dazed for a 
  few moments.” 
  “But—” 
  “They must have needed something 
  out of the trunk. That explains how they 
  found 
  the 
  miniature 
  short-wave 
  radio 
  transmitter. They put the transmitter a 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  41 
  hundred yards down the bank of that brook 
  and set the trap. They captured you while I 
  was down there looking for the transmitter.” 
  Chick Lancaster’s blue-green eyes 
  were wide.  
  “Trap? 
  You 
  mean, 
  we 
  were 
  supposed to be killed there at the bridge?” 
  Doc nodded. 
  The girl stared at Doc Savage. “I’m 
  beginning to understand the kind of 
  dangerous life you lead,” she said. 
  Doc had all four men tied up. He 
  picked up one man, set him in an armchair, 
  then took something that looked like a small 
  hypodermic needle from a vest beneath his 
  coat. The captive’s shirt sleeve was already 
  rolled up, so Doc Savage merely stuck the 
  needle of the gadget into the man’s arm 
  and pressed a small plunger. 
  Watching, wondering what this was 
  all about, Chick suddenly remembered 
  something. 
  “Look!” 
  she 
  exclaimed. 
  “I 
  just 
  thought. How did you happen to find me?” 
   
   
  DOC looked up at the girl. “The 
  police were given the license number of 
  their car two hours ago,” he explained. “It 
  was located in this neighborhood just a little 
  while ago. A few minutes ago I caught Joey 
  entering the car.” 
  “And the police?” 
  “They were merely requested to let 
  me know where it was last seen.” 
  The girl stared. “Then you have 
  connections with the police here?” 
  Doc merely said, “We have worked 
  with the police of various large cities at 
  different times.” 
  He did not explain that he was an 
  honorary member of the F. B. I. and the 
  New York City police department; that in 
  practically every city through the country, 
  he would gladly be given a free hand to do 
  what he chose. 
  The 
  fellow 
  who 
  had 
  been 
  administered 
  the 
  drug 
  was 
  suddenly 
  mumbling. 
  “What did you do to him?” Chick 
  queried. 
  Doc stated several long words. “In 
  short,” he added, “truth serum. We will try 
  to find out what he knows.” 
  The man’s eyes were open. At first, 
  he looked at the bronze man sort of 
  vaguely. Then his eyes widened and he 
  said, “I’m supposed to kill you. You’re Doc 
  Savage.” 
  “Why are you supposed to kill me?” 
  Doc prodded.  
  “Because they are not sure just how 
  much you know.” 
  “Who?” 
  “The rest of them—the guys I’m 
  working with.”  
  “And who’s that?” 
  The man answered the questions 
  readily enough.  
  “Oh, Joey and Louie Heller and the 
  Kid. All of ‘em.” 
  Doc Savage frowned slightly. Names 
  of ordinary hoods and gunmen were not 
  what he was seeking. What he needed was 
  the name of the big-shot, the person who 
  might know about the strange mystery that 
  had hit Shaft 9 and why it had done so. 
  He asked: “Who is behind you? Who 
  is paying you?” 
  The captive shrugged. “We call him 
  Lefty. That’s all I know about him. But he’s 
  working for some one still bigger.” 
  “Who?” 
  The man was obviously now trying to 
  avoid answering the questions. He looked 
  suddenly pale, frightened. But the words 
  came out against his will. 
  “I heard Lefty say something about . . 
  . about Governor Bullock.” 
  Chick Lancaster gasped. “No! It can’t 
  be!” 
  Doc 
  looked 
  at 
  their 
  captive. 
  “Governor Bullock?”  
  “Yes.” 
  Doc questioned the fellow further, 
  but learned nothing. The captive only knew 
  what he had overheard Lefty say. Lefty had 
  merely hinted that their pay was coming 
  from the State capitol itself. 
  Doc gagged the man, as he did the 
  others—they 
  were 
  showing 
  signs 
  of 
  returning consciousness—then stepped to 
  the phone located in the room. 
  He 
  called 
  police 
  headquarters, 
  identified himself, reported that there were 
  four thugs tied up in the room and a fifth in 
  a car down in the alleyway. 
  He hung up. 
  The girl was still stunned. “I can’t 
  believe that it is the governor,” she said. “I 
  happen to know him well. Why, he’s—” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  42 
  “It might be a good idea to see him,” 
  suggested Doc. 
  “But how? That butler told you he 
  was missing. He—” 
  Doc reminded Chick Lancaster of the 
  note that had been handed him at the 
  governor’s estate. 
  “It was a message saying to meet 
  him at the Mountain Hotel,” Doc explained. 
  “Governor Bullock is hiding out there. His 
  life has been threatened.” 
  The girl gasped. “But if he is behind 
  this mystery, why would he be in hiding?” 
  Doc said, “That is why it might be 
  interesting to see him.” He stepped toward 
  the fire-escape window, motioned the girl to 
  follow. It was obvious that Doc wanted to 
  avoid detection as they left the hotel. 
  He paused before helping the girl 
  outside, and said, “But first there is 
  something else. A phone call to the shaft 
  revealed that you are in the custom of 
  staying at the Plaza Hotel when on trips to 
  this city. I called them, and the desk clerk 
  said there is a package there for you.” 
  “Package?” 
  “Yes. A package for me, but sent in 
  your care.”  
  “What could it be?” 
  Doc said, “We had better hurry.” 
   
   
  Chapter XII 
  THE PHOTOGRAPH 
   
  THE package was about six inches 
  square and a half inch thick. Chick 
  Lancaster handed it to Doc Savage with the 
  comment, “What can it be?” 
  The bronze man was seated behind 
  the wheel of his big car. He had waited, 
  because he had not wanted to be 
  observed, while the red-haired girl had 
  gone into the hotel where she was in the 
  habit of stopping while in the capital city. 
  Doc unwrapped the package while 
  Chick Lancaster watched. Inside, two 
  pieces of cardboard protected a photograph 
  that was new and glossy. It was about the 
  oddest-looking picture either had ever 
  seen.  
  Chick exclaimed, “Heavens! What is 
  it?” 
  Doc was gazing intently at the 
  photograph. He said nothing for a moment. 
  It was a view that might have been 
  taken in some sort of tomb. Weirdness best 
  described it. 
  Rock walls formed a background for 
  what was some kind of ancient chamber. 
  Crude weapons leaned on the wall. On the 
  rock floor, a skeleton lay in a grotesque 
  position. Off to one side there was a huge 
  thing that looked like great slabs of marble 
  embedded with crude wood spikes. 
  The man was pressed between 
  these body-piercing slabs. It was evident 
  that he had died hideously. 
  But Doc Savage seemed more 
  interested in the size of the skeleton shown 
  lying on the rock floor. From his vest pocket 
  he took a small rule. He measured the 
  length of the picture and the size of various 
  ancient objects shown in the torture room. 
  In his mind, he calculated the size of the 
  skeleton. He remarked: 
  “No person living today would be as 
  tall as that.”  
  The girl gasped. “What does it 
  mean?” She was pointing at words printed 
  across the bottom of the picture. They read: 
   
  MEN SHALL DIE WHEN THEY 
  DISTURB  THE  BIG  PEOPLE 
   
  Doc 
  Savage 
  was 
  holding 
  the 
  photograph at various angles beneath the 
  dashboard light. There was something like 
  a shadow across one corner of the picture. 
  The shadow did not seem to be a part of 
  the view that had been taken of the strange 
  chamber. 
  The girl shuddered. “Heavens! What 
  a horrible thing! Where do you imagine it 
  was taken?” 
  “If we knew,” the bronze man said 
  quietly, “it might explain a lot of things.” 
  He made no further comment. He 
  locked the photograph up in a dashboard 
  compartment of the car, put the car into 
  speed and headed for the Morley Hotel, 
  after 
  asking 
  Chick 
  Lancaster 
  which 
  direction it was. 
  It was almost ten thirty when they 
  stopped on a side street beside the tall 
  structure 
  where 
  Doc 
  Savage 
  had 
  mentioned the governor was in hiding. 
  Doc said, “Perhaps you had better 
  wait here.” 
  But the girl’s eyes flashed. “Nothing 
  doing! I’m going with you.” 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  43 
  There was enough determination in 
  her voice to show that time might be 
  wasted in trying to dissuade her from going. 
  Doc shrugged, and climbed out. He locked 
  the car and they entered the hotel by a side 
  entrance. 
  The bronze man headed directly for 
  an elevator that was standing open on one 
  side of the large lobby. The car, except for 
  the operator, was deserted. 
  Doc said, “A friend is ill. Would you 
  take us right up?” 
  The operator quickly closed the 
  doors and Doc and the girl had the car to 
  themselves. 
  But in the hallways of the fourteenth 
  floor, she looked at him and asked, 
  puzzled, “How did you know—” 
  “Governor Bullock is registered here 
  under the name of Samuel Jones,” Doc 
  explained. “He is in Room 1401.” 
  Room 1401 was at the end of a long, 
  carpeted hallway. Doc knocked quietly on 
  the door, stood waiting. 
  After 
  a 
  while 
  a 
  voice 
  asked 
  cautiously, “Yes?”  
  Doc Savage looked at the girl. She 
  nodded. 
  “That sounds like the governor, all 
  right,” she whispered. 
  The bronze man said, “This is Doc 
  Savage.” 
  The door immediately opened and 
  they stepped inside. 
  And immediately men with guns 
  stepped out from where they had been 
  pressed against the walls and covered Doc 
  Savage and the girl. One said harshly: 
  “We kinda thought you’d fall for that 
  fake letter!” 
   
