Adventure Magazine Cover, December 18, 1919 — page 124: what you’re looking at

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

> nl ee oe Sits - ag = : iB : ae Sagi «a ere ee So Se +. % I10 “Nay! Nay! Sefor! It is time now! See, I will tell the truth of the whole affair. Once I have heard my senorita accused of the killing! It must not be so again! She is as innocent as the babe unborn of the death of the fiscal.” “Who, then—what know you of it? Who did it ?” “It was done for the best. There was no other way. It was your fault, Sefior Governor, and when you would have cor- rected your fault it was too late. I will tell all.” “Tell, then.” Mendoza seated himself quietly and drew his cloak around him. “Seiior—” Maria raised herself on her hands and looked him straight in the face—“it was I—I—who killed the fiscal.” “I know—” he did not know but he did know how to handle an dndian to extract the whole truth— “I know. Go on and tell me all.” “Listen, then, Sefor Governor. That night, the night of the banquet, my little senorita came to me and told me that you had said that she must marry that--that —what shall I call him?” “Go on.’ “T loved her, as you know. You, too, love her, but not as I love, whose blood flows in her veins, for I nursed her, senor, when she was a baby. When she told me that she was to be married to that man against her will, sevor, I swore -jt should not be. I intended to get Tematli, the man the fiscal had flogged, to send me_one of his men to do the killing. Then came the day of the tax gathering and the sevorita was struck, struck in the face before the crowd, and no man save only the tall sevor there—” she pointed to Andres—“raised his hand.” -“She came home that day and wept again. It was then, sefor, that I saw my way. I gave her peyotl and I sent for Tematli and was -about to tell him to have the man killed when I saw the yellow mantle hanging from the open window of the room where Sefor de Avilez slept. I ran back to the room, took the dagger, pulled the yellow cloak from the window and came to the patio, where I found the fiscal standing.” “My cloak,” said Andres wonderingly. “IT knew not. I did not care. It cov- r - Se a ee ee Adventure ered me. Without it I might net have got within knife-reach of ‘him. [ struek and ran.’ “And then?” “Wait! The knife was twisted from my hand, and I knew that when the body was found the seaorita would be blamed, so I ran to Tematli—he is dead now— and told him to send four men to carry off the sefiorita and to keep her in the hills till I could escape. I knew that when I confessed it would clear her and I would not send in my confession till I was safe among my own people. I knew that she was under the influence of the pevotl and could not talk, and that she would not remember what had taken place.” “But you did not escape and you did not confess.” “No. I waited to hear from Tematli that she was safe. That werd never came. Instead we got the word that she had been carried off by men of the north. I waited till we should hear. And— that—is—all.”’ She quivered and lay still. The governor was the first to move. Her story, true to Indian morals, had held them like a charm. “What think you, Avilez? tale ring true?” _ “What motive has she for a-lie?” “Do you know, Maria, what I now must do? Do you know that I must Does the place you in custody?” “7 know.” Unnoticed by any of them, the twitch- ing fingers had crept closer to the knife. Inch by inch she got it and drew it closer to her till in the dim light of the’ hall it was hidden in her clothing. “T know what your Spanish law says, ‘A life for a life.’ It matters not if one life be worthless, be spotted with sin and crime and vice, and that the other be decent and proper. Well—Sefior Gov- ernor’ and—se“orita—mny little, little seiorita whom I suckled as a baby, to whom I taught the words and prayers that your dark priests teach—I tell you this, Sefor Governor 4 She raised herself on her left hand = looked him full in the face as she ay. “T know your law. It was not the law before the Spaniard came but we are comicbooks: