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THE STEEL HAMMER: A DOC SAVAGE STORY
by Dave Taggart
CHAPTER 10 ~ Searching for Seven
The newspaper headlines blared the story across the country.
STEEL HAMMER STRIKES CLEVELAND
POISON GAS MENACE CONTINUED
The authorities still had managed to keep the demand for a ransom of one
hundred million dollars from the press. But almost all other details of the
attack in Cleveland had become public knowledge.
HAMMER GANG VANISHES
ELUDES POLICE CORDON
Gang of Seven Grabs $100 Grand
Escapes Into Poison Gas Cloud
The newspapers all had their own interpretation of what had happened in the
robbery:
Obviously, the Steel Hammer gang is organized with military
precision. Each member of the gang seems to have a code number
to use instead of their name. So the gang of seven crooks was lead
by a man named Seven.
Not all the newspapers agreed themselves. One ran a story proclaiming that the
Steel Hammer was obviously the leader of a misguided cult, so lacking in
humanity that it indulged in wholesale murder, and had impersonally replaced
names with numbers. Another paper insisted that the Steel Hammer had been addressed
as “Sven”, not “Seven”, and advised authorities to round up “suspicious-looking
Norwegians and Swedes” for questioning.
“II'S ALL bunk,” said Sally Morgan.
Renny and Sally were in the cockpit of Doc’s speed plane, flying over southern
Michigan at over 250 miles per hour.
“And you’re so sure of the because...” Renny suggested.
“Because I know who the Steel Hammer really is,” Sally continued. “He’s a
Chicago gambler named Steve McSwain, called ‘Seven-Eleven’ because he loves
craps.”
“And hearing the number seven, you automatically figure him to be the Steel
Hammer?” Renny commented. “Lady, I need my head examined, listening to you.” He
began to work the stick and the rudder pedals to turn the plane around.
“No, listen!” Sally cried earnestly. “McSwain is big cowboy motion picture fan.
He often decks himself out with a pair of six-shooters, just like the Steel
Hammer.”
“And that’s all?” Renny said quizzically. But he kept the plane flying
straight.
“No. The surveillance cameras at the bank show the Steel Hammer to be about six
foot three, 220 pounds. That exactly matches Seven-Eleven McSwain’s rap sheet.”
“Anything else?”
“Just that the guy has dropped out of sight for the past month. Nobody’s seen
him anywhere.”
“Just like your brother,” Renny whispered under his breath.
“I heard that,” snapped Sally.
“Do you deny it?”
Sally turned in her seat to face Renny, “Look, I know things don’t look real
good right now for my brother. But if Hank is wrapped up in this thing, then I
want to try to get him out of it..”
“Strange, I figured you for more the wanna-win-the-Pulitzer-Prize type of
newshen, myself,” said Renny sarcastically.
“Believe what you want,” Sally stated defiantly. But the fact is, my sources
tell me that the biggest crap game of the year is happening tonight in Toledo,
Ohio. If he’s alive, Seven-Eleven McSwain will be there.”
“And if he is?” asked Renny.
Sally smiled. “I figure between your muscles and my brains, we’ll take care of
him.”
THE POLICE department delivered the two telegrams to Doc Savage just as he was
leaving Memorial Hospital. The first read:
DOC SAVAGE
CARE OF CHIEF OF POLICE
CLEVELAND, OHIO
RECORDING OF ATTACK ANALYZED STOP HAVE
ANOTHER GIRL WITH MISSING BROTHER AND BIG
REPEAT BIG NEWS STOP COULD NOT GET YOU OR
MONK ON RADIO SO RENTING PLANE AND COMING
TO CLEVELAND
LONG TOM
The second telegram was also in care of the Chief of Police:
SALLY MORGAN HERE IN DETROIT STOP IDENTIFIES
CHICAGO GAMBLER SEVEN ELEVEN MCSWAIN AS THE
STEEL HAMMER STOP COULD NOT GET YOU OR MONK
ON RADIO STOP FLYING TO TOLEDO TO TRY AND
TRAP HIM
RENNY
The low trilling sound emitted from Doc.
“What can we do?” asked the police officer who had delivered the message.
Realizing that he had been unconsciously making the noise, Doc instantly
stopped. “”My aircraft is probably anchored at the lakefront,” he said. “Can
you take me there?”
“Right away, sir!”
“WHAT HAVE you found out?” Doc Savage asked Monk and Johnny when he arrived at
the big tri-motor plane that was anchored off the Cleveland lakefront. It was
nearly midnight.
