by Kevin Olson
It was a wig, for Mei was one of the hairless ones.
Her bald head accented beautifully arched brows, now obviously drawn on, and thick false lashes.
Mei then clutched at her dress, tearing it from away her body in one swift move.
Now standing in front of the Green Lama was a lean warrior wearing only a mawashi loincloth. Now standing in front of the Green Lama was a man.
Intricate tattoos covered his torso in green and scarlet. Crashing waves, bladed weapons of death, ropes and other agents of bondage were all part of the intertwined design. And in the center was a black-garbed, elephant headed warrior, holding a sword in the air, the body of a whale speared on the tip of the blade.
A grim smile crossed the countenance of the Green Lama.
“Finally, I look upon the true visage of the one known as Nalgiri,” he said.
Nalgiri simply sneered in response. “I thought you a simple fool, another man primed to comfort the poor woman presented to him. Yet you knew. How?”
“I was never sure of your exact role,” the Green Lama replied. “Though once I fell into the trap at the opium den, I knew that someone within this household was to blame. Only the residents of this house knew where I was headed.”
Nalgiri and the Green Lama began to circle one another, looking for exposed vulnerabilities.
“When I was investigating the hidden office in the opium den, I found several long black fibers lying among the notes. Examining these, it was clear to me that they were synthetic fibers used in wigs, and very similar to your own head of hair. You are not the only one who knows the artistry of disguise.”
Nalgiri laughed, “And that was how your identity with Dr. Pali was made known to me! I suspected that all was not natural, and when I touched my hand to your face during your visit, it came away with a hint of dark foundation.”
“Games on top of games on top of games,” the Green Lama mused. “Though I must admit, I only imagined you in league with your husband. I did not consider you the beast that fed the machine.”
Nalgiri sneered. “My husband. Don’t sicken me with that term, nor provide him any more credit than deserved. He was a spineless puppet, nothing more. A weak academic who let me twist him to my plans, giving in to his own perverse desires.”
The Green Lama was tired of the rants and moved on his enemy. Nalgiri brought his arms up in a defensive martial arts position, but the Lama struck swift and hard, moving up and under to deliver a fierce strike to the right flank.
Nalgiri recovered quickly. A fast drop kick savagely caught the Green Lama in the sternum. He staggered, scrambling to keep his feet under him. Crouching low, he allowed his free hand to take to the floor in order to regain his bearings.
Nalgiri moved in quickly though, ready to deliver another kick. The Lama continued to lean on the floor. Waiting, waiting. When the time was exactly right, he swiveled on his planted leg and delivered a devastating forked lighting kick, catching his enemy in the thigh.
The tattooed fighter’s leg instantly went numb, allowing him to use it only for balance, not for support. The Green Lama used this opportunity to move in, grabbing Nalgiri by both throat and the arm, and savagely slamming him into the wall using a whirlwind throw.
Nalgiri lay still, stunned by the devastating throw.
“And who is the man who stands in my way? Jethro Dumont? Dr. Pali? Or someone else entirely?” Nalgiri asked.
The Green Lama had almost forgotten that he now wore the countenance of yet another man. “If we are to die together tonight, we should at least know each other’s inner secrets.”
At that Nalgiri’s features softened, now again taking on the look of Mei, a heady mixture at once both demure and seductive.
“My material identity is one that you already know,” the Green Lama softly said. “Our identity in the world is only a manifestation of our virtue or our vice.”
At that, the Green Lama prepared to move in, ending the dance once and for all.
Suddenly, Nalgiri’s hand came away from his mawashi loincloth, a lighter in hand, his thumb running the thumbwheel against the flint.
The flame ignited, and Nalgiri tossed the lighter toward a pool of gasoline.
The Green Lama reached to his shoulders, taking the kata hung around his neck and flicking it forward, hoping to hit the lighter in flight and divert it from its intended path.
But he was too late, and the weighted end of the crimson kata fell short.
Suddenly, the room burst into light and intense warmth as the gasoline ignited in flames. Harsh heat washed over the Green Lama.
But he knew he still had a dangerous enemy to contend with. Turning to Nalgiri, he saw the man scrambling toward the pistol where it lay on the floor, flames starting to close in.
He let loose the kata once again, sending it hurtling at the side of Nalgiri’s bald skull.
His targeting was much more accurate this time, striking him hard directly at the temple.
The effect was instantaneous, Nalgiri’s brain slammed violently against the skull lining, resulting in a total blackout.
In those few moments, more spreads of gasoline caught fire, quickly rising to ignite the fuel which had been splashed on the walls. The beautiful lacquer furniture also proved highly flammable, reacting instantly, and further fueling the fire.
The room was totally ablaze, a burning inferno which seemed to be everywhere.
The Green Lama knew he had to get across the room, to escape the flames, but a clear path was not evident to him. And though he was well trained in various mystic arts of the warrior mind, making himself fireproof was not one of them.
