Adventure, January 20, 1922 — page 69: what you’re looking at

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

Tides of Hate sneer; but neither he nor any man offered to fight for leadership, and Davies there and then told off the men he had selected to remain as garrison of the town. “Take care ye let no man or woman leave town,” he ordered. “I march for the lake by way of Rivas at high noon. The ships should come up before that hour, but we march anyhow. Steve Carr, I make ye commandant of the town. See to it “Blast me if I stay then!’ shouted Carr, dashing his broad hat madly upon the ground. “Did I sail wi’. ye to be left out o’ the sport at last?” “T. make ve commandant, ”” repeated Davies coolly, meeting Steve's wild eye steadily. “I ha’ need for a stout man Ss: guts in the rear. The town’s our refuge if everything else goes gallusways. As for how far ye sailed, me, but ye were picked out o’ the sea like a ruddy castaway, Steve, and ought to be thankful ye gained station wi’ me, who were Cook’s right-hand man. See to thy men, and come to me be- fore we set out. I'll give ye last orders.” Davies and Nell Clark took. the shore path, and reached the high: bluff south of the fort. The sea lay speckless and level, ruffled almost imperceptibly by a crooning breeze that should have brought the ships up hours before if all were well. “Tis a scurvy crew ye have, Ed,” re- marked Nell. ‘Ye are not sure the dogs ye left wi’ the ships are honest. Here’s Swan and Cook ready to kill each other, the Frenchman grinnin’ as if he had some woundy foul play up ’s sleeve, and Steve Carr é “Let Steve be, Nell,” smiled Davies. “The dog’s one o’ the few I.can trust. Goliath, and Steve, and you, and some 0’ my own lads o’ the Cadiz are stout o’ guts and loyal to me. Ha’ no fear I shall forget when the reckonin’s cast up. Id leave ye behind wi’ Steve, Nell, but I believe th’ fellow’s in love wi’ ye and might forget’s duty.” ‘Steve Carr?” cried Nell, and as her wide eyes met his level ones she colored deeply. “I tell ye, Ed Davies, but one man of all I ever knew is man enough to make ad woman 0’ me, and ’tis not Steve Carr.” “Well; well, comrade, let it be then. But the ships ha’ got me worried, I confess to ye, girl. Come back to camp, and get ready for the march. ’Twill be a hard road for ye, Nell, and I wish 67 “°Twill be no harder for me than for you,” she replied spiritedly. “But hard or not, if ye dream o’ ordering me to stay, wake up! I’m wi’ ye to the end o’ the venture, since I begum it along wi’ you.” eS influences in the last stages of his -S quest, there was a splendid loyalty and resolution in Nell Clark which made him heartily wish for a hundred more of her kind. Then he would have brought to issue at once the chafing bitterness that existed between the nominal leaders of the expedition. As it was, he needed every man available, and already the reduced crews for the ships and the town garrison had brought his force down one half. “So ye shall,” he told her with a bright smile. “And I elect ye my own bodyguard against treachery in our own ranks. Now get ye Goliath to help ye collect necessities for the march. He can carry half yer share as well’s his own. He’s an ox for strength.” Davies strode away to speak to Steve Carr concerning the bestowal of the loot taken from the town. As he turned out of the square he heard Nell’s voice raised shrilly behind him, and then a long-drawn shriek of mortal agony that turned him about and sent him running up the narrow street where Nell had gone. In a wide garden, before a house of some pretension, he came upon L’Escuyler with two of his men, and some other things. As he appeared he saw Nell snatch out her pistol and fire point blank at one of the Frenchmen. The man fell with his face blown away, and his fellow leaped at Nell with his cutlas raised. Davies got his own steel interposed when Nell’s life seemed to be forfeit, and the man sagged to the earth like a burst sack of corn. And L’Escuyler stood staring in frank, open-eyed amaze- ment. In front of him an Indian lay face down- ward in a cactus, bound hand and foot, with a check-rein arrangement from his neck to his heels that kept his chin up and his face turned full upon an Indian woman tied to a tree before his eyes. Great stones lay upon the tortured man’s hollowed back; blood trickled through the fleshy, spiked leaves of the cactus. To each of the woman’s earrings a sea- man’s boot had been hung, and the boots were filled with stones; the ear lobes were LITTLE as he desired any feminine COmiclbooks (C@