Art by James Bama
Art by James Bama

The Strangest Northerns: Quest of Qui

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

Quest of Qui appeared in Doc Savage Magazine, July 1935. It was #12 in the Bantam paperback series. It also received a junior hard cover edition. It was Dent’s twenty-ninth Doc novel (alone or with ghost writers). It was not Doc’s first Northern but his fifth. On Page 40 this happens:

“Monk, Renny, better get your own [Arctic gear], too. You have them, haven’t you?”

“Sure,” Monk grunted. “I got some left from that last dizzy trip we took up there, that time we found that fantastic place underground.” (Land of Always Night)

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

Lester Dent wrote very fast but he never forgot that within the story the characters remember things from past issues. He didn’t do a lot of this but when it mattered he remembered.

Quest of Qui

Art by Ben Otero
Art by Ben Otero

The story begins with a Viking ship showing up off the New York coast. The Vikings boards the yacht Sea Scream, leaving the yacht’s crew and passengers on the longship. This weirdness gets Johnny’s attention as he is an archaeologist. Soon he is flying to Labrador in Northern Canada in search of a clue. He lands to help a man who has been shot. The attackers find him there and his radio is left on as a clue to his boss.

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

Meanwhile back in New York City, Doc, Renny and Monk are all attacked by an invisible attacker who throws Viking knives and spears at them. Fortunately Doc is wearing his chain mail undergarments. Long Tom is away on assignment but the boys think of Ham. Rushing to warn him, they are too late. The invisible attackers has taken Ham out the window, dumping his clothing as their black sedan drives away. Ham’s building superintendent is murdered in the escape.

Off to the North

Doc finds each piece of Ham’s expensive clothing, but it is in the pocket of his pants Ham has left a secret message. Doc knows it means “Diamond Point”. Ham also leaves a written message on the floor of the car: “Carleth A. L.” which means Carleth Air Lines. The boys drive off in a hurry to find a mansion there. The invisible attacker gets to them despite Doc’s infra-red goggles.

At the house Doc and his men meet the owner, the millionaire Thorpe Carleth and his butler, Peabody. The two men have been trapped inside because of the invisible attacker. Carleth learns about Johnny and the radio. He also finds one of his two new airplanes has been stolen. Carleth offers to take Doc to Labrador in the other. When Doc and the boys get back to the city they find their warehouse on fire. Their airplane has been destroyed. Doc decides to take Carleth up on his offer.

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

The Woman of the Snow

Meanwhile back in the snowy north, Johnny gets to know his captors, lead by a man named Kettler. Johnny notices the men all have recently shaved off beards (like the dying man) and realizes these men were the Vikings that took the yacht. The boss keeps Johnny half-frozen but alive so he can talk with someone, the real reason the thugs are in Labrador. They bring in a woman not of our time, a Viking named Ingra. The bad guys want Johnny to pump her for information on a place called Qui. Johnny talks to her long enough to effect an escape plan. The two make off into the snow with the baddies in pursuit. The two split up and the chase ends for Johnny when he falls into a crevasse.

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

Doc flies the crew north, using the dying radio signal to find Johnny’s destroyed plane. Kettler’s plane finds them and shoots up the spot. Doc and his men take cover in the snow. Doc gets back into the air but has no guns on his aircraft. He loses Kettler and his ship. (The bad guys cover it with a white tarp and snow.) Doc rounds up everybody, flies to a new camp, then leaves the others to go look around on his own. He finds Ingra but loses her when the bad guys show up with their rifles. Doc takes out several armed men and disables their plane by shooting a wire off their engine. He returns to his base.

The usual fights and feints follow with Renny, Monk and Ham captured, when Peabody shows his hand. He is the boss and Carleth works for him. Peabody turns out to be the secret enemy that is so popular in Doc novels. (But Lester Dent does one better. Wait for it!)

Qui Found!

Doc finds Johnny. The two walk through a crevasse until they arrive at a strange city of primitive buildings. They have found Qui, a city ruled by dwarfish men, masters of a stock of ordinary-sized men, descendants of Vikings, Inuit and French trappers. Doc has to use his skills as a negotiator to convince the dwarf kings that he wants to be their slave and help in the coming battle. (Turns out those knives that threw themselves were actually thrown by rogue Qui folk working with Kettler.)

Kettler and Peabody show up, landing their planes, armed with a machine gun. Doc manages to steal their ammo, giving the dwarves a chance. Despite this, the baddies take over and force the Qui folk to reveal their stash, the reason Peabody and his gang wanted to return to Qui. (Kettler and his bad apples had been captives of the kingdom for a short time before escaping in the Viking ship.) Under a totem pole is a fortune in metal, some gold, some silver, some even lead, as the Qui don’t understand money.

Art by Paul Orban
Art by Paul Orban

Doc gets his people free (now including Carleth who turned out to be working with Doc, a secret enemy of a secret enemy!) and they flee towards the ocean. He leads them all over the sand bars before climbing a ledge high above the sea. Peabody and Kettle follow. They don’t listen to Doc when he tells them to go back. The tide rises, drowning all the bad guys.

Back in New York City, a second Viking ship secretly appears, allowing the visitors to go home (The Qui folk destroyed all three airplanes.) Later genuine Viking artifacts are auctioned off, the money going secretly into boat loads of useful items to Qui. Doc tells no one of the secret city, allowing them to live their own lives. The dwarf kings make the slave folk equal partners after Doc negotiates a treaty of peace. Ingra, to Monk’s chagrin, chooses to stay in Qui.

Conclusion

Quest of Qui reminds me of other Northerns, though it predates most of them. The Lost Ones (1961) by Ian Cameron, better known by its film title, The Island at the Top of the World (1974). Cameron had a tribe of Vikings living in secret. Quest of Qui also reminds me of the “Queen of the Arctic” Pulp stuff descended from A. Merritt and ended up in comics like “Aurora, Queen of the North”. Strangely the tale doesn’t feature many of the details of a tale of Labrador. Dent does include Inuit people (as Eskimos) and a French Canadien trapper but only as victims of Qui. Most of the novel could have taken place anywhere cold.

Art by M. D. Jackson

Read an interview with creator, Jack Mackenzie