Mr. Morand was up. Morand came at the weird dark man, who was fleeing aft, toward the rear of the cabin. . . . Then Morand brought up oddly. He stopped. He seemed to poise, holding a queer suspended att.i.tude, bent forward, hands open and suspended for clutching, but not clutching. And Mr. Morand held that grotesque stance of pause until the dark one had pa.s.sed him and gone on into the rear of the plane.

The dark one disappeared now, turning the corner into the cubicle where the stewardess would be working. Back there was the galley, the lockers, the ladies' lounge.

Mr. Morand came loose from suspension. He stumbled toward Gail. And she had the queerest feeling that Morand had not, or was acting as if he had not, known that the dark man had pa.s.sed him. A thing that, under the circ.u.mstances, did not seem as preposterous as it did hair-raising.

Now the big man who had come from forward reached Gail. He snapped the saturated pad of cheesecloth from her lips.

His companion-short, homely, apish-endeavored to pa.s.s in pursuit of the dark one.

"Hold it, Monk," the giant said sharply."But that guy-"

"He'll be prepared for you back there, Monk. You saw that knife?"

"I'll make him eat that knife, Doc!"

"No. Give him time to soften himself up with his own thinking. He's trapped on the plane. He'll see that."

Now Mr. Morand spoke. He said, "You won't be able to touch him anyway. He doesn't exist."

The big man's hand fished in the seat-pocket that contained airline literature, and brought out the paper sack that was there for the use of pa.s.sengers suddenly and uncontrollably airsick. He popped the cheesecloth pad into the tough vapor-tight paper sack, and immediately closed the mouth of the sack.

He said, "Monk, you get a whiff of that stuff?"

"Uh-huh. . . . Why isn't she dead?"

The giant scrubbed at Gail's lips with a handkerchief. "Watch your breathing. That chemical is a paralysant, and deadly." He watched her intently.

Gail, terrorized, saw the wide homely man, Monk, watching her also. . . . Why, I know his voice! He's the Doc Savage aide I talked to on the telephone!

Mr. Morand stood behind them. He stood oddly, both hands clamped to his chest, one hand resting on the other.

"You evidently didn't take any of the vapor into your lungs," the big man said finally.

"No. I-I think I held my breath," Gail gasped.

"You were lucky." He had metallic bronze features and strange flake-gold eyes that seemed l.u.s.trous in the half-darkness of the dimmed-out airliner cabin. He shook his head, adding, "We were caught off base on that. We didn't expect anything that drastic and quick to happen. I'm afraid we were guilty of a lack of foresight, which is synonymous with stupidity."

Gail, staring at him wonderingly, exclaimed, "You got aboard at the last stop."

"That's right."

"And you're Doc Savage."

"That's right also." The bronzed man sounded wry-voice and self-disgusted. "I'm very sorry that we nearly let you be killed."

"Oh, but you didn't!" Gail said quickly. "He fled only when he saw you. If he hadn't seen you, I'm sure I couldn't have held my breath much longer."

"Well, I can a.s.sure you we're not going to brag about our showing. Another few seconds and-whew!"

"Anyway," said Gail, "you had no way of knowing anything would happen."

He shook his head at that. "We had enough expectations to meet your plane. That should have been sufficient."

Monk Mayfair was scowling toward the rear of the plane. "That guy has had enough time to do histhinking, hasn't he? I believe I'll go back and take possession of him."

"Wait. Let's make sure Miss Adams isn't going to suffer any effects from that stuff," Doc advised. "Then we'll collaborate on that fellow."

Mr. Morand stared at them.

"Fellow? Man? Whom?" Morand was back to short words again.

Monk examined Mr. Morand wonderingly and said, "That's a h.e.l.l of a question, if you'll pardon my parlor language. You stood there, looking like the kid on the end of the diving board just as he decided not to jump, and let the guy stroll past you. What was the matter? His knife look big to you?"

"Knife?"

"It wasn't a b.u.t.ter-paddle, bub."

"Knife? Saw none."

