Adventure Magazine Cover — page 43: what you’re looking at

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42 with birds and small beasts, insects and slithering reptiles. Yet there was a vague suggestion ever present of lurking bodies and peering eyes, in no way connected with the swinging monkeys; and as Saunders strode forward he held himself alert, using every precaution against surprize without showing outwardly that he felt uneasy. It was with something of a shock that he presently emerged from the forest and came upon a closely huddled village enclosed within a wattle-and-daub wall. As he paused for a moment in search of the en- trance, he could have sworn that several figures hurried past him some distance away, ‘out of the jungle, and disappeared through the wall. But when he approached, and pushed in through a wicket door which he found open, he experienced no opposition; he saw a few natives, women and children as well as men, and as he neared the center of: the huddled huts and came up beside a large, pretentious bungalow with glass windows he was mildly surprized to see several men who might have been white once. Of all breeds they seemed, and all bore the stamp of rascality, but white undoubtedly, except for the color- ing of sun and weather. “HERE, you whiskers,” he hailed, ‘take me to old Sadrash, will you?” ’ The man accosted turned slowly and flung an insolent glance at Saunders. “The sultan is asleep,” he retorted, and promptly turned away again. . That was not Saunders’ idea of getting business done. He overtook the fellow in half a dozen long strides, and swung him around as easily as he would turn a wheel. “Listen, buddy, you wake him up. I’ve come all the way to Lifou to talk trade with his nibs, and my time’s as precious as his.” “We know all about you,” the man re- turned. “It’s part of our business to get to know things in advance. And it ain’t healthy to go waking the sultan out of his after-dinner nap, old codger. “Tf you want to see him today you wait until he sends for you. He'll know you’re here the minute he wakes. You might as well go back to your schooner, though, for he won’t talk trade with you until he gets ‘his report from the officers he’s sent down to inspect your outfit.” Though expecting something of the kind, Adventure © Saunders felt a trifle uneasy at the sugges- tion of native or half-breed officials making free of his little ship in his absence. Tod Carter was sound and safe, but he lacked ‘that saving sense of humor possessed by Saunders, which would enable him to en- dure patiently the petty insolence of in- truding visitors. He might easily make a break which would ruin all chance of suc- cessful trading, especially if the visiting officials were of the same type as this be- whiskered, hybrid ruffian who treated the skipper so offhandedly. ‘So that’s the game, is it?” he retorted “All right, my ugly friend; Ill take a look at those officials first, to be sure they’re honest, then I'll come back with them and inter- view the old chap.” The man laughed harshly, placing himself before the skipper as he turned to retrace his track. “Not so fast, old-timer,” he said, and swung his belt around so that a heavy hol- ster came near to hand. “Orders is to hold you here. P’raps you won’t have to go back to the ship at all; see? Sadrash de- cides them things for himself. If he wants anything you’ve got, he’ll take it. P’raps he'll feel good and give ye some coconuts or somethin’ for what he takes, and p raps “Perhaps not,” the skipper broke in with one of his sunniest smiles. Like a streak of light he pounced upon the man, flung him aside from the path into the jungle and snatched his revolver from the heavy holster. “Now stand up,” he snapped. “I don’t do business the way you say. You plod on ahead of me, and feel this.” He jabbed the pistol-muzzle into the man’s back. “You know best whether it’s loaded. It’s your own. Somarch. Hold me here, hey? Not an army like you.” They started forward, and Saunders forced his unwilling guide to keep aside from the trail. He also forced him to hail a couple of curious women who peered after them, telling them that all was well. And as he trod in the guide’s steps the thought of Tod Carter’s outspoken distrust of Parchelly recurred to him sharply. For the first time he really believed that he had made one of his rare mistakes in the little Timor man. He felt sore to madness, for his mistakes in human nature, as his failures GComicbooks.co