by Lin Carter
At hearing these words, Scorchy flushed scarlet, muttered something rather uncomplimentary under his breath, and stalked off in a huff.
When Scorchy Muldoon and little Joey Weston arrived at the Old House, they found it brilliantly lit and filled with officers, both uniformed constables, riot police, and plain-clothed detectives from New Scotland Yard.
Scorchy looked heartily disappointed, for clearly the fun — whatever fun there had been — was long since over. The Yard men and constables were relaxed, standing around in small groups chatting, sipping hot coffee from steaming thermoses, speaking briefly into walkie-talkies.
“Looks like I done missed the party,” groaned Scorchy in disappointed tones to Doc Jenkins. The reunion between the boxer and his friends had been brief but hearty — and their relief was very evident, and heartfelt, that he and the boy had escaped from peril unscathed.
“Wasn’t any party,” grumbled Doc Jenkins, munching on a handful of candy bars — his favorite staple of diet. “They all flew the coop before we got here.”
“Not only that, Small Change, but they had time enough to clean the place out, thoroughly,” drawled Nick Naldini. After one brief flash of pure relief and joy that had showed in his dark eyes at the sight of Scorchy free, safe, and unharmed, the lanky, long-legged vaudevillian had relapsed into his usual taunting and insulting banter when addressing his sidekick.
“Oh, yeah?” asked Scorchy interestedly. “What about all them papers on the Vulture’s desk, and all that stuff in the lab?”
“Gone, clean as the proverbial whistle,” said Nick gloomily.
“Well, what about the crooks Joey and I tied up and left in the locked room they had us in?”
“Ditto,” said Naldini.
“Well, okay, but what about that danged miniature sub they left parked back in the mooring shed behind the house, then?” shrilled Scorchy.
“Likewise,” said Doc Jenkins in morose tones. Scorchy looked baffled, then he got angry and swore feelingly and with considerable eloquence for five straight minutes.
Fortunately, he cursed, it seems, in Gaelic, which I do not understand and therefore cannot transcribe here for my readers, sparing the censors a bit of trouble.
“But Mister Nick, didn’t the crooks leave a lotta fingerprints all over the place?” asked Joey Weston, who had pestered Scorchy into letting him tag along on the raid.
“Dunno,” sighed Nick, sucking on his long cigarette holder. “The Yard boys are dusting for ’em now.”
Scorchy looked severely depressed, but then his face cleared and his mood brightened. He burst into a crow of hearty laughter.
“You flipped your lid or something, Half-Pint?” inquired Nick Naldini with suspicion in his tones.
“Not me!” chuckled Scorchy Muldoon. “Lissen, Nick, we may not o’ caught the rest of them crooks, but we done got ourselves the boss-crook of ’em all. We got the Vulture hisself, locked up neat as you please in th’ town jail! And this gang ain’t gonna do nothin’ with their boss and mastermind gone.”
Nick rubbed his lank jaw, blue-stubbled at this early morning hour.
“You gotta point there,” he drawled slowly. “Gosh, I hate to admit it, but you sure gotta point there ...”
Shortly after this, Prince Zarkon and Ace Harrigan joined their comrades. If Zarkon felt any disappointment at the poor results of the raid on the Old House, it showed neither in his expression nor in his voice. He complimented Scorchy on his bravery and resourcefulness and quick thinking, and reserved very special praise for Joey Weston, who had really saved the day.
Dawn was pink and gold beyond the trees. The Yard men unlimbered solid breakfasts in sealed containers which resembled C rations. These were quickly heated and passed around, and all fell to with voracious appetites.
“Then we didn’t find nothing at all in the house, Chief?” inquired Doc Jenkins. Zarkon shook his head briefly.
“The personal effects, papers, and laboratory equipment had all been taken out of here, and very shortly before the raid commenced,” he said. “Probably by means of the miniature submarine Scorchy described.”
“Then, outside of putting the Vulture behind bars and chasing the gang out of their hideout, the whole thing amounted to nothing, is that what you’re saying, Chief?” asked Harrigan.