   
  BECAUSE the red-haired girl was so 
  close beside him, Doc Savage hesitated a 
  moment before whirling into action. In that 
  instant, guns were jammed into his spine 
  and at least half a dozen men had him 
  covered.  
  Chick Lancaster was seized by two 
  other 
  men. 
  She 
  started 
  to 
  scream. 
  Immediately a hand was slapped roughly 
  over her mouth and she was swept off her 
  feet. She was quickly carried through a 
  foyer and into a larger, inside room of what 
  appeared to be a suite. 
  Doc was urged inside also. Two of 
  the men remained behind him, two on 
  either side. They were taking no chances 
  on this bronze fellow. 
  The girl was being tied up and 
  gagged. Doc was treated in like manner. 
  There were so many guns covering him 
  that he had little chance of trying for a 
  break. Besides, there was the girl to think 
  of. 
  Someone went through the bronze 
  man’s pockets, found his car keys. 
  “This’ll be good,” the man said. “We’ll 
  use his machine. No chance of being 
  grabbed now in that hot car.” 
  Apparently Doc and the girl were 
  going to be transported to some other point. 
  While the other gunmen waited, two 
  men left the apartment. One was only gone 
  two moments. When he came back, he 
  said: 
  “Well?” 
  “Everything’s fixed. We’ve got that 
  guy on the freight elevator well greased. 
  We’ll take them down that way. Jimmie’s 
  gonna have the bronze guy’s car waitin’ in 
  the alleyway out back. Come on.” 
  While one man remained in the hall 
  as a lookout, Doc and the girl were carried 
  out by the others, hurried to a large service 
  elevator around an ell in the corridor, 
  placed inside and taken to the ground floor.  
  A dimly lighted freight entrance was 
  revealed when the car came to a stop. The 
  two captives were removed to an areaway 
  behind the hotel. It was here that Doc’s big 
  limousine was pulled up. 
  The girl and Doc were dumped in the 
  rear of the car. Two men climbed into the 
  seat; three others got into the driver’s 
  section. Those who did not get into the car 
  grinned down at the bronze man where his 
  great form was jammed in on the wide floor. 
  “Be seein’ you, Savage—in hell!” 
   
   
  THE driver spoke to one of the men 
  who were remaining behind. “You know 
  where to meet us?”  
  “Yeah. You better get going.” 
  “O. K.” 
  The car rolled off into the night. The 
  windows had been closed, and it was stuffy 
  inside the car. The girl, Chick, was crowded 
  between the two big men on the back seat. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  44 
  Each man held a gun. They watched Doc 
  Savage more closely than they did the girl. 
  Doc was flat on his face on the floor 
  of the machine. His hands had been tied 
  behind him. His ankles were tied also, and 
  yanked backward and upward so that they 
  were tied to the ropes encircling his wrists. 
  A gag was in the bronze man’s mouth. 
  The driver wheeled the big car 
  carefully through city streets. He took no 
  chance on being stopped by a traffic cop. 
  Ten minutes later they were beyond the 
  street lights and rolling through open 
  country. The windows of the machine were 
  opened. 
  Someone 
  said, 
  “Whew! 
  I 
  was 
  damned near roasted!” as a breeze came in 
  the windows and took away the thick 
  stuffiness inside the car. 
  Doc Savage, with his teeth, kept 
  working at the floor mat that was just 
  beneath his face. His movements, so as not 
  to arouse suspicion, had to be slight. He 
  worked for perhaps twenty minutes before 
  he had the corner section of the mat rolled 
  back beneath his perspiring face. 
  His teeth closed over the tiny hook 
  located there and he pulled on it carefully. 
  It was about a half hour after this, as 
  the car was passing through a particularly 
  lonesome stretch of country, that the plane 
  came down out of the air and circled them 
  and started dropping the magnesium flares. 
   
   
  THE flares were bright enough that 
  everyone in the machine was quickly 
  blinded. The driver yanked on the brake, 
  howled, “Holy hell! I can’t see!” 
  “Turn around, you sap!” someone 
  yelled. “It’s some kind of trap!” 
  The driver started to swing the 
  machine around in the roadway. He let out 
  a shout. Behind them, another flare must 
  have been dropped—for the space back 
  there was a blinding sheet of white. 
  The car was completely surrounded 
  by the curtain of intense whiteness, so 
  brilliant that it was impossible to keep the 
  eyes open for more than a moment at a 
  time. 
  Suddenly, beyond that sheet of 
  whiteness, a plane motor sputtered and 
  died. Almost immediately there was a shout 
  and a racket like a bull-fiddle roar. 
  The car driver slammed open the 
  door and cried, “Me, I’m gettin’ the hell 
  outta here!” 
  That seemed to be the general idea 
  of his partners. All piled out and ran like 
  confused blind men through the white, 
  burning magnesium glare. 
  There was the sharp crack of pistols. 
  Over this, more of the bull-fiddle roaring 
  sounds. And then, quite distinct, a voice 
  that howled: 
  “Yeo-o-ow! I got me a blasted 
  polecat!” 
   
   
  Chapter XIII 
  GOVERNOR MISSING 
   
  IT was hairy monk Mayfair who had 
  yelled. Running from the plane toward the 
  blinding white light, one of Doc’s machine 
  pistols in his hand, he had crashed into 
  someone, a fellow wiry, slender and quick-
  moving. The magnesium glare was too 
  intense to make identification possible. 
  But Monk got his huge hand on the 
  man’s coat and started thumping away on 
  the captive’s head with the butt of the gun. 
  It was Ham’s voice that yelled, “Wait! 
  You’ve got the wrong person!” 
  Monk thought it was a huge joke. “I 
  should have hit you harder,” he squealed. 
  The arrival of two of the escaping 
  thugs from the car momentarily stopped the 
  argument. 
  Monk grabbed a man. Ham had his 
  slender sword flashing. Everyone started 
  fighting enthusiastically. Three minutes 
  later the two thugs lay sprawled on the 
  ground and the two aids were trying to 
  locate Doc’s car in the blinding white light. 
  Somewhere ahead, Renny’s voice 
  roared, “Here it is, Lancaster. Come on!” 
  Ham and Monk, though they were 
  blinded, moved toward the sound across a 
  rough field. The two pets, Habeas and 
  Chemistry, ducked in and out between their 
  legs, also blinded by the light. 
  The four men—Ham, Monk, Renny 
  and the girl’s engineer brother, Reds 
  Lancaster—had been flying toward the 
  State capital when they had picked up the 
  peculiar signal from Doc Savage’s car. 
  They had been using the fast plane left in 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  45 
  the gas-station field when they had arrived 
  at Shaft 9. 
  The signal was a short-wave code 
  transmission that had automatically gone 
  on the air when Doc had pulled the tiny 
  hook in the floor of the car. The hook had 
  switched on a small transmitter concealed 
  beneath the floorboards of the big machine, 
  and was only one of the scientific gadgets 
  that Doc Savage had built into the unusual 
  automobile. 
  Trailing the steady source of code 
  signals, Renny—who had been at the 
  controls of the plane—had located the 
  bronze man’s car speeding along the 
  stretch of lonely highway. He had dropped 
  low, released the magnesium flares that 
  had blinded the car driver and his 
  associates. 
  There was the sound of voices from 
  somewhere within the curtain of dazzling 
  whiteness. Monk squinted his eyes as he 
  ran through the rough field, trying to see. 
  He saw Ham just ahead of him. And then, 
  abruptly, he couldn’t. 
  Monk yelled, “Hey! Where are you?”  
  A form raised up in front of him. 
  Ham! 
   
   
  MONK exclaimed, “Blast it! Where 
  am I going?”  
  Spluttering, the lawyer said, “Into the 
  river . . . I’ve just come out!” 
  The words came too late for Monk to 
  check his waddling, fast stride. He plunged 
  off 
  a 
  two-foot-high 
  embankment 
  and 
  sprawled into the water. The water was 
  only waist-deep, apparently a shallow 
  stream that cut through the fields. 
  Monk came up snorting with rage. 
  He glared at Ham, wading toward the 
  opposite bank. 
  “I’m gonna flatten you for not letting 
  me know that water was there!” he 
  muttered. 
  Ham ignored the remark. The brilliant 
  glow was dimming somewhat now; ahead, 
  he had seen the car parked in the roadway 
  just beyond a low fence. 
  Monk followed. The pets, looking like 
  scared, wet chickens, scrambled after him. 
  Ham and the hairy chemist reached 
  the car about the same time as huge 
  Renny. The brilliant flares had dimmed 
  enough now so that all could see. 
  Doc Savage had just stepped out of 
  the car. He was helping the girl, Chick 
  Lancaster, out of the rear seat. 
  Chick Lancaster stared at Doc 
  Savage, gasped, “You were not really 
  helpless, then? Why, you just now untied 
  yourself!” 
  Doc merely said, “It was possible 
  that they might have led us to where 
  Governor Bullock was either waiting for 
  them—or a captive. When I saw they were 
  not going to do this, I figured we ought to 
  try to seize them.” 
  Doc explained briefly to the girl about 
  the signal transmitter located beneath the 
  car. 
  “Renny,” added Doc, “had orders to 
  come to the capitol tonight if we had not 
  returned. I took a chance on catching them 
  somewhere en route.” 
  The girl’s green eyes were wide. “But 
  how did you know we were headed back 
  toward the shaft?”  
  Doc raised his hand briefly, indicated 
  a small compass that was a part of his wrist 
  watch. “It was quite obvious as to the 
  direction we were going,” he finished. 
  Big Renny had been staring around. 
  He asked abruptly, “Where’s Lancaster?” 
  “My brother was with you?” the girl 
  asked. 
  Renny, his long face as gloomy-
  looking as ever, nodded. 
  “He’s been helping us all he could,” 
  explained Renny. “He came along tonight 
  because he was worried about you.” 
  They all started a search in the 
  vicinity of the car. And a few moments later, 
  all returned and gave the same report. 
  Lancaster, obviously, was missing. 
   