"Huh?"

"No. Didn't pa.s.s. Positive."

Monk gestured impatiently, said, "You got a funny way of leaving out words, pal. Maybe you didn't see the knife pa.s.s you-"

"You misunderstand. The man. Never pa.s.sed me. Certainly didn't."

Monk's head jutted forward. "You'd better snow again on that one. The guy didn't pa.s.s you, you say?"

"Exactly. Definitely didn't." Mr. Morand jerked his own head up and down. His eyes, Gail thought wonderingly, were the most terror-filled eyes she had ever seen.

"Well, what do you know about that." Monk glanced at Doc Savage. "You hear that, Doc? We can't trust our eyes any more. We just imagined a would-be murderer trotted up the aisle past little short-words here."

Listening to his own voice seemed to enrage Monk, and he growled suddenly, "Why, I'll unscrew this little liar's head and put it back on straight!" He reached for Mr. Morand, who shuffled back in alarm.

"Cut it out, Monk," Doc Savage said thoughtfully.

Gail let a short silence pa.s.s, then said in confusion, "I'm afraid I don't understand this at all. . . . You are Doc Savage? You really are?"

Monk, scowling at Mr. Morand, said, "Sure we are. I mean, he is."

"But I don't understand your presence on the plane!"

Monk said it was simple enough. He added, "We grabbed a fast ship out of New York and beat your plane to that intermediate stop back there by nearly half an hour. There was nothing to it."

Gail examined Monk dubiously. "If you're actually the fellow who upset me so over the telephone, and I think you are, you specifically said you were having nothing to do with it.""Smoke screen." Monk was practicing glaring at Mr. Morand.

"What?"

"Look, Miss Adams, a telephone can be the next thing to a broadcasting station if the wire happened to be tapped or you were overheard. Do you think it would be smart to announce we were rushing to take the job, that it is the screwiest thing we've had come along in some time, and we wouldn't miss it for anything? Sure, that would be great. Our necks way out. Start shooting, anybody who doesn't like our company. . . . Oh, no! That kind of advertising begets trouble."

"But you didn't know I would be on a plane bound for New York. I didn't know it myself when I was talking to you."

"I wish they were all as easy as that one," Monk told her without taking his glower off little Mr. Morand.

"You told me on the phone you'd come to New York and see Doc. You were angry. You sounded as if you were going to do it immediately. You thought your brother had been murdered, so it was an important matter, one you would act on, and quickly. A plane was quickest transportation. We got the airline checking, found you were getting a ticket, and we struck out to intercept the plane."

Gail did some mental computing, and wasn't satisfied. "But the stop was over halfway, and this is the airline's fastest type of plane. You couldn't have taken an airliner and intercepted me."

"Who said airliner?" Monk asked. "We used Doc's private job. Ham Brooks, one of the lower-grade members of our outfit, is flying it back."

"I guess-I should believe you," Gail said uncertainly.

"Suit yourself," Monk advised. "Of course, we did save your life."

Gail straightened uncomfortably, embarra.s.sed by Monk's directness.

Doc Savage told her quietly, "You'll get to understand Monk, possibly. To him, the shortest distance is a straight line, even through a brick wall."

Monk told Mr. Morand ominously, "They make me count to a hundred before I get drastic. I'm on ninety-nine now."

Gail moved her attention to Mr. Morand. She thought there was a terror in his eyes beyond any apprehension Monk Mayfair might be causing. Not that Monk wasn't formidable.

"You'll see," Mr. Morand blurted. "Nonexistent. Not here. The man. You'll see."

"You still talking about the dark little guy with the knife?" Monk demanded.

"Exactly."

"He wasn't here, huh? I didn't see him. He didn't clap a pad of poison over her mouth? None of that happened, I take it?"

Mr. Morand rolled his eyes up. They were all whites. "You'll see," he said.

