Adventure Magazine Cover — page 41: what you’re looking at

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

Buried Gods He turned with interest, clutched his wrist, and then began feeling the remnants of his pants where his pockets had been. “YT wonder what I’ve done with it?” He twiddled meditatively with his long white beard. “By gad,” he remarked, “rather:nice of you to turn up.” He laughed—sanely. “Although rough luck, I must say. Haven’t any scissors, have you? My hair seems ,rather long, what? And my beard 2 Pulling the ragged ends, he glanced down, and started violently. “My , it’s white Dorsay did not reply. “Ts that true?” he demanded. {|———?”’ “No. It’s true—and your hair.”’ “And it used to be black!’’ His eyes filled with tears. Dorsay looked away. Constable rose to his feet, and be- gan examining his clothes. ““Good ! Good——! Iremember,”’ he muttered. “I tore up bits of my shirt and threw them over the crater in a piece of calabash. Oh my , how long was that ago!” “Ves, I know,” responded Dorsay. “I found one. That’s what brought me here.” “Brought you here? What, to rescue me? That was sporting!’ He smiled and held out his hand. 1)? “Or am “Thanks, Mr. — er fe “Beffert.”’ “Mr. Beffert. But where? How?” “T found it on a native as a charm, and then I came along with a doctor friend of mine, Macnamara 2 “Mac! What! Mac?” “Ves; do you know him?” “Where is he?” “T wish I knew.” Oblivious, in this excitement, of the wel- tering corpse of him who had been the un- conscious cause of restoring Constable’s reason, they talked on for some half an hour or more. Constable, it appeared, had come down from the Sudan, and among the Turkana had been trapped as Dorsay and Dorkin had been. When he had arrived there had been an- other white, a Scotchman, McCullough, a dour soul, said Constable, who would never talk and had one day disappeared. Con- stable had never known whether he had 39 died or had escaped. Dorsay thought of the skeleton he had stumbled upon in the cave. % could do no more. In the society of this man who had en- dured so much until his brain had given way, Dorsay’s desire to live, and courage to think, revived. He would watch Con- stable sometimes with a kind of awe, recol- lecting the giggling “thing” which had cringed and cowered for protection. The more he saw of Constable the better he realized how the man had withstood two or three years of solitary confinement in such environment; for as an experienced hunter and exploror he had a fund of mental life and a courage that nothing appeared to be able to daunt. Days melted into each other Constable so drew Dorsay’s attention from the con- crete present by stories of exploration and a philosophic presentation of life, founded on his experiences in many lands, that he almost forgot their sorry plight and began to draw, as many a prisoner has done before, a queer pleasure from the effortless life of a caged animal, relieved of the daily struggle for existence. At length, while pacing in the dark of a moonless night, there came to them a sound that quickened the action of their hearts, yet which was stoppered by a clutching fear of illusion. “Did you hear that?” whispered Con- stable as the two stood stockstill in the well of their prison, staring incredulously at the perforated disk of the sky. “Beff-ert! Are you there?” came a familiar voice from above before Dorsay could reply. “Ves, yes! Oh, my ——!” shouted Dor- say, hoarsely, almost stifled with emotion and clutching at Constable’s arm. “Is that you, doctor?” “Sssh!”? came back warningly, and the faint outline of an arm waved broke the rim of the crater against the frosty stars. “Are you all right?” “Yes, thank God. But ‘ “Alone?” “No, no. There’s a friend of yours here. Geoffrey Constable——” What!’ THEY buried the remains of Dor- kin, or rather carried them as far COMMICGLOOOKS into the cave as they could. They — (E@)