“That is more or less the state of things at present,” Zarkon admitted, sipping his scalding hot coffee from a Styrofoam cup.
“You mean we’ll never know what the heck this whole danged thing was about?” demanded Doc Jenkins aggrievedly.
“Not unless the Vulture talks,” said Zarkon.
Scorchy balled hard fists.
“Squawks, you mean, Chief,” he said dangerously. “Lemme alone with that skinny galoot fer five minutes: I’ll make him sing like a canary!”
Zarkon smiled briefly but said nothing.
CHAPTER 23 — The Coop Is Flown
Dawn seeped into the muddy darkness of the skies over the little country town of Fenchurch St. Paul. From the looks of the sky, which was heavily obscured by thick and turgid clouds, it seemed to promise a rainy day.
Menlo Parker kicked his heels against the feet of the hard wooden bench, fuming inwardly. The skinny scientist loved nothing more than a good scrap, unless perhaps it was a set of complicated mathematical equations to unravel with his keen intelligence. But — alas for Menlo’s fondness for a bit of wild and wooly action now and then — Prince Zarkon had been strict about the matter.
“One of us should stay here to keep an eye on the Vulture,” he had said. “I am giving this job to you, Menlo.”
“But what about Scorchy?” Menlo had demanded querulously.
Zarkon shook his head briefly.
“I need him with us on the raid. He knows more about the ins and outs of the Vulture’s headquarters than anyone else, and can save us a lot of wasted time by leading us directly to the parts of the house we are most interested in.”
Then he had departed, leaving poor Parker to cool his heels and reflect bitterly on the unfairness of things. “What does the Chief expect, that this crook can walk through walls or something?” muttered Menlo to himself in disgusted tones, peering into the cell where the captive sat quietly in repose. And it was a pretty good question, at that. After all, the Vulture’s person and garments had been carefully searched, not only by the police, but also by Prince Zarkon. They had found nothing whatsoever that could possibly have been used by the master crook to free himself.
From time to time, one of the officers posted outside the jail fetched hot coffee or a sandwich in to Menlo from the little pub across the street, which had remained open all night due to this unexpected influx of potential customers. Gulping down the strong brew, Parker peered out the front window as dawn slowly turned the gloom watery pink and gold. Outside of the cops, the town was silent as a graveyard.
Just about then, things began to liven up.
A number of men — six or seven of them, all told — emerged from a narrow alley and strode purposefully across the street in the direction of the jail.
It was still a little too dark to see their features clearly, but they walked with exaggerated caution, as if treading on slick and glassy ice. Several half-dozing constables snapped to full alertness and got to their feet to challenge the visitors.
The newcomers simply ignored them and continued to approach the jail. Their hands were empty of weapons and they were quietly dressed in business suits.
It was only when they came close enough for the light over the front of the jail to fall upon them, that it could be seen that the men were garbed in blue. And Menlo felt a surge of wicked joy well up within his bony frame.
“Hot dawg!” he chortled, and pulled out one of the special guns with which Zarkon had armed the Omega team before leaving Knickerbocker City. It was sleek and streamlined, this weapon, and rather long in the barrel. Something about the design was futuristic, like the hand-weapons carried by spacemen in science fiction movies.
None of the men of Omega had as yet enjoyed the opportunity of using one of the special guns on any of the Blue Men. It certainly looked to Menlo as if he might have the privilege and pleasure of being the first of them all to do so, and — since he had, after all, designed the odd-looking guns — he was pleased and excited at the prospect.
When the men failed to halt or to respond at all to the challenge, but continued to advance with slow and curiously careful strides upon the jail, Petrie’s lieutenant crisply ordered that a warning volley be fired over their heads. This was done with alacrity.
And the volley of gunfire, startlingly loud in the early morning stillness, woke the town up, all right. But the Blue Men neither paused nor flinched; they kept on coming.
Then the officer barked a different command and pistols, rifles, and riot guns were leveled directly at the oncoming men. Rifles cracked; pistols snarled; bullets whined.
The Blue Men didn’t even stagger. The first of them mounted the porch and entered the door, ignoring the hail of hot lead as if it annoyed him no more than might a cloud of harmless insects.
Menlo withdrew into a corner of the room near the front windows and watched eagerly as the Blue Men entered the jail. Their leader, who carried a heavy satchel, went directly to the cell wherein sat the Vulture, smiling thinly. The others turned about to block the door against any attempt at entry by the angry and startled officers stationed outside the building.
And Menlo made his play.
Leveling the queer-looking pistol at the back of the Blue Man as he withdrew something from his satchel and began to work on the lock of the cell with an instrument which the waspish scientist could not, at this distance, identify, Menlo aimed carefully and shot the Blue Man directly between the shoulders.
Instead of the loud bark and stench of gunpowder which you could have expected an ordinary gun to emit, there came an odd crackling sound like bacon frying in a pan, and the distinctive, metallic odor of ozone.
A needle-thin ray of intensely brilliant blue-white light etched an eye-hurting line between the muzzle of Menlo’s weapon and the back of the Blue Man.
Menlo’s eyes popped.
His jaw sagged.
Nothing happened.
The laser-beam packed enough punch to drill a hole through battleship steel. It should have burned a path through the crook’s body in a fraction of a second ... only it didn’t.
Resolutely, Menlo Parker held the weapon steady. He kept the searing beam of coherent light directly on target long enough to have fried a fair-sized elephant.
After a few moments, the Blue Man straightened a bit and shrugged his shoulders irritably.
Then he reached back with one bare hand and scratched the spot between his shoulders upon which the bolt from Menlo’s pistol was aimed.
After that, he turned partly around, spotted Menlo and the laser-weapon, and grinned slightly. Then he simply turned his back on the astounded scientist and continued working on the lock of the Vulture’s cell.
Disconcerted, baffled, and vaguely alarmed, Menlo turned off the beam and examined the weapon, which seemed in perfect working order. Then he peered at the back of the man, who ignored his presence.
A spot about the size of a dime between the shoulders of the powder-blue suit the crook wore seemed slightly darker than the rest of the fabric. It appeared to be faintly singed — the sort of scorched look you might have made by pressing a lighted match against a piece of cloth.
Menlo cursed and retreated out of the building in confusion. The gang members blocking the door politely stepped aside to let him pass. Their placid grins infuriated the scientist.
The officers were hastily erecting a barricade to close off the front of the jail and to block both ends of the street. Menlo told Petrie’s lieutenant what had transpired within the building. Hard muscles bunched along the officer’s jaw.
“Even if they are somehow invulnerable to our guns, and your fancy laser-pistol,” he observed grimly, “their leader isn’t. If we have to, we’ll pick him off the moment they bring him out.”
After a moment, the Yard man added tersely: “That’s contrary to orders, but what else can we do? We’ve got the gangleader under lock and key right now ... and we simply can’t let him walk away free, to continue his activities.”
Menlo knew how much Zarkon disapproved of killing, even of killing dangerous criminals, but he had to agree with Petrie’s man.
They waited to see what would happen.
When it did, they all stared in amazement.
First, the Blue Men at the door parted, to make way for the one who had gone inside alone. This particular crook, the one that Menlo had slightly singed with the laser-beam, emerged, followed by the Vulture himself, who smiled thinly, leeringly, at the fair-sized and well-armed reception committee which waited for him.
Pistols, rifles, and riot guns were raised threateningly by the officers from Scotland Yard and the local constable of Fenchurch St. Paul. But the Vulture seemed oblivious to the implied threat of the firearms; at least, he ignored them, and stepped off the porch of the jail, accompanied by the confederate who had freed him from his cell.
As the Vulture stepped full in the path of the lights above the porch, men tensed, gasped, cursed softly.
For he was entirely blue from head to toe.
CHAPTER 24 — The Getaway
Menlo looked nonplussed; also baffled. He hefted the laser-pistol, then lowered it futilely. Val Petrie’s lieutenant looked at him inquiringly.
