Adventure Magazine Cover — page 179: what you’re looking at

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

The Village of the Ghost full moonlight without the castle and the wind was damp with the passing of a heavy rain. The two sat close to the embers, muskets at their sides. The collection of the revenues had been completed that day and Malcolm had hidden the money in the wall not three feet away, having removed a stone on the inside to make a niche for it. It was a sorry treasury, he reflected, and, harassed and spied upon, he was a sorry figure of a king’s magistrate. Nevertheless the money was there, the surveys and cer- sus completed and—he and Rawul Singh still held the castle. “It is the part of wisdom to study thy enemy, Rawul Singh,” he nodded, puffing at his long clay pipe. “Now,” he went on in English, “I’m not liking this quiet. We are watched. I don’t think my chzt-bearer got through.” “Sahib,” observed the Rajput suddenly, “it is in my mind that Tala is near us. Last night my ears heard her song, not so far away. Yet her voice was altered and I could not be sure—fearing a trick I dared not leave thee.” The Scot’s eyes grew moody. “That’s a score we must settle,” he thought. “This poor chap is waiting for me to give his daughter back to him and I’m blessed if I can see any way to it. We’ve learned that she is not in the village, nor in the farming districts. God grant she isn’t dead.” “Tf it was a trick,” the Rajput pursued the tenor of his thoughts, “‘it means that our enemies are girding themselves for fight. Aye, it was a warning, perchance. They will only attack us openly when all other ways- are proved useless. Aye, they fear that the noise of our muskets and the sight of fight- ing in the castle—which can be seen plainly from across the Jumna—would bring down retribution from the feringhis on their heads.” Malcolm nodded. “So,” he added, “they will try to get rid of us secretly. Aye, we will not be fools enough to leave our fortress. We have food and we will wait until they come, or Cun- ningham sahkib comes.” “As the gods will—it may be that Tala will come, for she is near.”’ Rawul Singh glanced at the jungle. Mal- colm sahib, he thought, might have es- caped weeks ago from Bhir. But the ferin- ght was a man without fear. Now it was 169 too late; the net had closed around them, the wiles of the demon of Bhir would be loosed on them secretly so that no word would spread around the countryside that the men of Bhir had slain a sahib. It would be done inevitably as Powell sahib had been dis- posed of, and the other. And now, leaning forward the better to listen to the noises of the night, he touched Malcolm on the arm. “Danger is at hand,” he whispered, ‘‘for men are coming up the path from the vil- lage. Soon Malcolm noticed what Rawul Singh had observed—a muffled clamor on the highway beneath them. And presently he made out torches advancing up the trail to the castle. The patter of naked feet sounded in the jungle. He leaned forward to light his pipe with an ember from the fire. VI BZ THAT night the chief of the village had announced that there would be a tamasha at Bhir castle. Word had been passed about the bazaar and the outlying districts by the chief’s servants that the famasha would be a very fine one—in celebration of the good harvest that had been gathered in. The leading men of the village, the visitors in Bhir, and the merchants would see a delightful buf- foonery. There would be fiddles and comedy-men and—the devout Muhammadans said it under their-breath—a beautiful katchani, a dancing-girl. All this would be for the pleasure of Mal- colm sakib. So said the servants of the vil- lage chief. Yet he sent no word to Malcolm. Above all he was insistent that none of his friends should carry weapons, except per- haps knives that could not be seen. Whereupon the men of Bhir began to gather in the bazaar and with them were the visitor traders, many of them acquaint- ances, it seemed, of Hossein, for they spoke with him in the alleys and nodded under- standingly. Another order of the chief was that none of their women should accompany them. This, in a Moslem community, was deemed quite fitting. When the slaves and the mer- chants of Bhir were in motion toward the castle Hossein vanished from the cavalcade. COmiclbook C©