Adventure Magazine Cover — page 127: what you’re looking at

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

Burning Sumac Political places, then as now, were none too secure, and a man who was respected, liked and feared by all tribes from Seminole to Achusi, and at the same time was trusted by his own fellows who knew him, was altogether too formidable a possibility for the jobs of men like Forest, Dakin and Ven S y ¢ TOMB igges. Rh, x“ > Fr mumms TONICAS ersten; af \ TENS wst ~ *, Coast | CHuocraws (3; ss | pot MEXICO ADAPTED FROM GATSCHET’S MAP Smith, in whose hands rested the peace and prosperity of the border. In the face of their intolerance and ridicule—the safest weapons they could adopt against him— he kept to himself, and provided for his brothers and sisters by guiding wagon- trains and trading with the Indians. The barracks of the fort, and all the sur- rounding cabins were dark. Not knowing Forest’s whereabouts, Orcutt aroused first General Thomas S$. Woodward and Major Beasley, who kept bachelor quarters to- gether. To these he told his story; and the major dispatched a servant to awaken the agent. Forest, half-dressed and surly, answered the summons. When he found that he had been roused at the behest of Orcutt he was furious. _ Woodward kept him from stamping away. ' Forest was a big man, reddish of cheek even at this hour of the night, and in addition he was only nominally under the authority of ee while he remained at Fort Mims. Still, he aiabead with a bad grace, and listened while Orcutt repeated coldly his warning concerning the coming of Tecum- seh, and the great need for a white speaker at Tookabatcha. Orcutt, broad of shoulder Only a sharp command from . ae ee het Oe, 3 OT omrae et sare ee, Se {2I and jaw, but lacking five inches of .Forest’s six feet three, felt an impulse next to irre- sistible to knock some panic or other honest emotion into that heavy-jowled, sneering face. With an effort he controlled himself, feeling that no matter what Forest might be, the fate of hundreds of pioneers lay in his hands Forest brushed aside the warning almost ; savagely. “Nonsense!” he cried. “I have been lis- tening to these fairy tales long enough in the daytime, to say nothing of waking me from slumber to hear the wildest of them alll Tecumseh is here, you say? Ha! Ha! And you have seen him? Let me smell the rum on your breath, my good fellow.” He motioned as if to sniff at Orcutt. The woodsman’s cheeks paled, yet he held to his inflexible determination. “After your work at Tookabatcha is finished, Forest,” he announced quietly, “I shall take great pleasure in hunting you out and killing you! These gentlemen wit- ness my challenge. “And now,” he went on abruptly, as Forest, purpling as if in apoplexy, seemed about to hurl himself forward, “we have more lives than our own to consider. Know- ing that you, Forest, would disbelieve any statement I made—in spite of the fact that I am known as a man of truth if nothing else—I have brought evidence you dare not disbelieve!” He flung down on the table before Wood- ward and Beasley the hammered gold bracelet of Weatherford. “Lamochattee’s!”’ “The Red Eagle’s!” The two soldiers voiced together Wea- therford’s Creek name and its translation. Forest was silent, yet a deepening furrow between his beady eyes showed that he was less uncertain of the woodsman’s veracity. “Weatherford tried to warn me. He does not wish Tecumseh to succeed. He sent this bracelet by me to prove to Mr. Forest that I told the truth. At the present. mo- ment we have Weatherford and Push- ~ matah, the two chieftains, with us. Given an able man—” and he glanced coldly but speculatingly at Forest—“to speak for the whites, and Tecumseh will find the nostrils of the Creeks more hungry for tobacco than for acrid fumes of sumac. He and his twenty-five warriors will return north dis- appointed.” | Eomichook com