   
  MONK remembered the two men 
  that had been knocked out and left back in 
  the field. He started to say something about 
  going back to get them, then looked at red-
  haired Chick Lancaster. He grinned at his 
  partner Ham. 
  “You’d better go, shyster,” he piped. 
  “There’s something I gotta tell Chick.” He 
  smiled fondly at the girl. 
  For Monk had gotten over his first 
  suspicions of the girl. If she was trying to 
  help Doc Savage, she must be O. K., in his 
  opinion. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  46 
  He stepped toward her now and 
  said, “I’ve been worried about you.” 
  Chick Lancaster gave Monk a warm 
  smile. Then her lovely eyes clouded. She 
  gripped the chemist’s burly arm. 
  “What could have happened to my 
  brother?” she asked worriedly. 
  “Maybe he’s chasin’ some of those 
  crooks,” was Monk’s theory. “He’ll be all 
  right. He looks like a guy who can take care 
  of himself.” 
  Doc Savage said quietly, “We had 
  better make a more complete search. Monk 
  can bring back the two men who were 
  knocked out. Chick had better wait in the 
  car.” 
  Monk sighed as he looked hopefully 
  at the girl. “See you later, babykins,” he 
  said, and motioned to Ham. 
  “Come on, shyster.” 
  Ham, his custom-tailored clothes 
  clinging to him wetly, looked as though he 
  was going to cut his hairy partner’s throat 
  as soon as he got him in a dark spot. 
  Still arguing, they returned to the 
  spot where they had left the two men in the 
  field—and found no one. 
  Monk 
  stared. 
  “Them 
  danged 
  polecats musta been found by the other 
  guys who escaped from Doc’s car!” he 
  muttered. 
  They 
  searched 
  the 
  field. 
  They 
  climbed a stone wall that separated this 
  field from another beyond, a smoother 
  stretch of ground where the bronze man’s 
  plane had been brought down by Renny. 
  They even went to the plane to make 
  certain that everything was O. K. The two 
  aids finally returned again to Doc’s car. The 
  bronze man and big Renny had returned 
  also, and they too reported no success in 
  locating Reds Lancaster. 
  The girl, they found, was asleep in 
  the rear of the car. It had been hours since 
  any of them had had any rest. 
  Doc 
  Savage 
  was 
  thoughtful 
  a 
  moment. Then he said: 
  “There is an angle to this that is very 
  peculiar.”  
  Doc 
  told 
  them 
  the 
  mystery 
  concerning the disappearance of Governor 
  Bullock, of the things that had occurred in 
  the capital city. As yet, he had made no 
  comment about the queer photograph sent 
  him in care of the girl. 
  Renny suddenly boomed, “Holy cow, 
  Doc! If the governor is mixed up in this 
  thing, why would he have called you in to 
  investigate?” 
  “Smoke screen,” Ham, the lawyer, 
  put in quietly. 
   
   
  HAM explained. “He could have 
  called in Doc in order to throw suspicion 
  from himself.” 
  The bronze man’s features were 
  thoughtful.  
  “There is something that all of you 
  should know about,” he said abruptly. “It 
  changed the whole aspect of the mystery.” 
  “What?” Renny wanted to know. 
  “Governor 
  Bullock 
  practically 
  financed Yellow River Dam and most of the 
  water-tunnel project used in conjunction 
  with it. That would hardly make him out a 
  crook now.” 
  “Then how do you explain his 
  disappearance?” asked Ham. 
  Monk had a word to say before Doc 
  could answer.  
  “How do you explain anything in this 
  blasted mystery?” he demanded. “The giant 
  skeleton thing, that death fog, those guys 
  changing into mummies!”  
  Doc looked at Renny. “Have there 
  been any more accidents at the shaft?” 
  The big engineer shook his head. 
  “Nothing 
  happened 
  today,” 
  he 
  said. 
  “Everybody’s back on the job.”  
  The bronze man had apparently 
  reached a decision. He motioned them into 
  the ear. The pets were already in the front 
  seat. 
  “There is an answer to this thing 
  somewhere in the State capitol,” Doc said. 
  “All of you return to the shaft. Perhaps you 
  will find a trail to Lancaster. And you might 
  try to find out who mailed the photograph.”  
  All three stared. 
  “You 
  mean,” 
  asked 
  Ham, 
  “the 
  package that was missing from the farmer’s 
  car?” 
  Doc nodded. “It was a photograph, 
  taken recently and readdressed to me in 
  care of Chick Lancaster.”  
  The bronze man got the photo from 
  the car, showed it to the three aids. 
  Monk 
  jumped. 
  “Blazes!” 
  he 
  squeaked. “That’s the same kind of giant 
  skeleton we saw back in the barn.”  
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  47 
  “Barn?” asked Doc. 
  Monk told about the old fellow who 
  had tried to trick him. He described the 
  skeleton hidden in Zeke Brown’s barn. 
  But Doc Savage seemed more 
  interested in Monk’s description of the 
  ageless-looking old man whom they had 
  met at the farmhouse. 
  “Find him,” Doc ordered. “Look for 
  me back at the shaft some time before 
  tonight.” 
  Leaving them with the girl and the 
  car, he disappeared toward the field where 
  the plane had been set down. A few 
  moments later all heard the motor roar as 
  the fast craft took to the air, circled once, 
  then headed off toward the capital city. 
  It would be daylight in another hour. 
  Monk remarked, “Goshamighty! I just 
  thought of something! I just remembered 
  we didn’t see Hardrock Hennesey all day. 
  Now I wonder what’s happened to him?” 
   
   
  Chapter XIV 
  HARDROCK FINDS A CORPSE 
   
  THERE were two others who were 
  interested in finding tough little Hardrock 
  Hennesey. 
  The two were working on the muck 
  machine down in the tunnel below Shaft 9. 
  Powerful fellows, they wore the work 
  clothes and metal helmets of muckers. 
  They had gone to work on the midnight shift 
  that same day, when a call went out for 
  additional labor to help rush the tunnel job 
  to completion. 
  Around them now there was noise 
  and sweating and swearing. Air drills 
  yammered in the hands of miners up on the 
  platform of the tunnel head not far beyond 
  them. An hour ago the tunnel had been 
  cleared while a blast had been set off. Now 
  the miners and the muckers were back in 
  the bore cleaning out the cracked rock and 
  muck. It was mostly rock. 
  One of the two men leaned on his 
  shovel and spoke to the other. He almost 
  had to yell above the racket. 
  “You know what?” he shouted. 
  His partner—a close look at the two 
  men’s raw-red hands would show that they 
  were not used to this kind of labor—leaned 
  on his shovel also and said, “Well, what?” 
  “I think that little Hardrock Hennesey 
  has learned something. I just heard from 
  one of the nippers that Hardrock is up there 
  in the north extension of the tunnel. An’ 
  there ain’t no guys working up there 
  tonight!” 
  The other big fellow looked worried. 
  “Hell!” he exploded. “Maybe he’ll find 
  that—” 
  His partner nodded. “That’s what I 
  was thinking! We better investigate.” 
  They 
  dropped 
  their 
  shovels, 
  approached a tunnel foreman and one man 
  had a fit of coughing. He pressed his hands 
  to his chest. 
  The other said to the foreman. “The 
  dust has got him, boss. I’ll have to take him 
  up.” 
  The first workman kept groaning and 
  holding his hands pressed against his 
  chest. 
  “All right,” snapped the foreman. 
  “Take him up.”  
  Silicosis—a disease of the lungs 
  caused by inhaling quartz dust—kills more 
  tunnel workers than actual accidents. The 
  foreman took it for granted that one of the 
  two muckers had an attack of the disease 
  now. 
  The two men hurried through the 
  tunnel. After a while they were clear of the 
  work gangs. They proceeded swiftly until 
  they had reached the beginning of the long 
  north extension from Shaft 9. 
  Here, 
  work 
  was 
  practically 
  completed. The report was that, tomorrow, 
  the northern end of the bore would be 
  blasted through to meet the tunnel from 
  Shaft 10. And Shaft 10 was the last unit 
  connecting with Yellow River Dam, the 
  huge supply unit in the great project. 
  A nipper had just alighted from the 
  bucket, 
  having 
  come 
  down 
  from 
  aboveground. The “nippers” were the 
  apprentices who kept the miners supplied 
  with drills. They handled steel. 
  One of the two big muckers asked, 
  “You seen Hardrock Hennesey, kid?” 
  The nipper waved a hand toward the 
  north bore. “He’s up there. He went in just 
  as I was going out, about twenty minutes 
  ago.” 
  The two murmured something and 
  hurried on.  
  They covered the four miles to the 
  tunnel head. They passed no one. When 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  48 
  they had gone as far as they could, one 
  looked at the other and stared.  
  “Hardrock isn’t here!” he exclaimed. 
  His partner, for a big man, looked 
  scared. “That means,” he stammered, “that 
  . . . maybe he’s found it!”  
  “Come on!” rapped the other, and 
  they started running back through the 
  tunnel bore. 
  Halfway to the base of the fifteen-
  hundred-foot shaft entrance, they slammed 
  into Hardrock Hennesey. 
  Hardrock eyed the two and said, his 
  jaw thrust it, “I’ve been looking for you two 
  buzzards.” 
  There was a fight. 
   
   
  HARDROCK HENNESEY, as a kid, 
  had been raised on the sidewalks of New 
  York, in a section near Tenth Avenue. More 
  than once bigger kids had beat him up, for 
  Hardrock Hennesey had always been a 
  pretty small guy. 
  And so he had learned, as he grew 
  up, that there are other things to use 
  besides fists. Because most men were 
  usually bigger than himself, he generally 
  went prepared. 
  What he used now was a pipe 
  wrench yanked from the pocket of his too-
  big overalls. He sailed into the two big 
  fellows like a Spitz dog going after two 
  overgrown mongrels. 
  The wrench flew, and the two thugs 
  let 
  out 
  assorted 
  yells 
  and 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey got himself worked up to some 
  nice plain and fancy swearing. 
  One man was slammed up against a 
  hard rock wall of the tunnel. The other got 
  hold of Hardrock Hennesey’s arm and tried 
  to twist it so that it would break and the 
  wrench would be knocked free. 
  But the little tunnel worker sank his 
  teeth into the big fellow’s wrist. Howling 
  with rage, the man sprang clear. Hardrock 
  hit him with the wrench. He fell down, 
  moaning. 
  The other one had come running 
  back into the battle with his fists flailing and 
  his head pulled down like a wrestler’s. 
  Hardrock tapped the man on the head with 
  the heavy wrench, stepped aside as the 
  fellow fell atop his inert companion. 
  Hardrock Hennesey spat out tobacco 
  juice, put the wrench back in his pocket and 
  said for the benefit of the surrounding grim 
  walls, “About time I got those Doc Savage 
  guys, I reckon.” 
  When the sun was well up in the sky 
  later that morning, Hardrock Hennesey 
  located Monk, Ham and the big fellow 
  named Renny asleep in the limousine of 
  the bronze man. The car had been run 
  beneath some willows at some distance 
  from Shaft 9. It was a good shady spot 
  where the sun would not bother them when 
  it started to get hot. 
  Hardrock woke everyone up and 
  announced, “I got something to show you.” 
  Monk climbed out of the car looking 
  disgusted and sleepy. Ham and Renny 
  followed. 
  Renny asked, “What is it?” in his 
  blasting voice. 
   
