Cover Date: October 1941
Volume 18 # 2
Copyright Date: Monday, September 1, 1941
Author: Lester Dent
Editor: John Nanovic
Story Length: 35,988 words
Cover: Emery Clarke
WHMC: The collection contains six folders for this story, f. 707-712
Recurring Characters. The entire Iron Crew are all present in this story. Pat Savage also appears. The working title for this story was “Those Golden Birds.”

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Birds of Death by Kenneth Robeson
The Blackwater Intrigue by George L. Eaton

Doc Savage Club
Letters From Readers
Editor’s Page

Homely industrialist Benjamin Boot brings Doc Savage a tangled problem: his associate Winton Moldenhaeur has vanished, Moldenhaeur’s daughter Liona is terrified, and two thugs (Mr. Manley and Abner) tried to murder Boot after bribing his servant to free a pet canary as a pretext for entering his apartment. Boot has the pair captive.

The canaries are the key. On an earlier expedition to a remote African valley, Boot, Moldenhaeur, Sam John Thomas and others discovered a lost colony of ancient Egyptians whose golden-yellow birds are sacred. The natives possess a drug, derived from the birds’ environment, that induces a deathlike suspended animation in living creatures or preserves food; a second treatment revives the subject with only temporary illness. The explorers brought birds and drug samples home. Rights were assigned to a holding company, Century Projects, owned by Boot, Thomas and Moldenhaeur.

Greedy partners—Ollie Saff and his hirelings—try to seize the secret. They use the drug as a weapon, capture several of Doc’s aides, and force a return to the hidden valley. Doc analyzes the compound during the flight, devises a temporary antidote, and immunizes himself and Monk by skin application. In the thorn-walled native prison they stage a break, seize machine pistols from their planes, and free the captives. Saff’s men, underestimating the mercy bullets, are overwhelmed by the revived natives.

Boot’s true role emerges: he planned to use Saff as a figurehead to strip the others of the company and monopolize the drug. When confronted, he dives into the cold lake and drowns. Doc determines the drug leaves an ineradicable unpleasant taste that makes it useless for commercial food preservation, though it may illuminate ancient Egyptian embalming techniques. Enough samples are taken for research; the valley is left in peace.

This story has many similarities to two prior adventures: “The Thousand- Headed Man” and “The Green Death.” The suspended animation theme was first used in the later story. In both stories Doc wins through primarily by the use of an antidote he had previously prepared.The ending in “Birds of Death” is very suggestive of “The Thousand-Headed Man.” Perhaps “Birds of Death” reveals the most about the super machine pistols. We have been told the ordinance is delicate and not suitable for military use. In this story, the bad characters use a pair of machine pistols in a desperate attempt to escape from hostile warriors. And, sure enough, the inexperienced shooter jams the weapons by firing bursts that are too long.

Monk anticipates this as they listen to the long bursts being fired: “Monk, thinking of the fire mechanism of the machine pistol, groaned, “He’ll jam that gun! He’ll burn it all—”
Yes, the mechanisms are very delicate indeed.

GHOST WRITER?
Here is a very interesting passage. Monk, who in previous stories swung through the trees like Tarzan of the Apes, is now terribly afraid. In fact, he can’t do this for himself but instead has to hold on to Doc’s back and ride along piggyback style.
Monk squawked in horror, but the bronze man, seemingly unconcerned, fastened to a passing limb, and a moment later was walking through space on a narrow, swaying limb.

Excuse me but this is a terrible inconsistency. Something funny is going on here. I find it difficult to put this off to editorial meddling. Likewise I find it difficult to think Dent would make such monumental change to Monk’s character.

According to Will Murray’s article “Other Ghosts” in in Comic Scene Yearbook Volume 2, he comments that Mort Weisenger and Jack Shiff came up with a plot titled “Dead Man’s Club” which Dent bought. This evolved into “Birds of Death.”  Perhaps some of these incongruous details are reminants of that plot.