Adventure Magazine Cover — page 152: what you’re looking at

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

.~ bs Bogs — me <9 my, © ee FE ee ee f Ns oe oe . - ee Se I have seen you glance. more than once, though you were too polite to ask me about them. And these are not all, for there are other scars all down my body and legs, made in the same way. With those thorns the grinning Amarillo nailed me to that tree so that I hung in torment, unable to escape. “There, sefvior, you will not have to carry any more burdens for us,” he jeered when it was done. ‘You will have nothing at all to do but.to hang here and scream curses after us when we are gone. When we come back we wiil let you watch us eat and drink, for you will have hunger and thirst by that time. “Oh no, dear friend, you will not die be- fore then, for I have been very careful not to break any large blood-veésels,. which would let you die too soon. You will last for some days, unless a wandering jaguar should happen to find you. In that case— well, a jaguar must-eat; is it not so?” And all the Peccaries laughed. But I kept my jaws locked and made no sound. After watching me a minute he added: “The thorns hurt, yes? That is very sad. Perhaps I can find something that will take your mind off the thorns for a few hours to come.” He went away again, and returned with a folded leaf. Keeping it closed, he shook it violently. Then he flipped it open and snapped it at me. Out from it flew several ants, maddened by the shaking they had had—and they were the aracaras, the fire-ants whose bite gives keen pain that is felt for hours after- ward. The instant they struck my body. they bit me, and ran over me biting furi- ously, until I groaned in unbearable pain. Then those beast-men laughed agai harshly, and one of them went and caught a couple of tucandeira ants—those terrible black ones which are more than an inch - long. He would have thrown these on me too, but the Yellow One struck them from him and destroyed them with his rifle-butt. “Fool!” he snarled. “Bitten as this man is already, those black ants would kill him. Would you spoil all the enjoyment we shall have with him in the next few days?” The man muttered something and turned away. And after spitting in:my face the bandit chief turned away too, saying: “We have more important things to do than to stay longer with you, you Brazilian dog. But we shall return, and then you ill ~ a wr Se i * os Py a M6 <n od s; ¥ ee) Ee is s se i ee Adventure nye ~—s ye s ; EY Re is SY)" v4 Fath an) shall have new things to think about.” And soon they were gone in the bush. - \ Rite HOW long I hung there, senhores, I Fiiq do not know. It seemed eternity. Burning with the torment of the fire-ant poison and the thorns and my wrenched and twisted muscles, I know I raved and screamed after those men had gone. I know, too, that if it had lasted much longer I should have gone stark mad, and that when the Yellow Man returned he would have found me only a yelling idiot. But before my mind gave way a new thing happened. Without a sound two men suddenly stood before*me. () stant I took them for a}pair of the No Peccary porters who had sneaked back to tortere me anew. But then I saw that they were lighter in color, their faces were shaped differently, and they carried big bows. They were men of the cannibal tribe in the big maloca where I had once been assist- ant chief, and their faces showed that they knew me. They had little love for me, I felt, for when the Jaguar and I had been among them we had killed their\chief and five others of their men. Still, a quick death at their hands would be a mercy to me now; and as I had learned some of their language during the time I spent among them, I begged them either to kill me or set me free. They grunted to each other, and one asked me how I had come there, nailed to that tree. I made them understand that a band of human Peccaries had left me there. At once they flew into a rage, and I knew my guess had been right, and they were of the tribe whose women the beast-men had stolen. They gritted their teeth, and beat their chests, and acted as if about to start off in pursuit. But I managed to tell them they were much outnumbered, and their foes had firearms, and so they must have more men before attacking the bandits. They scowled, but talked it over between them and agreed that I was right. And then they laid down their bows and set to work taking out the thorns. Though they were wild, fierce fighting- men of the jungle and eaters of human S THEY were Indians. For an in- flesh, they handled me as gently as they an