   
  “IT’S about that farmer, that Zeke 
  Brown, who turned into a mummy. I know 
  what he had found out.” 
  “What?” 
  “You won’t believe it unless I show 
  you,” said Hardrock Hennesey. “But I got 
  wise to it when I followed an old buzzard 
  that looks old enough to be Meth—what the 
  hell was his name?” 
  “Methuselah,” supplied Ham.  
  “Yeah—him,” agreed Hardrock. 
  Monk was suddenly interested. He 
  described the brown, leathery-faced old 
  man who had tricked him at the farmhouse. 
  “That’s the bird,” said Hardrock. 
  “Well, 
  come 
  on, 
  and 
  I’ll 
  show 
  you 
  something.” 
  Hardrock suggested that they drive, 
  and they all piled into the car. The pets, 
  Habeas and the runt ape, were asleep on 
  the floor in the rear. 
  Hardrock Hennesey gave directions, 
  then looked worried and asked, “Where’s 
  Chick Lancaster? She all right?” 
  “We made her go home and get 
  some rest,” said Ham. 
  Chick 
  and 
  her 
  brother, 
  Reds 
  Lancaster, lived in a rented house about a 
  mile away from Shaft 9. 
  The 
  route 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  pointed out led away from the construction 
  center, followed a dusty country road that 
  ended in a meadow some distance behind 
  the farm of Zeke Brown, deceased. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  49 
  They got out and Hardrock led the 
  way across a pasture. Habeas, the pig, 
  immediately chased Chemistry across the 
  field. 
  Summer heat had dried up the 
  ground until it was like a baked, hard mud. 
  They walked for some time, came to a 
  hollow that dipped down beneath some 
  trees. 
  Hardrock Hennesey indicated some 
  dried-up tracks in the hard earth. “Zeke 
  Brown musta been looking for a strayed 
  cow,” he said. “There’s the prints.” 
  “So what?” Monk demanded in his 
  squeaky voice.  
  The little tunnel worker gave the 
  chemist a cool look, led the way farther into 
  the hollow. It became a crevice between 
  ridges of land. Well into the opening, 
  Hardrock suddenly paused and pointed at 
  something hardly a dozen feet away from 
  where they stood. 
  “What do you think of that?” he 
  asked.  
  All stared. 
  The opening was a three-foot-wide 
  crack in the earth. Cautiously, they moved 
  forward and stared over its edge. The 
  bottom of the thing was approximately 
  twenty-five feet below them. 
  Big Renny studied the split in the 
  ground a moment and then commented, 
  “Some earth vibration has probably caused 
  it.” 
  “You ain’t seen nothing,” put in 
  Hardrock Hennesey. “Wait a minute.” 
  He moved off beneath the nearby 
  trees, returned quickly with an armful of 
  rope. He was paying out the rope as he 
  returned, having, apparently, tied the other 
  end to a tree trunk. 
  “Wait’ll you see what’s at the bottom 
  of this place!” he exclaimed. 
  He caught hold of the rope, lowered 
  himself over the edge of the crack, and slid 
  downward. Shortly, the others followed. 
  In the bottom of the crevice, they all 
  noted that it seemed to follow a well-
  defined fissure in the rock. Hardrock led the 
  way. 
  It became darker and they appeared 
  to be dropping lower at each step; and after 
  a while the little tunnel worker took out a 
  flashlight and indicated the way. 
  They had proceeded for perhaps 
  twenty minutes. They were below ground 
  now, and it was cool and dank in the 
  narrow passageway. Hardrock suddenly 
  paused and said, “Here it is.” 
  He pointed the light ahead. 
  Monk exploded, “I . . . ah . . . 
  Jehoshaphat!”  
  The others merely stared. 
  The place had been widened into a 
  sort of small room. And what was in the 
  room was enough to create the horrors. 
  It looked like a medieval torture 
  chamber. Crude, ungainly contraptions for 
  tying up a person were built into the rock 
  walls. There were sharp implements made 
  out of quartz and stone. 
  On the floor there was a skeleton as 
  long and as big as the one Monk had seen 
  in the barn. A giant!  
  But the most awesome sight of all 
  was the torture thing to one side of the 
  roomlike space. Created of two crude slabs 
  of granite, the machine held stone spikes 
  that had been ground down to needle 
  points. 
  A man was in the machine, and red 
  liquid had oozed from his body and dried on 
  the stone spikes.  
  Monk had a hard time getting out 
  words. He blurted, “I . . . ah . . . Blazes! 
  This is the same place shown in the 
  photograph that was sent to Doc!”  
  Hardrock was staring intently at the 
  dead man in the spike device. His intense 
  gray eyes widened and he stared at his 
  companions. 
  “Holy 
  hell!” 
  the 
  tunnel 
  worker 
  gasped. “That . . . that guy in the machine! 
  It’s Jackhammer Edwards. A miner! He . . . 
  he disappeared from the shaft a couple of 
  days ago, I heard!” 
  Monk, curious, walked over and 
  examined one of the hooks embedded in 
  the rock wall. It, too, was of stone, as 
  though made back in the dark ages. 
  Tugging at the hook, he exclaimed, 
  “That old fellow might not have been so 
  cracked after all. He kept talkin’ about the 
  big people.” 
  The chemist turned and stared at the 
  others. His homely face was puzzled. 
  “Jeepers! What kind of people did live here 
  in the earth?” 
  Monk had been holding to the stone-
  hook thing in the wall. 
  Suddenly Ham looked past Monk 
  and yelled.  
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  50 
  “Look!” 
  the 
  well-dressed 
  lawyer 
  rapped. 
  A foggy, vaporous spray was coming 
  from tiny openings in the stone ceiling of 
  the room. It spread, lowered swiftly, 
  becoming like a grayish mirage. The room, 
  within seconds, grew terrifically hot. 
  Monk let out a yell and leaped 
  toward the others. “The fog!” he howled. 
  He started toward the opening where 
  they had entered the room. And staggered 
  backward as though he had been slammed 
  with a massive fist. His homely features 
  were blistered and his huge hands burned.  
  “We’re trapped!” squalled Monk. 
  The opaque fog was fast growing 
  more dense in the room. 
   
   
  Chapter XV 
  TUNNEL OF DOOM! 
   
  LATE that same afternoon, every 
  newspaper in the State was carrying black 
  headlines. 
  Word 
  about 
  the 
  mystery 
  centered around Shaft 9 and Yellow River 
  Dam had leaked out. Also other facts. 
  A capital afternoon sheet ran the 
  following: 
   
  GOVERNOR MISSING 
   
  Mystery Surrounds Tunnel Project as 
  Strange Fog Causes Deaths 
  and Terror 
   
  Capital City, August 3rd.—Though 
  various State officials deny the fact, it has 
  been learned on good authority that work 
  on the ten-million dollar Yellow River Dam 
  and tunnel project has been stopped. A 
  series of queer accidents have occurred on 
  the construction job. Workmen, it has been 
  stated, speak of a weird fog that appears 
  and which turns men into mummies. Others 
  even speak of a queer race of people that 
  have been unearthed, and now men are too 
  terrified to enter the various shafts. 
  This newspaper recalls a warning 
  given months ago when Governor Bullock 
  first broke ground for the mammoth Yellow 
  River Dam. At that time, a committee of 
  leading State businessmen and politicians 
  held out for a site to be used in an adjacent 
  valley to Yellow River. The site was 
  considered 
  more 
  advantageous. 
  But 
  Governor Bullock, through a bond issue, 
  had financed the site for the present dam 
  and adjoining water-tunnel outlet. At the 
  time, as many will recall, there was 
  considerable argument over the entire 
  thing. 
  And now, surprisingly, and as the 
  mystery spreads at Yellow River Dam, it 
  has been learned that Governor Bullock 
  cannot be located. There have been hints 
  of swindle. Has the people’s money been 
  invested in a project that is worthless? 
  What has happened to Governor Bullock? 
  Doc Savage, a remarkable person 
  who has solved baffling mysteries the world 
  over, is reported to be at Yellow River Dam 
  investigating. At this writing, Doc Savage 
  could not be reached. 
   
  There was more, and at the very end 
  of the newspaper story there appeared a 
  box announcement set in boldface type. 
   
  BULLETIN 
   
  Three Doc Savage assistants are 
  reported missing in tunnel mystery. The 
  three men, accompanying a tunnel worker 
  named Hardrock Hennesey, apparently 
  were seen last at an early hour today. No 
  trace has been found of them since. More 
  details will be given here as soon as they 
  are received. 
   
  Oddly, Doc Savage himself was in 
  one of the very newspaper offices from 
  which 
  the 
  foregoing 
  information 
  was 
  released. It was the bronze man himself 
  who asked that the articles be toned down. 
  All facts concerning the tunnel mystery 
  were not given to the public. 
  Two of the officials of the paper were 
  on the committee that opposed Governor 
  Bullock and his Yellow River Dam project. 
  Doc had talked to them, and the others. 
  One man in particular, a Colonel Henry 
  Bishop, was returning to Yellow River with 
  Doc Savage tonight. It was he who insisted 
  that Governor Bullock was a crook. 
  While Colonel Bishop awaited Doc 
  Savage in the executive offices of the 
  paper, the bronze man went to the dark 
  room of the newspaper and made a 
  request. He would like to have use of their 
  largest photographic projection equipment. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  51 
  The request was quickly granted. 
  Alone in the room, Doc Savage did a 
  peculiar thing. Using special apparatus, he 
  projected the photograph of the torture 
  chamber onto a huge silver screen. He 
  magnified the picture until it was “blown up” 
  to a hundred times its regular size. 
  For a long time, Doc studied the 
  projection. 
  He 
  seemed 
  particularly 
  interested in a shadow that was cast on 
  one side of the picture. Just before Doc 
  switched off the projector, his unusual 
  trilling 
  sound 
  filled 
  the 
  quiet 
  room. 
  Apparently he had made some discovery 
  which interested him. 
  Some time later, accompanied by 
  Colonel Bishop, Doc Savage was returning 
  in his plane to Shaft 9.  
  Colonel Bishop, politician and part 
  owner of the Sentinel, was a man in his late 
  forties. He looked like an unassuming 
  clergyman rather than an aggressive State 
  leader and a person reputed to be worth a 
  million dollars. 
  He wore somber black and a flowing 
  black tie. He had pale, almost scared-
  looking eyes that stared widely out from 
  behind thick-lensed eyeglasses. 
  When Doc Savage brought his fast 
  plane down swiftly for a landing in a field 
  near Shaft 9, thin Colonel Bishop clung to 
  the sides of his seat and looked as though 
  he was going to be sick. This giant bronze 
  fellow’s 
  dynamic 
  personality 
  sort 
  of 
  frightened him.  
  They had no sooner landed, and 
  climbed out, than a man whom Doc Savage 
  had been seeking met them. 
  Reds Lancaster, the girl’s engineer 
  brother! 
   
