Adventure Magazine Cover — page 91: what you’re looking at

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

gO her. He would not have believed me. He was not in much of a conversational mood after Zoronna’s message. But I was. I talked to him of Madame Kraschenin, and for something more than the purpose of making talk. I had a suspicion that had been growing ever since I finally identified Zoronna’s elusive resemblance to some one I had met and known before. I mentioned Madame Kraschenin’s slightly Asiatic cast of eyes, her raven-hued hair, her singularly magnetic personality. I even drew on my imagination a bit and spoke of her eyes as inclined to be yellowish, but he did not see the significance; or rather did not at all associate her with the only other person, so far as I knew, that he had ever seen with eyes of the kind. I asked Lord Bob if he was inclined to observe Zoronna’s instructions about not letting me out of his sight; but of course he was not; and besides he had some matters of his own that needed attention—chiefly, I surmised, a little talk with Sin Chang that would relate to certain notations made in the handwriting of one Remy Cantello. “Do you mind,” he asked, “if I let Sin Chang know yow’re ’bove ground? And about Hurgy?” I know two things of Chinamen, having been more or less thrown in contact with them from rather youthful days. They are the most unswerving and indestructible friends it is possible for a man to have. That is one thing I know of them. And the other is that they are the implacable and unrelenting enemies, the most treacher- ous of foes, that a man can have. And—though perhaps this is really a third thing—it is often utterly impossible to tell by their bearing and attitude whether they are friend or foe. So far as I knew, Sin Chang and I had never met, our affairs never mingled; in which case, I being, so to speak, a neutral, he would not hesitate the tenth of a second to make any unscrupulous use of me in a bargain with Hurgronje. Chinamen have friends, which include tong brothers and relatives, and they have enemies; and all the rest of the world is of no importance, except to be used as occasion offers. So I answered in such away that Lord Bob concluded that I did not care to have him intimate to anybody that I was not tucked away in a Pittsburg graveyard; which, I realized, was a very inadequate Adventure precaution after he had let the truth slip into the very pretty ear of Miss Symondi: Sorceress. NAPOLEON was an eminent psy- ( @) chologist. He won most of his ) battles before a shot was fired by the extremely safe and cautious maneuver of doing the unexpected. I have often re- flected on what a great, what an extremely great, gamester was lost when he gave up his Bohemian life for the thunder and rattle of monarch-unmaking. ! So I made a typically Napoleonic move, combining a slight risk with a sensational advantage, when I dismissed the taxicab before the Bayview apartments, entered with an air of assurance, took the elevator to the third floor, stepped from it and tried the nearest door, which interfered slightly in my plan by being locked. This obstacle was almost at once removed by a rather surprized French maid who no doubt won- dered what tradesman’s boy had mistaken the apartment’s rear‘entrance. By gestures and mysterious whispers I somewhat detracted her attention from suspicion and gave the appearance of having some secret and confidential business, until I had got inside and closed the door, where- upon the poor maid no doubt thought she was being garroted. Though so far as I recall it has been no more than three or four times that I have ever struck anybody a mere blow, I have taken care not only to keep in good health but to be continually in what athletes call training; and one needs to be both skilful and strong to overpower a woman without putting her unconscious, at the same time suppressing her inevitable yells. It is generally taken for granted by people who know little about such things that the presence of a gun will silence any person; and while this is so true that a “Shh-hh” and leveled revolver may be trusted to keep any man quiet it is likely to have the opposite effect on most women, since a congenital urge to scream when surprized is nearly irrepressible; and this is particularly true of maids, servants, the less educated and more natural women. This dainty little French girl did not yell, for my fingers closed tightly on her throat. I tripped her so that she lost her balance, then drew her stumblingly against my left shoulder, and with my left hand GOmMiIGdooks.co