Tom Swift and The Visitor from Planet X by II Appleton Victor (best ereader for comics .txt) 📕

noticed the young inventor make a quick "thumbs down" gesture.

"My name is..." The man's voice fell to a mumble, obscuring the syllables. "Frankly I am not yet sure I desire a job here, but being an engineer, I thought perhaps—"

The man's gaze switched back to Tom, and in that instant Chow jumped the intruder. With surprising agility for his rotund bulk, the cook bore down on him and let fly a gnarled fist at the stranger's jaw. Tom followed up like lightning, grabbing the man's wrist and yanking his hand out of his pocket.

(Tom and Chow fight the intruder) He was clutching a snub-nosed automatic. Tom twisted it from his grasp as the man landed, writhing on the hard ground. Chow quickly pinned his other arm and drove a knee into the man's solar plexus.

"Jest lie quiet now, you varmint, or you may git yourself roughed up a bit," Chow warned, then added, "Who is he, Tom?"

"Search me. He stopped my car on the road and forced me to drive him in through the private gate. Boy, was I ever glad to see you, old-timer!"

Tom emptied out the clip of shells. Then he searched the stranger while Chow continued holding him down. The man carried no wallet, papers, or other means of identification.

"Brand my tumbleweed salad," Chow grumbled, "he sure wasn't takin' no chances on people findin' out who he is! Which proves he's some sort o' crooked cowpoke! Honest ones ain't afeared o' showin' their own brand!"

The man muttered something angrily in a foreign tongue. Chow merely pressed down harder with his knee. "What'll we do with him, boss?"

"Let him up, Chow," Tom said. "Security should be here any second."

Even as he spoke, Tom glimpsed a jeep speeding toward them in the distance. The young inventor knew what had happened. Since the stranger did not have the special electronic wrist amulet worn by all Swift employees, his presence had automatically shown up on the master radarscope. A security squad was coming to investigate.

As Chow released the man, he got to his feet slowly. Then, without warning, he suddenly butted the cook square in the stomach. Chow was knocked sprawling!

Before Tom could counter the surprise attack, the man's fist cracked against his cheekbone. Tom, though stunned, lashed out. More punches flew back and forth. Tom landed a stinging blow to his opponent's midriff, then took a punishing one himself.

Suddenly Tom felt the stranger's hand clawing at his pocket for the key to the gate. With all his wiry strength, Tom locked his arms around the man and wrestled him to the ground.

The stranger fought like a tiger. But a second later a jeep screeched to a stop. Three security guards, led by stocky Phil Radnor, leaped out. Within moments they had the man subdued.

Tom quickly briefed the security men on what had happened.

"All right, mister, start talking!" snapped Radnor, head security police officer.

The man's only reply was a scowl of rage.

"Okay, take him away till he cools off," Tom ordered.

Disheveled and still panting, the man was bundled into the jeep and driven off to the security building.

Tom arrived there by motor scooter several minutes later. Harlan Ames, the slim, dark-haired security chief of Enterprises, had taken charge of the case, and the prisoner was now being fingerprinted and photographed.

"Any leads?" Tom inquired.

Ames shook his head. "He won't talk and we've nothing on him in our files. His clothes have no tags or laundry marks, but I'd say they're of foreign make."

Tom nodded. "He's definitely foreign. He spoke with an accent and he also muttered something at Chow—I didn't catch it, but it certainly wasn't in English."

Ames frowned. "I don't like the looks of this, skipper. He may be a spy."

"Have you notified the police?" Tom asked.

"Right. Also the FBI. They're on the way right now to pick him up. Maybe they'll be able to worm something out of him."

Tom spent the morning in routine work in the big double office which he shared with his father in Enterprises' main building. It was equipped with huge twin modern desks, deep-pile carpeting, and roomy leather chairs.

Each of the two inventors had his own drawing board, designed to swing out from the wall at the press of a button. Small scale models of some of their most famous inventions were also placed about the office, including a red-and-silver replica of Tom's first rocket ship, the Star Spear; a blue plastic model of the jetmarine in which he had fought a band of undersea pirates; and also a gleaming silvery model of Tom's latest, unique space craft, the Cosmic Sailer.

Because of his father's absence in Washington, the burden of administering the vast experimental station now fell on Tom's youthful shoulders. Telephone calls, letters, and other detailed work occupied him until noon.

Chow broke in, bringing a lunch tray with milk, a hot chicken sandwich, and a chocolate eclair. Tom ate hungrily.

"Kind o' peps up the ole supercharger, eh?" said Chow, lingering to chat.

"Sure does," Tom agreed.

"Wal, jest remember that, an' don't go missin' any meals—or sleep, either," Chow advised as he gathered up the tray. "A brainy young hombre like you needs plenty o' rest an' vitamins to keep from burnin' himself out."

"I'll remember." Tom grinned affectionately as the leathery-faced old Texan took his leave. The Swifts had first met Chow when they were on an atomic research expedition in the Southwest. Chow had become so attached to Tom that he had returned to Shopton with the Swifts as a permanent employee.

Soon after Chow left the office, the telephone rang. Tom took the call and had just finished talking with Harlan Ames when Bud came strolling in.