Monk glanced at Doc Savage. "The bats will start flying out of him in a minute." He threw a gesture at the rear of the plane with his formidable jaw. "Do we go back and see if dark-suit has become thoughtful enough?"Doc Savage said, "Yes. But just a moment." He touched Mr. Morand's arm, added, "You wouldn't mind sitting here and waiting?" And without waiting for an answer, he pressed Mr. Morand down into a seat-the man's own seat-and for a few seconds Mr. Morand seemed frantically anxious not to sit there.

Then Mr. Morand closed his eyes. When Doc Savage took his hands away, the small man remained pa.s.sive. He seemed asleep.

Gail was white-faced with surprise. She felt Monk's touch. He whispered, "Don't let that upset you. Doc used a hypo needle on him before he knew what was going to happen. To keep him on ice until we have time to get around to him."

Doc Savage moved toward the rear of the plane. Monk followed hastily. Those of the pa.s.sengers who were awake looked at them curiously, but no one seemed to have any special feeling that anything was wrong. Almost everyone had been asleep, and there had been little noise.

The stewardess was arranging paper coffee cups in a rack. She made a clean bright figure under the only brilliant light in the plane. She lifted a shining blonde head and said, "Good morning."

"The man who was in a hurry?" Doc Savage asked her quietly. "Where did he go? Which lounge?"

She gave him a puzzled smile. "I beg pardon?"

Doc gave it to her a little more fully. "A thin man in a dark suit. He had a knife, but had perhaps put it away when you saw him."

"But I didn't see him," the stewardess said. "That is, if it was in the last ten minutes."

"It was less than ten minutes ago."

She shook her head. She had a page-boy haircut and the blonde hair waggled vaguely. "It wouldn't make any difference. No one has entered either washroom since the last take-off."

She said this calmly, confidently. It was an impossibility. No one could have pa.s.sed, gone into either lounge, or gone anywhere in the rear of the plane, the part that lay beyond the part.i.tion that shut off this section, without pa.s.sing her. Without, in fact, squeezing past her. If she had been standing or sitting here all the time.

"You must have been in the ladies' lounge when he pa.s.sed," Doc Savage said.

"But I wasn't. I've been right here-certainly more than ten minutes. Nearer thirty. And no one pa.s.sed me."

Monk brought his head around and looked up at Doc. He had a foolish expression. "I seem to be getting snowed in," he said.

Doc Savage told the stewardess who he was.

"Yes, Mr. Savage, I recognized you," the stewardess said. "I've seen you before. You were pointed out to me."

"This man tried to kill a young lady pa.s.senger."

"Oh!" Her hands flew to her cheeks."He came back here."

Uncertainty, confusion, mixed with a distressed certainty in the stewardess' features. "But he didn't-I'm sure he didn't-pa.s.s me. No one did."

"Do you mind if we take a look?"

"Oh, of course not. You must look. Maybe he-but really, no one could have gone through here without my noticing."

"It doesn't seem possible," Doc agreed without much expression. "But we'll look anyway."

They did a quick job on both lounges, the men's and women's. Both service rooms were extravagantly done in chrome and pastel colors, but their man wasn't in either.

"Would you unlock the storage lazarets?" Doc asked the stewardess.

She paled. "Certainly," she said angrily.

There were two clothing lockers, and three others containing blankets, pillows, food supplies, and they rifled each thoroughly. No small man in a dark suit.

"This gets better as we go along," Monk said in the tone of a man who is beginning to wonder if he didn't see something white and transluscent in a midnight cemetery.

"There's the tail section of the plane," Doc said. "The unused part of the fuselage fartherest aft."

But that, they found, was closed off by a bulkhead fastened with at least twenty sheet-metal screws that had a special head machining. "You have a screwdriver to fit these?" Doc asked the stewardess.

"Why, certainly not!" She was coldly angry with them now.

"Sister, this isn't a rib," Monk told her.

Doc used the blade of a knife on a few of the screwheads. Presently the tip of the blade broke. He stepped back, frowning now, and said, "The screws would have to be re-inserted from this side after the fellow went in. That would have taken a busy three or four minutes-twice as long to remove them also.