“Blazes, Doc, I hardly know where to start!” exclaimed Monk. “Johnny got here,
and me and him gathered samples until dark, and interviewed witnesses. Then we
came back here, and found recorded messages from Renny and Long Tom.”
“I got telegrams from them. Where are they now?”
“Renny’s landed in Toledo, Doc,” said Johnny. Doc Savage was the one human
being he did not use his advanced vocabulary on. “He and the girl have cooked
up a scheme to capture this Seven-Eleven McSwain character that they think is
the Steel Hammer.”
“And Long Tom?”
“He should be here in about an hour or so. He’s bring a girl named Margaret
Adams who supposedly also has a brother working for the Steel Hammer gang.”
Monk slammed a huge hairy first into the metal side of the plane. There was a
resounding metallic, gong! “This thing is getting screwier and screwier! Guess
what I found when I ran the liquid samples I collected through the testing
process?” Doc turned and faced Monk. “You found amounts of the chemical compound Phenol
Yellow Four throughout the downtown area. The concentrations of it were
strongest near the Cuyahoga River. The only place you found any trace of the
poison gas was in a two block area along East Second Street.”
“Blazes, Doc, how’d you know that!” Monk was astonished.
“Because the only authenticated poison gas fatalities which were brought to the
hospital came from that area.” Doc turned to Johnny, “I’m glad you’re here. What
do you make of this?”
“On the surface, Monk has it right -- it doesn’t make sense,” Johnny replied.
“Poison gas that isn’t always poison. Gamblers and bank robberies and insane
ransom demands. I’m starting to think ...” He paused.
“Go ahead,” said Doc quietly.
“Certain cultures place a great value on complicated rituals. They tend to use
misdirection and schemes to confound their enemies to a greater extend than we
do. The logic of western civilization tends to be linear. A leads to B, which
leads to C, and so on.
“But in other cultures, A leads to D, which leads to J, which leads nowhere,
while B leads to C, which leads to K and the true path,” Johnny finished.
“You lost me with the alphabet,” Monk said glumly.
“I believe you have deduced this correctly, Johnny,” said Doc. “Much of what we
have been dealing with here has no doubt been calculated to confuse us and
deflect out inquiries. There are many things which are not what they seem to
be. We are dealing with a very dangerous group who wishes their motives to
remain secret.”
Monk snorted. “Doc, I think them asking for a ransom of one hundred million
smackers in gold would give a guy a pretty good idea as to their motive.”
“That’s a crimson Clupea harengus,” elucidated Johnny.
“Translate or I wring your scrawny neck.” growled Monk.
“A red herring,” Johnny said. “Something they want us to puzzle over which they
have no intention of following through upon.”
“How do you know?” Monk asked.
“Mathematics.”
“Huh?”
“The price of gold is fixed by the government at $32 an ounce,” Johnny said.
“One thousand dollars in gold weighs roughly about two pounds. One million
dollars in gold weighs two thousand pounds, or one ton. One hundred million
dollars weighs...”
“...One hundred tons!” Monk finished. “They’d need a locomotive to haul it
away!”
“Precisely,” agreed Doc. “Nobody could ever realistically hope to collect such
a ransom. We can assume such a demand was made only to divert us from
investigating the Steel hammer’s real purpose.”
“Which is?” asked Johnny.
Doc shook his head. “I do not know. I’ve gained some information, but not
enough.”
“Police boat coming out from shore,” Monk called.
IT CARRIED Long Tom and the brunette he introduced as Margaret Adams.
“I’ve got big news, Doc,” he said. “I didn’t want to put it in the telegram:
too many prying eyes out there. We rented a plane and landed at the Municipal
Airport here about twenty minutes ago. The cops gave us a lift here.”
“You were able to analyze the sound recording?” asked Doc.
“Absolutely. I’ve made a copy to play back for you,” said Long Tom.
“Set it up on the plane’s electrical lab equipment,” Doc ordered. “Monk,
Johnny, prepare for take-off.”
“Now just a coal-fired minute here,” said Margaret Adams. “What is going on
here and where’s my brother?”
“Miss Adams, we are in a desperate situation, and the lives of countless fellow
Americans depend on our success,” Doc said sternly. “I need to find out
information from you, but I also need to begin traveling immediately.
Therefore, I’m going to have to ask you to accompany us for a while. Please sit
down here,” Doc guided her to a seat, “and strap yourself in with these belts,
and you and I will talk presently.”
Three minutes later the plane bearing Doc Savage, Monk, Johnny, Long Tom, and
Margaret Adams took off into the Ohio night.
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