   
  DOC inquired, “What happened to 
  you last night?”  
  Lancaster was tense and excited. 
  Apparently 
  he 
  knew 
  the 
  newspaper 
  publisher, for he spoke to the man briefly. 
  Then he turned his attention to the bronze 
  man. 
  “I trailed two of the crooks almost all 
  night,” the wiry-looking engineer exclaimed. 
  “I’ve found something!” 
  “What?” asked Doc. 
  “Peculiar animallike tracks, down in 
  the 
  north 
  bore of Shaft 9. There’s 
  something damned queer we’ve hit down 
  there. No wonder most of the workmen are 
  terrified!” 
  “We’ll investigate,” Doc Savage said. 
  At the shaft, they met the girl, Chick 
  Lancaster. The lovely red-haired sister of 
  Reds Lancaster looked tired and pale. 
  She spoke to the bronze man about 
  Monk and the others. 
  “We’ve searched everywhere for 
  them!” Chick gasped. “And we can’t find a 
  trace of where they 
  went. Hardrock 
  Hennesey was with your three assistants—
  Monk, Renny and the one who is so nice—
  Ham.” 
  Naturally the bronze man did not 
  know about the four men being trapped by 
  the weird fog. He said, “They are perhaps 
  trailing something. All are capable of 
  handling themselves.” 
  But 
  the 
  mystery 
  of 
  their 
  disappearance had even affected the 
  tunnel workers. Hundreds of men milled 
  about near Shaft 9, their faces grim in the 
  glare of the floodlights at the shaft opening. 
  Only a few had been persuaded to 
  stick to their jobs. As Reds Lancaster 
  explained bitterly: 
  “We’re blasting through the north end 
  of No. 9 tonight. No. 10 is completed and 
  hooked into Yellow River Dam. We’re going 
  to make a test.” 
  “Test?” Doc prodded. 
  “Water is going to be released 
  through the system,” explained the alert, 
  red-headed engineer. “We blasted through 
  the southern end of No. 9 this afternoon. 
  Were rushing things in an attempt to prove 
  that the project is O. K., and before the rest 
  of the muckers quit. We’ve got to!” 
  Chick Lancaster looked suddenly 
  horrified. “You can’t blast tonight!” she 
  cried. “Perhaps those men—the ones with 
  Hardrock—are down there some place!” 
  Reds Lancaster moved to his pretty 
  sister’s side, squeezed her slender arm. 
  “Nonsense, sis. The tunnel has been 
  searched from end to end. Besides, we 
  can’t wait any longer.” 
  Colonel Bishop, his pale eyes wide, 
  had been standing saying nothing. 
  He abruptly blurted, “I think I’ll go up 
  to your house, Lancaster. This . . . this 
  whole thing gives me the horrors!” 
  He disappeared into the night. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  52 
  Doc looked at the engineer. “But 
  about these funny tracks you saw down 
  there—” he started. 
  “Come on,” suggested Lancaster. “I’ll 
  show them to you before we blast through.” 
  A few moments later they were 
  descending the fifteen-hundred-foot shaft in 
  the bucket. The girl, Chick, had wanted to 
  go with them, but her brother had argued 
  her out of it. 
  Twenty minutes later, Doc Savage 
  was being shown the peculiar tracks in the 
  earth of the tunnel. 
   
   
  SEVERAL workmen had come down 
  with them. The men carried powerful 
  flashlights, battery affairs that sprayed light 
  as bright as day over the tunnel walls. 
  The prints were like the tracks left by 
  a man’s bare feet—only twice as large. 
  They appeared in some of the soft muck of 
  the tunnel floor. 
  Lancaster asked, “What do you 
  make of them?”  
  Oddly, Doc had not been examining 
  the tracks closely. Unobserved, his interest 
  seemed to be more intent on the walls of 
  the water tunnel. 
  But now he looked at the tracks, 
  turned to a mucker and said, “You might 
  give us a little more light here.” 
  Behind Lancaster and the bronze 
  man, who was bending down examining the 
  earth, the workmen swung the light beams 
  across the tunnel. 
  From where he crouched, none 
  could observe the bronze man’s gaze. It 
  had flicked quickly to the tunnel wall 
  beyond, was studying what appeared to be 
  a large, grotesque shadow visible there. No 
  one else observed the shadow, for Doc was 
  careful not to lift his head too high. All 
  thought he was studying the footprints on 
  the floor. 
  But suddenly, the bronze man’s 
  trilling sound filled the bore. Musical, like 
  distant winds stirring, it floated on the dank, 
  close air. 
  A mucker gasped, “What was that?”  
  Others stared around. 
  No one had noticed the slight 
  movement of the bronze man’s lips as he 
  made the unusual sound, an unconscious 
  thing he did in moments of startling 
  discovery. 
  Doc straightened up, said, “The 
  tracks are very interesting, but obviously 
  faked by the man responsible for this 
  trouble here.” 
  Muckers stared at Doc Savage. 
  Reds Lancaster looked spellbound. 
  “You mean,” he stammered, “there is 
  . . . is something explainable about all this 
  mystery?” 
  Naturally,” said Doc Savage quietly. 
  “In fact, something has been made vividly 
  clear to me.” 
  Doc Savage would make no further 
  explanations. It was his policy never to tell 
  what he knew until he had a case 
  completely solved. 
  But one thing was clear to those 
  accompanying him now; Doc Savage, 
  obviously, knew what the tunnel terror was 
  all about. 
  Reds 
  Lancaster 
  was 
  suddenly 
  saying, “We’ll have to hurry. We’ll have to 
  get out of here. The blast is scheduled for 
  ten o’clock.” 
  They had fifteen minutes in which to 
  get aboveground! 
   
   
  LANCASTER’S 
  auburn-haired, 
  worried sister was waiting for them when 
  they reached the surface. The bronze man 
  drew the girl to one side. 
  He made a quiet request. He would 
  like to know where there was a phone that 
  could be used in private. 
  Chick Lancaster directed him to a 
  community store that was located near the 
  shaft. “There’s a private booth in the back,” 
  she explained. “Old Milt is so deaf he 
  wouldn’t be able to hear you anyway.” 
  Doc disappeared into the night. 
  Oddly, he did not wait for the blast that was 
  going to be set off in a moment or so. 
  In the store, within the private booth, 
  the bronze man called a number in New 
  York City. He talked several moments, then 
  got the operator again and called another 
  number. The bronze man made three calls 
  in all. 
  When he came out of the store his 
  metallic features were grimly thoughtful. He 
  looked around for the girl, saw her running 
  toward him. 
  Her face was white. She was 
  trembling as she ran up to the bronze giant 
  and cried frantically, “Reds—my brother—” 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  53 
  For a moment, it appeared as though 
  she was going to faint. 
  Doc seized the girl’s slender arms, 
  demanded, “What’s happened?” 
  The girl choked out stark words. “The 
  blast . . . in No. 9 . . . they’ve set it off!” 
  “Yes?” 
  “And Reds . . . he’s missing. 
  Someone saw him go down in the shaft just 
  before the explosion!” 
  At the shaft opening, there was 
  yelling 
  and 
  confusion. 
  Steel-helmeted 
  miners and muckers were grouped around 
  the shaft opening, staring out of horrified 
  eyes at the bucket that had just been raised 
  from the tunnel. 
  It was empty. 
  Doc Savage looked, said nothing. 
  But he seized the girl’s arm. “Come on,” he 
  said quietly. “From now on, you must stay 
  with me. Your life is in grave danger.” 
  The girl’s eyes were wide with 
  amazement. “My life? But what about my 
  brother?” 
  She drew back in horror as she 
  realized Doc’s purpose. The bronze man 
  intended going below, into the tunnel. 
  “That explosion!” Chick Lancaster 
  cried. “The water will be coming through. 
  Oh, my God! Poor Reds—” 
  It was then that the bronze man 
  made a strange statement. 
  “I don’t think there will be any water,” 
  he said. “We will be able to enter the 
  tunnel. 
  Perhaps 
  we 
  will 
  locate 
  your 
  brother.” 
  Men protested as Doc and the girl 
  climbed into the lowering device. 
  But Doc held up a bronze hand, said, 
  “If we cannot get into the tunnel, we will 
  signal you. The bucket can be then brought 
  up again.” 
  He motioned to the bellman, and 
  then he and the girl dropped out of sight. 
  Someone said, “He’s doomed!” 
   