“He wasn’t blue before, was he, sir?” asked the officer. Menlo shook his head, disgustedly.
“Then how is it that the Vulture is one of the Blue Men now?”
“Danged if I know,” admitted the skinny little scientist grudgingly.
Cars appeared at one end of the village street. They were dark in color, long and low, and built for speed. As the officers fired their weapons, the autos smashed through the hastily-built and rather flimsy barricade, pulling up with a screech of their brakes before the town jail.
The Blue Men piled in, ignoring the hail of bullets. Their leader was the first to enter one of the vehicles.
Gunning their motors, the heavily laden cars pulled away from the curb.
Petrie’s lieutenant raised his bullhorn to his lips. “Into the cars, you men! Follow Pursuit Plan F — and don’t lose them, at all costs!”
He and Menlo boarded one of the vehicles. As the driver joined the others in following the fleeing crooks, Petrie’s man thumbed his walkie-talkie into activity.
“Pendleton here, sir,” he reported. Then, in crisp, brief phrases, he reported to Val Petrie all that had occurred in the last few crowded and busy minutes at the site of the jail.
Signing off, he nodded briefly to Menlo Parker who sat on the seat beside him.
“Your Chief and mine will be following by helicopter, sir,” he said. Menlo nodded grimly. Then a small, slight smile of sour satisfaction creased his lips.
It hadn’t been a total fiasco, after all. They had routed the Vulture and his gang of mysterious Blue Men out of their hiding-place, and had driven them into headlong flight. Even now, the fleeing crooks were being hotly and closely pursued.
This particular adventure, with all of its many and unpredicted ups and downs, might be over within half an hour, thought Menlo to himself.
And then ... it began to rain.
And when it rains in the southern parts of England, it — rains! And with a vengeance. Especially at this time of the year.
All morning long, the turgid, dark, and lowering clouds which obscured the blue sky had threatened a shower. Now it came down, and it was a veritable cloudburst.
In seconds, the windshield wipers were striving vainly to clear the water-slick and clouded vision of the drivers. The rut-riven dirt road, narrow and curving, became a sea of slippery, sloshing mud.
Cars, trying to make the best speed they could, slipped and slid from one side of the little country road to t
he other. One or two ran into the ditch or the embankment of packed earth on the other side of the road.
Ahead, blurred streaks of weaving scarlet in the downpour, the taillights of the Vulture’s cars wove and winked mockingly.
The downfall, already torrential, became a genuine deluge. Strive as he might, their driver could barely see ahead for ten feet. Petrie’s man cursed bitterly under his breath; Menlo Parker maintained a tense and grim-lipped silence.
Then there was a blaze of brilliant light, a blast of deafening noise, followed by a heart-stopping crackkld as if the very earth beneath their wheels had been riven asunder by some seismic convulsion of nature.
They had been barreling down a country lane, lined on either side with close-set trees. They were ancient oaks, huge of girth and hoary of age, and the roadway itself was so narrow that only one car could drive on it at a time.
After this unexpected explosion of light and noise, one of the centuries-old oaks toppled slowly across the road, barely missing the bobbing taillights of the last of the Vulture’s cars, and almost thundering down on the hood of the foremost police car. It settled to earth with a bone-crunching thud as the police vehicles, one by one, slammed on their brakes. Some crunched into each other’s rear fenders, some merely bumped with a bone-jarring bump.
“Damn the luck!” groaned Petrie’s lieutenant, leaping from the now-motionless car. Through the rain-obscured windshield, Menlo saw him stride through the pouring deluge, waving his arms and yelling hoarse commands.
The driver cocked an eye at Menlo Parker.
“Lightning, do you think, sir?” he inquired.
“Mebbe so,” muttered Menlo. “And mebbe a dynamite charge, planted just right to cut off pursuit. I wouldn’t put it past the Vulture — he’s a danged clever old bird, after all!”
“He is that, sir,” agreed the driver fervently.