He suddenly remembered the vial of radioactive salts that Jean had brought him. Reaching into his green cloak, he removed the small tin vial and quickly swallowed its contents.
He would wait for a moment, letting the powers of the salts take hold in his body, for what he was going to do was sure to be a substantial.
Thick smoke was filling the air around him, turning the space into a darkening cavern. Tongues of flame continued to lick the walls, while the acrid smoke began to sear the eyes and lungs of the Lama.
He moved all of his concentration to the task at hand, his thoughts aimed at collecting his body’s energy to move it lower and lower still.
And then he stopped. He turned to the unconscious form of Nalgiri lying behind him.
It would be so easy to leave the body here, to let it burn away with the multitude of sins that had existed here.
But that was not the way.
Vengeance. Destruction. That was not the path he chose. The man in the green cloak realized that the most valuable service is the one rendered to his fellow human being.
That is the way of the Lama.
He leaned down, taking up the unconscious form of Nalgiri into his arms.
The fire now had a life of its own, the roof now engulfed in flames.
Once again, the Green Lama made his mind go still. His focus moved through his body, first taking the active energy of his mind and collecting it into a throbbing bundle.
His concentration forced this bundle of pure energy lower and lower into his body, allowing it to absorb all of the body’s vital energies that pulsed around it.
The heart, the lungs, each gave up its own energy so that his body was filled with the pulsating bundle. It then moved down his legs, attracted to the muscular strength of his legs, getting heavy with the mass of energy it absorbed, and then, coming to rest within his feet, before purging itself from his body in a concentrated burst of heat energy that flowed.
And the Green Lama rose.
His body began to levitate, one inch, six inches, a foot, raising above the floor, using the power of the radioactive salts to drive his body’s heat energy out and under h
im.
Slowly he began to levitate across the flaming room. To anyone who saw the spectacle, it would be a miracle; a hooded man seeming to float across the room with ease.
To the Green Lama, it was an act of herculean strength. Every bit of fortitude in him, every bit of training, went into maintaining his concentration. One stray thought, one lapse in intensity, and both the Green Lama and Nalgiri would plunge into the flames below.
He felt the flames licking at his feet. Was he faltering, falling lower and lower, eventually lapsing into the flames? Or were the flames climbing higher, moving to a height that he could not rise above?
These random thoughts had to be banished, tossed away to the winds.
From deep within, a single prayer filled the mind of the Green Lama Om. Ma-ni pad-me Hum. Hail to the Jewel of the Lotus..
This was the mantra of Mahayana Buddhism. Its invoker to be protected from all dangers.
And this was all the Green Lama needed.
He came down hard on the floor just outside the stairwell. The flames had not spread this far, though he knew that the entire floor would soon be consumed, collapsing and dropping the flames into the first floor below.
He had to get out. Exhausted and drained, he threw Nalgiri into a fireman’s carry over his shoulder and slowly made his way down the stairs, one foot in front of the other.
The first floor was already filling with smoke, debris beginning to fall from the ceiling.
The Green Lama tried to get his bearings, but the mental strain upstairs made it hard to concentrate. Thick, acrid smoke was everywhere.
Suddenly a hand reached out. It was Jean, her mouth covered with a damp towel, another damp towel over her head and shoulders. She wasted no time speaking; instead she took the Green Lama by his hand to the waiting front door.
The fresh night air of New York City was so sweet. Jethro Dumont did have warm memories of cool evenings in Tibet, just breathing in and out the fresh air of the Himalayas, savoring its pureness.
But no breath taken there was so satisfying as the evening city air that he now breathed deeply into his parched lungs.
He had been pleased to find that Jean had already dragged the body of Tan to safety on the small green lawn in front of the diplomat’s townhouse.
Laying the unconscious form of Nalgiri alongside him, he tightly secured the man’s hands and feet with his own kata.
Jean gave the Green Lama a questioning look after he laid the tattooed figure of Nalgiri in the grass.
“Meet your mastermind, Ms. Farrell,” he said. “You might have met him earlier as the wife of Cheng Yi-chuan.”
The Green Lama took simple pleasure in the utterly confused look that Jean gave him.
The sounds of incoming sirens signaled that both police and fire vehicles were on their way.
“Don’t worry. When Lieutenant Caraway arrives, tell him that I will find a future opportunity to explain the whole case of the hairless ones to him, but he can rest assured that the immediate danger has passed.”
The Green Lama did not want to wait for the authorities. Once Nalgiri was questioned, he was certain that claims would be made that the Green Lama was Jethro Dumont. Or perhaps he was Rev. Dr. Pali. Or even a Tibetan valet. As usual, confusion and slight of hand would be his best ally in protecting his identity.
All of these claims regarding the Lama’s identity had been made at one time or another in the past; but for now, he intended to get home and secure a solid alibi for Mr. Jethro Dumont.
Jean continued to be perplexed by the appearance of Nalgari. She looked over the man; the young actress absorbed by the hairless body, the intricate tattoos, and what appeared to be a set of false eyelashes glued his closed eyes.