   
  Chapter XVI 
  THE DEAD AND THE LIVING 
   
  THEY found the mummified man 
  when they stepped out of the bucket at the 
  base of Shaft 9. He was lying beneath a 
  huge muck machine, his body mangled. 
  Chick 
  Lancaster, 
  showing 
  the 
  courage that was part of her makeup, 
  rushed forward as some detail about the 
  man’s clothing riveted her attention. She 
  bent to look before the bronze man could 
  stop her. 
  And then she had whirled away from 
  the spot, terrible screams coming from her 
  throat. She flung herself against Doc, beat 
  at his great chest. 
  “It’s Reds!” she sobbed wildly, and 
  her slim body was suddenly quivering with 
  choking sobs. 
  The man beneath the muck machine 
  wore whipcords and a flannel shirt and 
  high-top leather shoes. From a pocket of 
  the whipcords was visible a length of watch 
  chain; attached to this a small gold key with 
  the name of a well-known engineering 
  society. It was the key and chain that the 
  girl’s brother had always worn. 
  The rest of Reds Lancaster was 
  unrecognizable. His hands, face, entire 
  body—as Doc learned after a brief look—
  was a thing of dried-up, parchmentlike skin. 
  Shriveled, as though by terrific heat that 
  could have only come from one source. 
  The fog! 
  Doc 
  examined 
  the 
  corpse’s 
  fingernails and skin ridges near the eyes. 
  Gently, Doc led the girl to one side. 
  He went back and inspected the muck 
  machine. A brief examination showed the 
  bronze man that the machine had been 
  tampered with, so that it would collapse the 
  moment anyone turned on the power that 
  operated it!  
  Abruptly, reaching their ears, there 
  came a distant thumping, a sound as 
  though someone was pounding on a solid 
  wall of some kind. 
  Doc listened. He moved across to 
  the girl and touched her arm. He said, “I 
  realize how you feel. But I must ask you to 
  come with me. You are not safe alone for a 
  moment.” 
  Chick Lancaster was too stunned to 
  protest. She allowed the bronze man to 
  lead her away from the gruesome sight of 
  the crushed, mummified man. They headed 
  northward through the great bore of the 
  tunnel. 
  But 
  even 
  in 
  her 
  grief, 
  Chick 
  Lancaster’s brain was clear enough to 
  prompt a question. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  54 
  “I don’t understand,” she said. “That 
  explosion! That water that should be 
  released from No. 10 bore! Why hasn’t it 
  been released?” 
  As they hurried through the tunnel, 
  Doc, from time to time, had been glancing 
  at his wrist watch. He drew up short now, 
  held out his arm for the girl to see. Visible 
  was the small, accurate compass which he 
  had shown her once before. 
  “The tunnel should lead true north,” 
  he said. She nodded, her eyes still misted. 
  “Look!” 
   
   
  SHE stared at the compass needle.  
  “But what—” she started to ask. 
  “Magnetic north!” Doc said. “The 
  tunnel has not followed the original line 
  plotted by the engineers. It tends to a slight 
  curve west of north. There has been a 
  mistake.” 
  “Mistake?” 
  “They use a plumb line in the shafts 
  composed of a heavy weight attached to a 
  cable, which is lowered down the shaft, is 
  that right?” 
  The girl nodded. “They use that to 
  make certain the tunnel follows a straight 
  line.” 
  “Exactly,” 
  agreed 
  Doc 
  Savage. 
  “But—that weight was magnetized by 
  someone. It threw the calculations off. I 
  examined one of the plumb-line devices 
  yesterday.” 
  Chick Lancaster was stunned by the 
  information. She quickly understood why no 
  water had been released into this tunnel 
  from No. 10 by the explosion of the tunnel 
  head. 
  “The two tunnels do not meet!” the 
  girl cried.  
  Doc nodded. 
  They had been hurrying through the 
  tunnel as they talked. The thumping sounds 
  had 
  become 
  louder. 
  Suddenly, 
  they 
  appeared to be right beside them. 
  Doc paused, swung around. One of 
  the spring-generated flashlights was in his 
  bronze hand, for the vague tunnel lights 
  were too dim to reveal much of the rock 
  walls. 
  Doc started to say, “It was just about 
  here Monk cracked his head on what he 
  thought was a—” 
  Then he stopped. The girl, too, 
  stared. 
  It was as though the dynamite blast 
  of such a short while ago had found a weak 
  spot in an earth fissure. For the rock wall 
  had split. There seemed to be some sort of 
  opening! 
  Doc plunged forward, the light in his 
  hand. The girl followed. And before their 
  intense gaze they both saw the heavy slab 
  of rock that had swung aside as though it 
  were a door of sorts. 
  Both peered past the opening. 
  “Good heavens!” cried the girl, her 
  eyes wide. 
  Doc led the way past the crack in the 
  wall. The place beyond was a huge, 
  underground cavern. A great domed ceiling 
  met their gaze. The vaulted passage 
  stretched off to the right and left, and 
  somewhere in the distance was the faint 
  sound of water moving over stones. 
  And something else. 
  The thumping sound was loud now, 
  as though someone were hammering on 
  something. 
  The girl had started to move into the 
  underground cavern. She turned back as 
  she noted that Doc had paused, examining 
  the wall through which they had entered. 
  Doc had taken out a penknife, was 
  probing at the surface of the wall. 
  An exclamation escaped his grim 
  lips. 
   
   
  “GLASS!” he said.  
  “What—” the girl started. 
  “It is not a rock wall of the tunnel at 
  all, but a glass section painted over to 
  resemble rock. It is an opening through 
  which anyone could have entered—or 
  escaped from the tunnel.” 
  Chick Lancaster stared. “But—” 
  Doc was bending down, picking up 
  something that had been hidden behind the 
  door. Moisture dripped from the domed 
  ceiling over their heads as he moved, and 
  ran down his corded neck. 
  The object the bronze man clutched 
  was a cylinder, an aluminum-colored object 
  about the shape and size of a small oxygen 
  cylinder used in hospitals. There was a 
  valve at the end of this thing, and Doc gave 
  it a turn. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  55 
  Immediately a vaporish, gray-white 
  gas came from the nozzle. It touched the 
  bronze man’s hand, burned like hot fire into 
  his flesh. 
  Doc jerked the valve closed, whirled 
  the girl away from the spot. The odor of the 
  escaping, foglike gas identified a chemical 
  that he well knew. 
  “What is it?” Chick cried. 
  Doc waited until the small amount of 
  escaped gas had dissipated. Then he 
  moved carefully back to where it had struck 
  the wall that was moist. The wall was 
  absolutely dry! 
  And there was a livid, small burn on 
  the bronze man’s hand. 
  He said, “The formula is complicated, 
  but briefly—it is a chemical that destroys 
  water, 
  breaks 
  it 
  down 
  into 
  its 
  two 
  components, oxygen and hydrogen. And in 
  doing so, terrific heat is generated. Enough 
  of that stuff would even dry the moisture out 
  of a human’s body.” 
  Chick Lancaster gripped the bronze 
  man’s arm. She was trembling. “It . . . it 
  explains the . . . the mummies!” she said. 
  Doc 
  Savage 
  nodded. 
  The 
  girl 
  covered her face with her hands, thinking of 
  the body they had just seen back by the 
  muck machine. 
  The thumping sound from within the 
  underground cavern had abruptly faded. 
  Doc was straining his ears, listening. 
  He started to say, “We might—” 
  And then the yell came. A roar, 
  rather, floating back from some distance. A 
  voice that called: 
  “Holy cow! Monk! Ham! Look what’s 
  here!” 
  Doc and the girl raced through the 
  great underground cavern. From time to 
  time their feet struck loose sand. It was as 
  though they were on the hard packed 
  beach of a section that had once been at 
  sea level. 
  They ran toward the sound of 
  Renny’s voice. 
   
   
  Chapter XVII 
  DANGER OVERHEAD 
   
  THE four men moved with weary 
  steps. For hours they had been pushing 
  their way through the vast underground 
  caverns. For hours they had been without 
  food. They had about given up hope. 
  Monk, his homely face gloomy, said, 
  “You know what?” 
  The three men trailing behind him 
  drew up short and looked at the hairy 
  chemist’s bedraggled appearance. The 
  three men were Ham, big Renny and little 
  hard-boiled 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey. 
  Even 
  Ham’s usually natty attire was soiled and 
  torn. 
  Hardrock 
  Hennesey 
  spat, 
  remembered that there was no tobacco in 
  his mouth, swore and said, “Maybe we 
  oughta go back to that torture-room place 
  and try our luck at getting out the way we 
  came in.” 
  Monk jumped. 
  “Not me!” he piped shrilly. “We had a 
  close-enough escape as it was. It was 
  blasted lucky we found that way out of the 
  room and into this cavern.” 
  Renny nodded. “We’d better keep on 
  the way we’re going.” 
  They were using a single flashlight. 
  Above their heads moisture dripped from 
  the 
  great 
  domelike 
  ceiling 
  of 
  the 
  underground passage. A dampness, a raw 
  coldness, had got into each man’s bones, 
  and they were shivering. 
  Powerful Renny carried a heavy 
  stone which he had picked up a couple 
  hours ago. From time to time, he moved 
  close to one of the rock walls and banged 
  the stone against the surface. He had 
  hoped to find some spot that might show a 
  fissure by which they could get out. He had 
  not been lucky. 
  The four kept walking. 
  Monk muttered, “I wonder if there 
  really are some of them big people still 
  living in this crazy world down here?” 
  Ham snapped, “Shut up. I’m trying 
  not to think about it!” 
  Their steps lagged. Renny took the 
  lead, being of more powerful build than the 
  others. It was he who was carrying the light, 
  and he got some distance ahead of them. 
  They seemed to be climbing now, and the 
  giant engineer’s hopes had quickened. 
  Thus he had forged on ahead. 
  And 
  when 
  his 
  booming 
  voice 
  shouted back to them, all stood still for a 
  moment in stunned silence.  
  “Holy cow! Monk! Ham! Look what’s 
  here!” 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  56 
   
   
  MONK, 
  his 
  bowed, 
  short 
  legs 
  carrying him along furiously, for all his 
  weariness, was first to reach Renny’s side. 
  The others arrived shortly behind him. 
  Renny was squeezed into a narrow 
  crevice where there was barely room for his 
  massive shoulders. His gloomy face turned 
  back to look at the others. He yelled: 
  “There’s something—here—ahead—
  that looks damned modern, or I miss my 
  guess. Looks like a pipe!” 
  They all squeezed in behind Renny 
  and urged him forward. 
  The round, huge thing gleamed in 
  the light ray. They reached it. It was a 
  pipe—a steel water-line pipe about eight 
  feet in diameter. By the merest chance, 
  Renny had spotted the thing at the end of 
  the narrow defile leading out from the 
  cavernous underground space. 
  They immediately started following 
  the pipe line. At points it was necessary to 
  crawl on hands and knees, to squeeze 
  through knothole spaces. 
  They proceeded perhaps half a mile, 
  and found that the pipe ended in a room 
  that was apparently some sort of valve gate 
  in the water system. 
  An iron ladder led upward. They 
  scrambled up the ladder, opened a huge 
  steel cover. They were suddenly out in the 
  night air. 
  For a while, it was difficult to get their 
  bearings. But Renny, who knew more about 
  engineering than the others, was first to 
  figure out where they were. 
  “Holy cow!” he bellowed. “It’s the 
  dam. We’re in some kind of sluiceway that 
  runs off one side of the thing!” 
  High, concrete walls bordered them 
  in on either side. The walls were higher 
  than that found around any prison! 
  Ahead, a broad apron of concrete 
  angled upward. Up, up! It stopped at a 
  sheer cement wall that rose as high as the 
  side walls themselves. 
  Behind them, the wide apron of 
  concrete dropped downward in a spillway 
  that ended at a drop-off a hundred feet 
  above jagged, huge rocks. 
  All stared. 
  Monk voiced their thought. “How the 
  blazes we gonna get outta this place?” he 
  wanted to know, puzzled. 
  From far above their heads, the 
  harsh, cold voice from atop the wall rapped: 
  “That’s just it. You aren’t!”  
  They all craned their necks upward. 
  The flashlight that Renny was holding 
  outlined the wiry, alert figure of the man 
  standing up there looking down at them. 
  It was the engineer brother of 
  Chick—Reds Lancaster! 
   
