Adventure Magazine Cover, December 18, 1919 — page 67: what you’re looking at

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

The Shehu Wants an Armorer E had to cut down his long noon rest in the shade of the baobab to a short hour. It took great effort of will to rise to his protesting legs, to force his eyes into the tortuous glare and plunge into the heat waves that danced on the plateau as on a hot stove. He hesitated a moment, of a mind to throw up the sponge and bee-line for the ant-hill, but he caught the upturned faces of the men on the ground and saw them reading his hesitation, ready to burst into guffaws. Grinding his teeth he swung out for the lone rock. The Kanuri did not im- mediately follow, but took their deliber- ate comfort in the shade. After a while, however, the staccato of the hoof-beats came up behind, beating on his irritation like a physical pain. He dogged on, his body flung forward at an angle that car- ried him along by gravitation, his sweat- soaked turban a dead weight. Hours were months, the sun’s slow de- cline to the west a century. His seared eyeballs stared into the haze at the lone mount; he wanted it in view all the time to help him keep a true estimate of the position of the ant-hill and gage his chances against the sun’s decline. The land grew broken and boulder-strewn, the result of the earth convulsions thaf had squeezed out the mountain. He had to keep a lookout for the boulders. His chin sunk on his chest. Suddenly the following hoof-beats were punctuated by drawn-out “A-ah’s!” of discovery. He lifted his head and looked back at his tormentors. They were pointing lean, long black forefingers to the left. He was amazed to see palms or, rather, amazed to think he had nearly missed the date oasis. The sun- -glare must have affected his sight. That was the great joke : one could easily miss the jewel of the domain. Yes, that was the explanation of Issou’s mysterious prayer that Allah grant him vision of the oasis. But why had the Kanuri drawn his attention to it? them! They were daring him; they saw he would be taking a great risk by swerv- ing out to include the oasis. They- were daring him, mocking him. He could never make it. They saw that and were giving him a teasing vision of the very desirable oasis. Desirable—! His lips already felt the cooling water of the lolloping ~make on his return. 53 wells; it trickled down his gritted throat ; he lapped his hot face in it, bathed his inflamed eyes. He stopped and fed his soul on the sight—the palm fronds patterned against the horizon, mysti¢eal, magical, wonder- ful—dates, the bread of the Sudan. Date palms and wells! What kind of laugh would he have on his tormentors if he- failed to hog the oasis? Yet He looked at the mount, estimated the ant-hill and the sun’s decline. A hand’s breadth above the jagged sky-line the sun waited—seemed to wait. ‘The palms looked less than a mile away. A Kanuri teased his indecision. “QO Strong White Man Learned in the Magic of Metals, what is demain with the date palms, without the wells ?” | What indeed? In Issou’s minstrelsy the shehuw’s greatness was glorified by the number of his wells., The figures in the saddles looked down on him curiously. A mouth uttered a guttural taunt through its muffling fold— “A dog has four less, yet it can not walk two paths.” He with the peeled wands cackled— “T will plant a wand for the white man by the oasis.” The ruffians rocked in their saddles in rib-breaking merriment. Such a joke they had on him, them! He’d show them! A stupid fury swept him. He would show them what a white man’s strength and will and endurance is. He laughs best who laughs last He plunged toward the silhouetted palms, breaking into a Chinese peddler’s run-walk, his leg muscles protesting. Suddenly he halted on the brink of quite a precipice. He swayed there a moment in dull surprize, then started to clamber down. He lost foot-hold, whirled, clutched, rolled to the bottom, picked himself up and teetered on toward the oasis, ‘without thought of the awful climb he would be forced to He was not doing any thinking. Rage and grim determina- tion to put it over his scoffers shut out thought. He blundered on for a short while, relieved of the Kanuri, who rode off to find a descent for their mounts. \* JOOKS COME ? con