Adventure Magazine Cover — page 94: what you’re looking at

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

sorcery and Everhard 93 But among them [I found one that I seized upon and held up with a disturbing sense of incredulity; a group photograph it was, old and old-fashioned and foreign, of what appeared to be a family in curious, outlandish costumes—a family of four people; the father, the mother, a girl of about ten or twelve and another girl of about three. If either of the children was: Zoronna I could not have known it from the resem- blance, though I suspected it. It was upon the mother that I looked, and as I stared her face seemed to detach herself from the pasteboard and swim in a kind of mist, much like the image one sees in a crystal— ~ or like the image one is said to see. I never had any luck in that sort of thing though I have had the curiosity to try it. I blinked a time or two and the face was again a part of the family group. I slipped the photograph into my pocket and read- justed the trunk. All the searching that I cared to do was over. Though I might not possibly myself be able to reach Hur- gronje, I carried his death-warrant in my pocket. aia THEN I went into the pantry to e. ,* make sure that my prisoners were all right. The little French girl had loosened a hand, and when she saw that I would discover it she slapped my face— slap, smack, crack! | “Little Miss Tiger,” I told her, “‘you are so young that I overlook your indiscretion — but it must not happen again.” She had spirit, that young lady. And somehow or other, during those days from the Summer of ’14 on, when all the world was wondering anxiously whether France could hold or would break, I got an incom- municable sense of security and confidence out of the remembrance of that pretty, fragile little French maid whose spirit was unbreakable, whose temper uncompromis- ing, and who had no more fear in her than an archangel. The other woman had fainted, and came to under a splash of a glassful of water with terror staring from beneath her eyelids. A very absurd and tasteless simile, I suppose, to compare a gagged and bound little servant girl with a magnificent, anguished ' nation that raised a wall three hundred miles long of living breasts; but a race has no more spirit and courage than its women, and it is very significant that a warrior maid is the patron saint of France. I went into the front room where Zoronna had entertained me the previous night, sat in a chair near the thick yellow curtains, and waited. The screen had been re- moved or I might have taken a seat behind it, but the curtains would be screen enough, and though they did not quite touch the floor I realized that the background of carved low paneling would make my black shoes inconspicuous, particularly when a chair was also in front of them. I wanted no more of a hiding-place than would protect me until Zoronna was well into the room. I was not afraid of her screaming unexpectedly, for she had had training enough to respect a gun—and it is a curious thing that the people who are themselves most dangerous and lawless most readily respect the other person’s threatening weapon. Watch and wait is one of the things I do well, do nearly as well as the distinguished personage who made the phrase, and the example, of “watchful waiting” famous. Hours slipped by, but I did not move, ex- cept to go in once and retie Mlle. Guyot’s small feet, since she had partially kicked them loose and was trying to make a great racket with her stocking feet—I had re- - moved the Cinderella-like slippers—in the expectation of attracting help. At that time I asked whether she would keep quiet if I removed the gag and eased her bindings to let her rest a little; but she shook her head vigorously. She was above | both lying and compromise. The other woman had fainted again. I readjusted the pillows I had placed un- der their heads, drew down the blind ofa window through which the afternoon sun was streaming, asked them to pardon my seeming cruelty, for which their mistress was really to blame by her delayed ap- pearance; and I withdrew. The telephone rang. three or four times, and I was tempted to take the receiver from the hook, but knew that the connection had been made through a switchboard in the lobby and was afraid that I might arouse the suspicion of the girl there; for if there is one thing more certain than another it is that switchboard girls in apartment-houses do a lot of listening. As I experiment with almost everything that occurs to me, I had practised a little at imitating the feminine COPMNIE OOKSsCO