Adventure Magazine Cover — page 186: what you’re looking at

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

bat iM x i e ‘ 7 ’ ® ; ‘ eo Tate “ai ‘ ™ ve oe Te SF MALS MND de ey. Uae Peet eS * ce. AS yehe --He was dazed a little at that and stared - around. I told him that if he wished to do some- thing for the governor to be at the Tre- borne Hotel, Suite C, Thursday at 2.35 P.M. “Be there promptly, and come right in. I'll give you the little black steel box and you can give it to the governor. He’ll be there, too. Now don’t look at me that. way. You know it isn’t a trap. As for traps, if -my little, withered old Chinese servant hadn’t shaken his head as you came up the walk, you would now know how it feels to to trapped. You see, somebody hit him over the head recently, and we are waiting for that person to call again. I rather wondered if, after all, it had not been you.” A little grateful, much bewildered and scarcely knowing whether or not he was dreaming, Ellis got out of the house.’ In - his hand he carried a little slip of paper upon which I had written his Thursday’s ap- pointment. He would at least have that to assure him that he had not been dream- ing. XIT I COULD have told him that Cora i) had been doing fine. I did tell him that without adding that she had been out for a ride in Jack’s limousine the day be- fore. I could have told him some other things that would have been of extreme importance, but when one has for so many years kept his own counsel and arranged his little affairs with an eye for the dramatic—perhaps for the melodramatic—one is likely to have no scruples about keeping from people things they have a right to know. © When Joseph Cornwall sent me word that he would meet me at the Treborne, I sent back as an answer that he would do nothing of the kind unless the cashier’s check had been . put into my hands. I was pretty sure that he would not send the money beforehand, though in that answer I conveyed that I had already got in touch with other interested parties out West. I wanted, however, to be sure to have Joseph at the hotel. I should have perferred to have had Daniel Cornwall, of course. There are various ways of getting what one wants, and though many of my most carefully laid plans have been futile, I have occasionally been quite successful. For one» thing, I have never hesitated in life or in Sos avenue the lesser gamble of games defined by Hoyle, to play with marked cards. That may seem a contemptible thing to admit, but I never | saw an honest poker-player yet who wasn’t eventually trimmed by cheaters. Though, by way-of keeping my hand in. with a revolver, I toss pennies into the air and hit them, yet I do not go about picking quarrels with quiet, honest folk, and, though I can do some very nearly unbe- lieveable things with cards, I have never yet cleaned out a man who played honestly. Understand me, for I have no desire to whitewash myself. If aman who can afford to lose gets into a game and he is no personal friend of mine and I happen to have some use for more money than I have, he is pretty likely to complain -of his luck. But to get back to my story: By Wednes- day evening I had begun to feel a little im- patient. As I had been doing every evening, I left the doors unlocked, the rear windows open and the screen unlatched. I drew the blinds and rigged out a kind of dummy that threw a passible silhouette against the shade, while Yang hovered in the shadows of the front porch, sheltered by vines, and I lurked patiently as an Indian in the pantry. As usual, nothing came of our precautions, so about ten o’clock, with much care in case we were being watched, the dummy was dismantled. I took its place for a moment — then arose and went into my bedroom and undressed. Then Yang turned out the lights. : Whoever has watched the night out, sleeplessly listening—lI care not how strong his nerves—evokes a feeling of the eerie. With every sense strained to catch sounds, one hears much creaking and rustling, and it is very easy to believe in ghosts. Phan- toms seem to flicker in the darkness before one’s tense eyes, and the over-alert ears report all manner of faint, suspicious noises. I was alone in the house, not that being alone at all disturbed me, but even I, who am sometimes thought to be without emo- tion, am much more susceptible than I will admit to the startling ‘effect of solitary and tense darkness. Each night after he turned out the lights, Yang left the house, and had any one taken the trouble to follow him, that person would have been convinced that he did not return until morning, for . Yang was very subtle and elusive. On that Wednesday night I was*more _ tense than ever, for on previous nightsIhad fee Ae er, “Sirs * a ve * he te Py 4 ‘ . r ‘ ots ‘ 4 U ty A295) Bul ie rn A eae Lily a ~ Reet ak eli: aa y ; A A , partir > wikis a was