Adventure Magazine Cover, October 1911 — page 175: what you’re looking at

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

The Woman With the Wolves “‘ Mr. Charles’ cough is bad to-day,” said Gregg, reaching for my bag. ‘‘It’s the frost nips his chest.” I believe I heard a resentful mutter of ‘‘Cigarettes” as the huge old man turned, handling the big bag as though it were no more than a fan. Under the flickering oil lamps of the wayside station I fancied Gregeg’s face-looked hard and a little anxious. We climbed into the little slipper-shaped car. “T’ve got to get a few things in the village,” said Gregg, as we dropped like a toboggan down the hill that leads sharply from the station. ‘‘Owbridge’s lung tonic, cigarette-papers, ink, and salt butter,” I heard him say to himself as we pulled up at the narrow-windowed, lamp-flickering gen- eral shop of the village. Gregg never writes down a message or list _of requirements—and never forgets them. But he forgets nothing—and, I sincerely believe, knows everything—worth knowing. Just as he can do everything—worth doing. Old Gregg is about the only man-servant of my acquaintance that I find myself able to like and respect at the same time. A man with a piece of bacon under his arm came out of the shop as we slid to a standstill. He was talking over his shoulder and paused a second on the threshold. ‘Heard tell of bloodhounds comin’ over from Sal’sb’ry Plain to-morra,” he said to some one inside the shop. Old Gregg suddenly stiffened, half-turning his head to catch the reply. His face looked white and worried in the wavy, uncertain lamplight. ‘“‘ Ah, be ’em, now,”’ droned some one from behind the piled counter. ‘Take a main host of bloodhounds to find Major Stark, I’d reckon. Nivver heard much good of they things.” The man with the bacon guffawed, came noisily out of the shop, and swung off down the windy street. ‘Only keep you a minute, sir,” said old Gregg, and passed in under the jangling doorbell. ‘“‘Good evenin’, Must’ Gregg,” drawl of the shopkeeper.again. ‘Main cold out to th’ Forest, I reckon.” Gregg nodded and spoke quietly. ‘“‘And so you’m havin’ the bloodhounds out your way to-morra,—they tell me,” continued the other garrulously, reaching about his shelves. ‘Not that they’ll do a came the. L121 lot of good. Reckon the Major knows the forest too well to lose his way out there— sober.” The shopkeeper—a little, bald, beady- eyed wisp of a man—shot a look of rustic cunning at tall hard-bitten old Gregg. “We folk—butcher, baker, tinker and tailor—’ud do as:svell as bloodhounds to find ’im, I’d reckon, Mr. Gregg, and good cause most of ’em got.” He leaned forward across his counter. ‘‘I’ve heard tell the Major owes a matter of three to four hun- dred pound in the village alone. Now he’s gone. Take a main of bloodhounds to find he, Mr. Gregg.” The shopkeeper cackled cunningly as he passed over Gregg’s change. I took it that a resident in the district was missing—some, apparently, believing that it was a case for bloodhounds, others that it was a case for creditors. I asked Gregg, as the little car began her climb up to the Forest level. “IT’S a Major John Stark, sir,”’ said ) yi Gregg, staring straight in front of him. ago. oan horse was found on the road near Stony Cross Hotel—without a rider. They think he intended riding out to No-Man’s Court. He was the owner. It is let now to a Russian lady—a Princess, I think. From what she has told the police, it looks as though Major Stark never reached the house that day. He had been there before, but not that day—she said.” Old Gregg turned, and I had an instinct that he had given a little, tight-lipped smile. “It’s a mystery, sir. Mr. Charles will know more about it than I do.” We had topped the long hill and the little car set her droning nose to the Forest. It was bitterly cold and now we seemed to be traveling along an illimitable white road flung across unfathomable canyons of darkness. I sank down among the heavy furs Tor- rance had sent for me—although he is a dreamer, Torrance can be very practical— and listened to the strident wind. Our lights ate into the darkness like a white-hot graving-tool eating into soft black stuff; twice I saw little shadowy dark things flicker across the road—rabbits, I supposed they were; occasionally I caught, or im- - agined I caught, the smell of the busy motor in front, hot and oily; and once we passed a wee spot of light with a shadow behind it— a belated cyclist hurrying out from the deso- Comicbook “He disappeared a few days’ C©