   
  A MOMENT later, another figure 
  appeared beside that of the red-headed 
  engineer. A man of about forty, wearing 
  glasses and black clothes and a flowing 
  black tie. He was extremely thin. 
  Hardrock said, “Who the hell is that 
  guy?” 
  None could have known that it was 
  the man who had accompanied Doc 
  Savage 
  from 
  the 
  State 
  capitol—the 
  newspaper publisher-millionaire, Colonel 
  Bishop! 
  But all were certain of one thing. 
  They had been tricked. The expression on 
  the two men’s leering faces above said that 
  they planned death for these Doc Savage 
  men and little Hardrock Hennesey. 
  Reds Lancaster had made a motion 
  with his arm. A moment later there was a 
  sound like a rushing of wind through 
  swamp willows. What followed almost 
  immediately held all four men momentarily 
  frozen with horror. 
  Water. Tons and tons of water, 
  suddenly appearing at the top of the 
  spillway, hurtling down upon them. 
  Water that was being released from 
  the storage lake that was Yellow River 
  Dam! 
  Ham screamed a warning.  
  “Back inside. Hurry!” 
  They tumbled back into the opening 
  that led into the valve-gate room. They 
  slammed the heavy, round steel trapdoor 
  over their heads. There was a heavy dog-
  arm arrangement that sealed the lidlike 
  affair tightly in place. 
  Water was pouring through even as 
  powerful Renny grabbed the levers and 
  screwed the lid up tight. 
  Above them now, ominous in sound, 
  water rushed past the slim steel protection 
  and made the noise the sea makes against 
  the side plates of an ocean liner. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  57 
  At the bottom of the ladder, below 
  them, Doc Savage said: 
  “It was lucky Renny called out your 
  names while you were back in the cavern.” 
  They looked down. They saw Doc 
  and the girl, Chick Lancaster! 
  Monk, without thinking, started to 
  yell: “Doc! Blazes! Guess who’s behind this 
  thing? He’s up there on the wall and he’s—” 
  Some expression in the bronze 
  man’s magnetic eyes stopped the hairy 
  chemist from completing the statement. 
  Doc was standing just a little in front of the 
  girl. 
  He said, “The man’s name is Colonel 
  Bishop.” 
  The girl gasped. “Bishop? The 
  publisher? Why, good heavens, he’s a 
  friend of Reds—” She remembered the 
  accident at the muck machine. “He was a 
  friend of my brother—” 
  She was suddenly in tears. 
  Doc Savage was listening to the 
  sounds of the tons of water overhead. His 
  metallic features were grim. 
  Ham yelled down, “We’ll have to go 
  back, try to find some way—” 
  But the bronze man was suddenly 
  shaking his head. 
  “There is no way back,” he pointed 
  out. He indicated the girl. “We located a 
  clever entrance from the tunnel into the 
  underground caverns. Later, we went back 
  to 
  examine 
  it 
  again. 
  It 
  had 
  been 
  automatically sealed by some electrical 
  device, 
  apparently 
  operated 
  from 
  aboveground.” 
  Hardrock Hennesey stared at Monk. 
  Ham looked at big Renny. And they all 
  knew that as long as that spillway was open 
  above their heads, they were trapped. They 
  could be kept down here for days—weeks. 
   
   
  DOC 
  SAVAGE 
  had 
  suddenly 
  motioned them down from the ladder. He 
  had moved toward a heavy steel door on 
  one side of the concrete-walled room. He 
  turned back a moment and directed: 
  “You will all wait here. There’s just 
  once chance that the main sluiceway valve 
  can be shut off—if the water in the dam is 
  not too high to block off his passage.” 
  He disappeared beyond the door, 
  entering what was obviously a passageway 
  beneath the great dam itself. 
  They waited. Ham, as gallant as ever 
  for all his bedraggled appearance, held the 
  girl’s slim hand. He heard her story about 
  the death of her brother, at the base of 
  Shaft 9. He listened in silence and said 
  nothing, but his eyes met those of his 
  companions. 
  He, like Monk, Hardrock Hennesey 
  and Renny, had seen Reds Lancaster a 
  moment ago with their own eyes. 
  It must have been an hour later that 
  they all stiffened, listening. The rush of 
  water above them had slackened. It slowly 
  dropped to a murmur. It finally stopped. 
  Renny yelled, “Doc’s got it shut off!” 
  He 
  piled 
  back 
  up 
  the 
  ladder, 
  unloosened the heavy dog-arms, put his 
  weight against the round trapdoor. 
  It lifted upward and water dribbled 
  down his shoulders, and gloomy-looking 
  face. 
  But the way out was clear. 
  A light beam hit their faces as they 
  came out into the night air. Doc Savage’s 
  voice called down to them. 
  “Grab the rope. Come up one at a 
  time.” 
  They tied the rope around the girl’s 
  slender waist first. They saw her pulled 
  upward 
  to 
  safety. 
  Renny, 
  Ham 
  and 
  Hardrock Hennesey went up next. 
  When Doc dropped the rope down 
  the last time, Monk didn’t wait to be pulled 
  up. He scrambled up the thing hand over 
  hand like a happy monkey! 
  Atop the sluiceway wall, off to their 
  left, they saw something in the dark night 
  that held them momentarily rigid. 
  Two men, fighting, along the very 
  edge of the great retaining wall of Yellow 
  River Dam! While two hundred feet below, 
  bellowing and waving their fists angrily, was 
  a mob of tunnel workers from Shaft 9. The 
  workmen 
  held 
  flashlights 
  and 
  flares. 
  Obviously they were yelling at the two 
  fighting men atop the great wall which 
  towered over their heads. 
  But on top of the dam wall, the light 
  was too vague to make identification of the 
  two fighting men possible. 
  Monk was all for getting over there 
  and investigating. 
  It was Doc who held him back. The 
  bronze giant indicated the girl, whose face 
  was still pale from the ordeal which she had 
  been through. 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  58 
  He told Monk, “Take her up to the 
  superintendent’s house.” Doc indicated the 
  house overlooking the big dam, the home 
  where Flynn, the superintendent, lived. 
  “She has taken a slight chill,” Doc said. 
  “Hurry.”  
  The assignment was one which 
  hardly displeased the homely chemist. He 
  lifted the girl into his arms and hurried off. 
  Doc swung back to the others. 
  “She must never know,” he ordered 
  Ham asked: “You mean, that her 
  own brother, Reds Lancaster, was behind 
  this mystery?” 
  The bronze man nodded. For one of 
  the few times ever observed by anyone, 
  slight lines of fatigue showed around his 
  remarkable flake-gold eyes. 
  “Yes, that,” said Doc. “Also, that he 
  was merely a dupe for the real villain—
  Colonel Bishop.”  
  Everyone stared. 
  As Doc Savage talked, his eyes were 
  on the two men battling high up on the 
  dam. He suddenly started in that direction, 
  saying quickly, “We can figure out what to 
  do with Lancaster after we rescue him. It 
  appears that he and Bishop have split.” 
  Renny, racing after Doc Savage, 
  exclaimed, 
  “That’s 
  Bishop 
  up 
  there 
  fighting?” 
  Doc nodded, and as he swung up to 
  grasp a ladder that led onto the wall, the 
  others ran after him. 
   