"Any more news on that nut who jumped you this morning?" the young flier asked. "Ames told me about it."

"Not yet, but there may be soon," Tom said. "Harlan just phoned and said he'd had a call from Washington, asking us to stand by the videophone at one-thirty sharp."

Ames arrived in person shortly before the scheduled time. Moments later, a red signal flashed on the control board of the Swifts' private TV network. Tom flicked on the videophone and two men appeared on the screen.

One was Blake, the Swifts' Washington, D.C., telecaster. He introduced the other man, a calm-faced, balding individual in a dark suit.

"This is John Thurston of the Central Intelligence Agency, Tom," Blake said. "He thought it might be better to discuss this with you face to face."

Tom, Bud, and Ames were also visible to the pair in Washington.

"Glad to know you, sir," Tom said, and introduced his companions.

"We've identified the man you captured this morning," Thurston began. "He's in the United States on a French passport under the name of Jacques Renard. But we've just learned from the International Police Organization that he's actually a Brungarian. His name is Samson Narko."

Tom and Ames exchanged startled glances. In the past, certain Brungarian factions had been responsible for some of the most fiendish plots ever perpetrated against the Swifts.

"Unfortunately, that's not all," Thurston went on. "Interpol believes that Narko is also a member of the same rebel outfit with whom you've had trouble before."

Tom was dismayed by the news. "I sure thought that group had been smashed!" he said. Soon after Tom had balked their attempts to seize the satellite Nestria, the rebel ringleaders had reportedly been arrested and tried for treason.

"It now appears," Thurston explained, "that only one segment was quelled. Other members of the antigovernment movement are active again and are said to be strongly organized."

The CIA man related even more sinister news. It was suspected that a larger nation—by aiding the rebels—was planning a coup to take over Brungaria. They had already subverted various government agencies and were sending their own professors to staff the Brungarian technical schools. It was all part of their insidious fifth-column pattern.

"Many top Brungarian officials have joined the plotters," Thurston added, "and it's now becoming very difficult for anyone to enter or leave the country."

Ames asked for information on any rebel sympathizers known to be in the United States. Thurston was able to tell him very little.

"We keep strict tabs, of course, on all Brungarians entering this country," Thurston explained. "But even though we screen them carefully, a rebel agent like Narko may slip in—usually on a stolen or faked passport."

When the telecast ended, Tom, Bud, and Ames discussed the news grimly.

"What if Narko has pals working with him?" Bud conjectured.

"If he does," Tom said, "they may try carrying through Narko's mission."

"I'll station extra guards around the outer wall on twenty-four-hour alert," Ames promised.

Tom approved this measure wholeheartedly, but the purpose of Narko's secret mission remained a mystery. Why had he tried to force his way into Enterprises? What was he after? There was little hope of resolving these questions, since United States Intelligence had learned of the rebel movement itself only within the past few days. Thurston had asked Tom and his companions to treat the information as confidential.

"I'd better get back to work," Tom decided after Bud and Ames had left his office. Tom sat down at his drawing board and began to sketch out some rough ideas for a vehicle to house the "brain energy" from space.

Tom wondered if the brain would be able to perform actions by itself, given the proper mechanical output devices. Or would he have to help it function via an electronic computer to digest incoming information or stimuli and then to respond through servo controls?

The problem was so baffling and complex that Tom became completely oblivious to the passage of time. He sketched out plan after plan, only to crumple and discard each one.

Suddenly a disturbing thought jarred the young inventor out of his concentration. Perhaps the Brungarian rebel scientists had now figured out how to decode the radio messages from the Swifts' space friends!

If so, when the brain energy was launched toward earth, they might try to divert it to their own receiving setup!

CHAPTER IV ANOTHER TREMOR!

Tom was appalled at this new danger. Shoving his drawing board back into its wall slot, the young inventor hurried to his desk and made a number of telephone calls.

Within minutes, a group of five of his most trusted associates had assembled in Tom's office. First to arrive were Bud Barclay, Ames, and George Dilling, the Swifts' communications chief. They were joined moments later by Hank Sterling, the square-jawed chief engineer and trouble shooter of Enterprises, and Arvid Hanson.

Hanson, a hulking six-footer, made all the delicate scale models of Tom Jr.'s and Tom Sr.'s inventions. He was not only an expert craftsman, but, like all the Swifts' key men, a trained aircraft and space pilot as well.

"What's up, skipper?" Bud asked.

"I guess you might call this a council of war," Tom replied.

He divulged his fears that Brungarian scientists might hijack the brain energy to be sent from Planet X, home of the Swifts' unknown space friends.

"Bud, you recall Mother's remark last night about the danger that this energy may prove overwhelmingly powerful," Tom went on. "Well, just suppose that our Brungarian pals fit it out in robot form, then turn it loose against us or our friends in other countries."

Bud gave an awed whistle. "Boy, a thing like that might make even a powerful missile look like a toy!"

Even if the brain energy proved too small to be harnessed for destructive purposes, Tom went on, it might turn out to possess superintelligence. Gifted with all the scientific know-how of the space people, it might be made to reveal those secrets to the Brungarians.

"They might learn from it how to construct weapons or space craft powerful enough to conquer the free world!" Tom