Adventure, January 20, 1922 — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

Tides of Hate Cook was plainly impressed by the plausi- ble tale; yet he hesitated to believe all this about Nell Clark. -The woman was a fellow pirate to him, and no more; she was no more than that to any man, so far as any man dared say; but she had always showed fearless courage coupled with true-steel loyalty, and such traits were ever a bond of affection between brave men, whether with- in the law or without it. The pirate cap- tain ran his eye over the hangdog throng, and singled out a youngster who hung in the rear. “Speak, you smooth-faced dog!” he gritted, with his blade lifted high in air above the lad’s head. “Is this tale true, or does Dogget lie to save his scurvy neck?” 3 The lad trembled, but was silent. The blade trembled, but still remained poised. Back of the crowd a disturbance began, and men glanced fearfully at some appari- tion approaching. Then out before John Cook stepped Nell Clark, dressed in sea- going man’s attire, belted and booted, the pirate to her finger-tips; and with her strode the Schoolmaster, dressed as he was before, but wearing an expression on his handsome face which was a revelation to his late tormentors. 5 “Doggett lies!” cried Nell. ‘“Am I blown up, or burned alive?” “Doggett surely lies, captain,” laughed the Schoolmaster, gazing steadily into Cook’s amazed face. “I am neither dead, nor resurrected, nor @ robber of another man’s dove-cote.”’ He and Nell swiftly stepped beside Cook, and together they faced the sea of upturned faces upon which sat amazement, awe, dis- belief, and terror. “Qh, the liar! There’s blood on _ th’ moon!’ squawked the parrot with vast ruffling of wings and a side-cocked eye. @ own sword-calloused palm startled Nell out of her momentary intensity of attention. She turned, saw the shrouded figure of the girl captive, and in a moment the dormant woman within her put words of comfort into her mouth, and delayed the fierce resentment that jealousy brought to her later. “Seize him! | V A SOFT little hand slipping into her Iron the whelp till I can 13 flake him!” snarled Cook, flinging an arm toward Doggett. Men closed about the trembling Doggett, in haste to please their angry captain even to turning upon their shipmate whom they had been’so ready to follow blindly a mo- ment before. “Seize Rando, too!” Nell Clark cried spitefully, mindful of the man’s part in starting the trouble. Doggett and Rando leaped to sudden life in face of the menace of what they knew well from experience must prove to be nothing less than their end, and an agonizing one. Like beasts preparing to leap they crouched before their advancing ship- mates, then sprang into the thick of the mob. “Ye'll take me dead then!” screamed Rando, his cutlas swinging. “Follow me, Doggett! We'll cheat the dogs!” There was a whirling clash of biting steel, the staggering impact of furious men, and the two culprits burst through and into the thicket under the palms, with a howling pack at their heels. John Cook laughed grimly. Then he blew three blasts on his deck whistle, re- calling the mén. “Let be, men; let be! Aves is but small. They won’t swim away. Get busy, you lousy tipplers, and save what ye can from the wreck. Cast sand on the fire. “Vou—” he turned savagely upon the Schoolmaster— ‘“T’ll attend to presently. For now, show me how much of a man ye are. ‘Take men and pull down the huts next to the farther edge of the fire, that we lose not all. “Away with you, Nell, and take this shivering wench with you. And see that you lodge her snugly. If aught happens to her that should not, I’ll have that to say to you that’ll shiver ye out o’ yer man’s boots and make ye wish ye’d remained a woman as ye were made.” Through the remainder of the lurid night the pirates sweated and cursed at their hot, heavy labor. Two hours after Cook landed the schooner dropped anchor off the beach, and the rest of the pirates leaped ashore and joined in the work of salvage; and at dawn the settlement lay like a leprous ulcer—a ring of white huts about a blackened spot, in the heart of which red embers still glowed angrily but harmlessly. OO CONMUC S The captain inspected the ruins wath a ° (C@