   
  Chapter XVIII 
  DEATH FOR TWO 
   
  THE distance to where the two men 
  were struggling furiously near the sheer 
  edge of the dam wall was perhaps two 
  hundred yards. Doc and the others were 
  almost to the spot when the bronze man 
  drew up short, pushed the others back 
  “Listen,” he said warningly. 
  They all heard the shots. The 
  gunshots that were accompanied by curses 
  and loud yelling from below the wall, from 
  the tunnel workers momentarily out of sight 
  of Doc and the others. 
  The 
  workmen, 
  enraged, 
  were 
  shooting 
  at 
  the 
  two 
  fighting 
  men—
  Lancaster and Colonel Bishop. The two 
  crooks had been spotted, and now men 
  were intent upon killing them! 
  Little Hardrock Hennesey wanted to 
  get his hands on Reds Lancaster. He tried 
  to get past the bronze man. Powerful 
  Renny yanked him back. 
  Renny bellowed, “Fool! Do you want 
  to get riddled with those bullets?” 
  They could hear lead smacking the 
  wall of the dam, close beneath the feet of 
  the two struggling figures. The slugs 
  richocheted 
  off 
  the 
  concrete, 
  went 
  screaming upward into the night. 
  For the moment, Doc and the others 
  could do nothing. To move nearer to the 
  fighting pair of men meant danger of being 
  hit by a stray bullet. And so they stood 
  tensely and watched. 
  A powerful spotlight being used by 
  one of the workmen below the dam wall hit 
  one of the struggling figures. It outlined the 
  thin figure of the black-clad publisher—
  Bishop. The man’s flowing black tie was in 
  shreds; he was now without his glasses. 
  As they watched, Ham demanded, 
  “But how is Bishop tied into this thing?” 
  Doc said, “Bishop owns practically all 
  the property in the valley sponsored by the 
  politicians opposing Governor Bullock. By 
  throwing suspicion on the governor, and 
  also creating a menace here so that the 
  work would have to be stopped, he would 
  force them to use the other site. Thus he 
  would clean up a fortune when they came 
  to buy the property.” 
  “But 
  Lancaster?” 
  Ham 
  prodded. 
  “What about him?” 
  “Lancaster 
  owes 
  Bishop 
  forty 
  thousand dollars. Years ago Bishop helped 
  him out of some sort of mess. Now he is 
  forcing Lancaster to pay off. The girl 
  informed me tonight that her life has 
  recently 
  been 
  threatened. 
  That 
  was 
  Bishop’s trick to force Lancaster to do his 
  bidding.” 
  As he talked, Doc had moved closer 
  to the two. So intent were they upon 
  slaughtering one another, that neither had 
  noticed the approach of the bronze man 
  and his partners. 
  But more bullets arrived over the top 
  of the dam wall. They whined past the ears 
  of everyone. Doc and the others were 
  forced to crouch low. 
  Lancaster and Bishop were rolling 
  around in a tangled heap now, dangerously 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  59 
  near the edge of the wall. Miraculously, the 
  bullets missed them. 
  As they all watched tensely, Doc 
  added another bit of explanation. “A phone 
  call to New York revealed that Bishop was 
  the owner of most of the property they 
  would be forced to use. Of course, he was 
  working through a false name, under a fake 
  company.” 
  Suddenly, 
  before 
  their 
  eyes, 
  a 
  peculiar thing happened. 
  Colonel Bishop, with a frightful yell, 
  swayed to his feet, clutching his thin chest. 
  In his right hand was a gun. His own, 
  apparently. 
  Obviously he had tried to use the 
  gun on Lancaster. But the quick-moving 
  engineer had managed to twist the weapon 
  away from him. Bishop had shot himself. 
  He swayed. Even Lancaster looked 
  amazed that such a thing could have 
  happened. Perhaps he had not meant to kill 
  Bishop. At least the expression in his wide 
  eyes now said that he was startled. 
  Unmindful of the shouts from below, he 
  watched the wounded man. 
  And then, without warning, Bishop 
  threw 
  his 
  toppling 
  body 
  against 
  the 
  engineer. In his last weak step forward, he 
  knocked into Reds Lancaster. 
  Lancaster made a frantic attempt to 
  catch his balance. His hands pumped the 
  air as though he was making a frantic 
  attempt to grab something. In the next 
  instant he went backward over the wall and 
  disappeared from sight. A scream floated 
  above the yelling from below. 
  Bishop crashed into a broken heap 
  at the very edge of the wall. 
  Doc and the others leaped forward. 
  Disregarding the moaning man at their feet, 
  they stared down the sheer length of the 
  wall. They were in time to see Lancaster’s 
  tumbling body strike the outward curve of 
  the dam, two hundred feet below. It struck, 
  bounced, then slid like a limp rag doll along 
  the remaining seventy-five feet of dam 
  footing. A wide swath of red fluid, revealed 
  by the spotlights, was left behind the body. 
  Every bone in Lancaster’s body must 
  have been broken by the plunge. 
   
   
  MONK had arrived back from the 
  superintendent’s house in time to witness 
  the death plunge of Lancaster. He stared 
  now in awe. 
  Puzzled, he asked, “Doc, while we 
  were waiting for you to shut off that water, 
  the girl told us her brother died back there 
  in the tunnel. She even said—” 
  “The person she saw,” said Doc, 
  “was the old fellow who tried to lead you 
  into a trap earlier. I estimated his age from 
  the ridges in his fingernails and from the 
  crow’s feet around his eyes. Lancaster saw 
  that he was almost trapped. He was going 
  to vanish from the picture. And so he made 
  it appear that he had died. What he did was 
  kill off that old fellow who had been working 
  for him throughout.” 
  Mention of the withered old man 
  made Monk remember the giant skeletons 
  and the horror chamber. He asked about 
  that. Renny and Ham were bending down 
  over the dying man. 
  Doc Savage said, “When the girl was 
  with me in the underground caverns, she 
  happened to mention the old Indian 
  mounds that used to be near here. They 
  unearthed some of the stuff when they first 
  excavated. The Mound Builders left weird 
  collections. Lancaster used the stuff to 
  make it appear some race of people were 
  still living there in the earth. In fact, there 
  was an old museum near here once. It is 
  now closed. Investigation will probably 
  disclose that things have been stolen from 
  the place.” 
  Bishop, dying, had been propped up 
  by powerful Renny. The man’s dimming 
  eyes sought the bronze mans. He muttered 
  weakly: 
  “The photograph . . . I mailed . . . did 
  not fool you!” 
  Doc shook his head. He said. “There 
  was a shadow across one edge of the 
  picture, Bishop. In your own newspaper 
  building that photo was enlarged many 
  times. Tonight, down in the tunnel, a 
  workman’s flashlight happened to cast an 
  enlarged outline of Lancaster’s profile on 
  the tunnel wall. It matched, identically, the 
  profile revealed by the enlarged shadow in 
  the photograph. Lancaster took that picture, 
  and inadvertently his own shadow was cast 
  on a wall as he made it.” 
  Monk 
  suddenly 
  remembered 
  something. He made a dive toward the 
  dying man. The chemist wasn’t very 
  particular whether the man was dying or 
  
  DOC SAVAGE 
   
  60 
  not. Bishop was the real villain, and there 
  was something he should know. 
  “Hey!” squalled Monk. “Betcha he 
  knows about the governor!” 
  Doc pushed Monk back as he said, 
  “Governor Bullock is safe at our New York 
  headquarters.” 
  Monk stared. “But how—” he started 
  to demand.  
  Explaining another of the phone calls 
  he had made tonight, Doc Savage said, “He 
  went there because his life had been 
  threatened.” Doc told them about the letter 
  handed him by the dazed butler at the 
  Bullock estate. “The letter the governor 
  really left explained that he was going to 
  our 
  headquarters. 
  He 
  had 
  previously 
  phoned and asked me to investigate this 
  mystery. But his letter was switched for 
  another by thugs who knocked out the 
  butler.” 
  The dying man gasped, “Has . . . 
  anyone ever . . . outwitted you . . . Doc 
  Savage?” 
  Monk started to blurt, “Brother, 
  nobody fools Doc—” And then he paused. 
  Colonel Bishop was dead. 
   
   
  LATER, following a circuitous route 
  from the small valley below the dam, the 
  tunnel men arrived at the spot where Doc 
  and the others were grouped around the 
  dead man. 
  One of the arriving men exclaimed, 
  “Lancaster’s dead. He tumbled off this 
  wall—” 
  Doc Savage nodded. And then, 
  holding up his hand, he made a brief 
  speech. It was probably one of the most 
  impressive speeches the bronze man ever 
  made. He said: 
  “Lancaster, in a way, was a dupe for 
  this man here.” He indicated the dead 
  newspaper publisher. Briefly he explained 
  how Bishop was behind the mystery. He 
  went on, “Lancaster is dead, but his sister 
  believes he died down in the shaft. It is best 
  that she always thinks that.” 
  Doc mentioned the fight between the 
  two men behind the mystery. “At the very 
  last, Lancaster must have turned against 
  Bishop. He had realized his mistake. And 
  so now, and for all time, it is best that his 
  sister know nothing of his connection with 
  the real villain. Since he is dead, no good 
  can be gained by making her suffer further.” 
  There were shouts of “Bravo!” from 
  the tunnel men. All liked Chick Lancaster. 
  She was the kind of a girl who inspires 
  admiration in brave men. All agreed to Doc 
  Savage’s suggestion. 
  Preparations were made for the 
  removal of Lancaster’s broken body, lying 
  at the base of the great dam. Someone 
  asked the bronze man: 
  “But what about that fog that turned 
  guys into mummies?” 
  Doc told of finding the cylinders of 
  chemical 
  hidden 
  in 
  the 
  cavern. 
  He 
  explained how the chemical broke down 
  water and at the same time generated 
  terrific heat. 
  “The heat,” Doc pointed out, “was so 
  intense that it literally baked a man’s body. 
  The chemical is also poisonous. Bishop 
  planned on using it in the water system of 
  the dam to make it worthless—in case his 
  other plans fell through.” 
  Tall, 
  angular 
  Flynn, 
  the 
  superintendent 
  of 
  the 
  dam, 
  arrived 
  accompanied by the two pets, Habeas and 
  the chimp. 
  Monk let out a joyous shout. Ham 
  grabbed his pet. 
  The superintendent said, “They were 
  just delivered to the house. They wandered 
  back to the shaft tonight, half starved. But 
  they had been fed.” 
  Monk petted Habeas. Ham held the 
  chimp in his arms. 
  The 
  hairy 
  chemist 
  suddenly 
  remembered the girl. He asked: 
  “How’s Chick?” 
  “Got her wrapped up in bed with 
  plenty of blankets,” the superintendent said. 
  “She’s O. K. now. In fact, she’s been asking 
  for you two.” 
  Monk beamed, and Ham looked 
  pleased also. They led the way back to the 
  house. In the lower hallway, they waited 
  until the superintendent had gone upstairs 
  to see if the girl was awake. 
  She was. 
   
   
  MONK’S homely features split in a 
  wide grin that threatened to dislodge his 
  ears. 
  
  TUNNEL TERROR 
   
  61 
  “Chick likes Habeas,” he piped in his 
  squeaky voice. “I’m gonna go upstairs and 
  cheer her up!” 
  Ham pushed his burly partner aside. 
  He gave Monk a frigid stare. 
  “She likes me!” Ham said icily. “Not 
  that scrawny pig! Get out of my way!” 
  They both went up the stairs, 
  arguing. 
   
   
  THE END 
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
  THE PURPLE DRAGON 
   
  Whether it was the weird manifestation of some unearthly 
  power, or the result of some wicked scheming, no one 
  seemed to know. But that it was a menace to the entire 
  country was quite evident; and that some one like Doc 
  Savage would have to put an end to it was also apparent. 
  Even Doc had a tough job on his hands when he entered 
  this unique fight. You'll thrill to every line of this novel, 
  complete in the next issue of 
   
  DOC SAVAGE MAGAZINE 
   
  10 Cents—Every Month 
   
   
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Vault2.0.-.Fiction-and-audiobooks/Books/R/Robeson, Kenneth/090 Tunnel Terror.pdf