Turning with a bemused smile to the mystic warrior, she said, “I must say, this is one of the damnedest things that you’ve ever...”
But the Green Lama was gone.
The End
Blame it On Steranko
I was seven years old, and I discovered an amazing hero.
He was a hooded, caped figure in green, descending through a black sky, caught between the massive might of CC. Beck’s Captain Marvel (a tiny Mister Mind atop his shoulder) and the fierce electrical bolts of Jack Binder’s Pyroman.
The Green Lama may not have been the most dominant character illustrated by Jim Steranko on the cover of The Steranko History of Comics, Volume 2, but to me, this was one cool dude swooping through the air.
Inside Steranko’s oversized pop culture reference guide, I read about the Green Lama’s comic book adventures, and I was enamored by the book’s black-and-white reproductions of Mac Raboy’s art.
And it was in these pages that I first learned that Jethro Dumont originally appeared in the pulp pages of Double Detective magazine.
At the time, I was just getting into the Bantam reprints of Doc Savage, and I was fascinated by the idea of a character that started in the pulps and then found a new lease on life in the comics (a practice commonplace today!).
But where was a seven-year-old boy to find the prose adventures of the Green Lama in the early 1970s? I’d visit my local bookstores, searching the shelves, hoping to find his adventures in reprint editions, but my search was always in vain.
All was not lost though, as my hunt for the Green Lama led to me to discovering Pyramid Books’ reprint of Walter Gibson’s The Living Shadow, and I found my pulp-addled mind now obsessed with another costumed crime-fighter.
And of course, who else would have painted the cover to this reprint edition but the great Jim Steranko.
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Fast forward nearly forty years, and I’m found myself in a new golden age for pulp fans!
Due to the hard work of pulp publishers John Gunnison and Matt Moring, I was finally able to consume all of the Green Lama’s original adventures in issues of High Adventure as well as The Green Lama: The Complete Pulp Adventures collections from Altus Press.
Here I discovered Kendell Foster Crossen’s novel-length adventures of the Green Lama from the pages of Double Detective. And what fun tales these were! Though not quite achieving the epic nature of the best of Doc Savage or the Shadow, these prose adventures tapped into something that Stan Lee made popular at Marvel Comics in the 1960s: they fully exploited the value of continuity.
In Crossen’s Green Lama novels, characters and their relationships changed over time, the locale of one adventure could lead directly into the next, and previous tales were referenced within the current storyline. This was good stuff, way ahead of its time.
And although I continued to devour any pulp reprints that I could get my hands on, I was also finding great enjoyment in the booming New Pulp movement. The adventures of my favorite pulp characters had become ‘infinite’ in scope; lovingly cared for by a new generation of writers, artists and editors who respected the pulp heritage while bringing modern sensibility into these continuing adventures.
Having had the pleasure to become acquainted with Airship 27’s Ron Fortier and Rob Davis at my annual pilgrimage to PulpFest, I eventually approached Ron about crafting a tale for his publishing house. I couldn’t have been more thrilled when he told me of the need of a new adventure of the Green Lama!
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I truly hope that the Airship 27 readers have fun with my take on the adventures of Jethro Dumont. For “The Case of the Hairless Ones,” I wanted a title that would fit right in with Crossen’s original titles for his Green Lama novels in Double Detective.
My goal was to incorporate the historical turmoil that China faced as it transitioned from centuries of Warlord control, and then blend these facts into one of my favorite pulp genres, that of the “weird menace” with its bizarre masked villains, impending tortures, and sinister acolytes.
This would be an intriguing setting in which to
set loose the Green Lama, placing him in a situation where he would have to face down evil while remaining true to his own spiritual beliefs. I also wanted to honor the original pulp vision of the hero while demonstrating Dumont’s inner motivations and actions (without halting the action too much!).
And if you don’t like my take on the spiritual crime-fighter, just blame it on Steranko.
If it weren’t for him clouding the mind of an impressionable seven-year-old, we may never have met on this road celebrating the pulp heroes of the past.
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I’d love to hear from fans of the Green Lama, as well as any other readers and creators involved with all forms of pulp. Drop me a line at [email protected] or look for me on the pulp message boards!
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Author Bio:
ROBERT CRAIG is the president and creative director of a Midwest advertising and digital marketing agency, as well as an associate design director for several affiliated marketing and media firms.
When not reading pulp fiction (classic, new, and anything in between!) or herding his three sons around to various academic and athletic events, Robert spends his spare time as an operating board member of the Bright Side of the Road Foundation, where he has helped to raise over $2 million for ALS research nationwide over the past several years.
The Old & the New
Several years ago we had the fun of publishing our first ever Green Lama anthology that featured three brand new stories. Peter Miller and Kevin Noel Olson delivered two great short adventures and Adam Garcia swung for the fences offering us a truly awesome novella. The book was published and to rousing critical success, thank you all very much.
