Adventure Magazine Cover, December 18, 1919 — page 118: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

PMP ap AS Nites s ds eee ee wae) as cA ie 4 my pe, ) a 104 ‘Adventure — where none would ever disturb his re- mains. See——” He picked up the copper casque and nearly dropped it in astonishment. “Por Dios!’ he exclaimed, and as the startled Mercedes looked she saw him thrust ~his hand wrist deep into a little pile of flashing green stones that had been concealed beneath the helmet. “What are they?” she asked breath- lessly. Andres drew his breath hard and opened his fingers, letting the stones trickle through his open hand. “What are they? They are treasure trove that is come to us too late to use. ‘They are wealth, beside which the fabled cities of Cibola are poverty-stricken. They are emeralds of the purest water, and some of them have been carved and worked. Look!” Three were preeminently beautiful. One huge stone was carved into the shape of a rabbit and carried a drop of gold in its mouth. Another had been roughly shaped like a human face, but it was the third that held their gaze. It was a prickly-pear, the leaves of which were of flat emeralds, the stem of soft red gold. “Holy Mother! What wonderful workmanship. Remember, it was done by a people who had no knowledge of the use of iron. This is either art-magic or the man who was buried here was one of a lost race. Doubtless his race be- queathed to the present Indians knowl- edge how to make bricks and irrigate fields with a skill that equals our own. What is that?” SHOUT from Fray Marco drew them back to the cave. Andres slipped off his leather doublet as he passed out through the hole in the wall. “Stay here,” he said, flinging her the garment. “It is safest here. Take this leather doublet and tie up the stones in it. If we get away they will accompany us. If we are killed—well, then, I will have no use for the doublet. I am com- ing,” he shouted in answer to a frenzied shout from Xicotl. He was none too soon. Despairing of a direct attack up the slope in the face of three desperate men, the Indians had sent three of their number up the oppo- site slope of the “cafion.~ They had climbed to a point higher than the top of the wall so they could see into the cave and from this vantage-point were sending arrow after arrow into the en- trance. Even while Andres struggled through the gap in the wall, an arrow pierced Fray Marco’s arm and another whistled venomously through Xicotl’s bedraggled plumes and broke against the wall behind him. “Inside with you,” said Andres quickly. “You can do no good here. My bow will range farther than theirs, but if I use it it will make them conduct a long-range fight. We must tempt them to close quarters and get this matter settled by force of arms before we are starved out. If they besiege us we are beaten. We . must tempt them to a rush when my sword, Xicotl’s macahuitl and my pistols, most certain of all, will soon settle it. “The Indians pray to an arquebus! They have never heard a gun! I war- rant they break when they hear the re- port of arms for the first time. Ah! I have it! Xicotl, when the next arrow enters the cave, you give a great shout and spring into the air and fall so they will think they have killed you. They will be more ready to rush us.” A moment later an arrow whistled into the entrance. Xicotl with a sharp cry leaped high in air and dropped to the floor. He very promptly wriggled back to safety and lay laughing at the ear-piercing yells that rose outside. “T think they are preparing for a rush. T will take a last look at my pistols. They must not fail me now. I have but six charges left.” He drew the charges from the bell- mouthed brass barrels that measured two hand-breadths across the muzzle and re- loaded them very carefully. As a last precaution he rammed home in each a double handful of good-sized hard peb- bles over the seven bullets with which each was already loaded. “The Count of Pistoja, who invented them, never loaded them better,” he said grimly. “My faith! How they gather in the valley! It is a scant sixty yards. I can not resist it, Fray Marco. I shall fire one pistol at them as they stand in that group yonder. Here goes——” And before Fray Marco had time to