Adventure, December 1914 — page 72: what you’re looking at

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

{O to share the news! Nobody, then, to warn the Russians! For the hundredth time his trick of keeping silent had served him well! For the dozenth time Usbeg Ali Khan, who would have scoffed at the suggestion, would wonder at the subsequent event! Men who would have almost surely feared to venture had he hinted at his aim, would thunder in his wake at dawn, and trust him well enough to follow later, on the stagger- ing, amazing trail he meant to tackle Hex. “Only Russia—of all the nations in the world—could have made such a dismal mess of things!’ he told himself. ‘TI sup- pose only Russia could afford it!’ he added as an afterthought. | AT DAWN, when the drifting \AG grayish mists were rising to pro- : claim the hour of prayer, he found Usbeg Ali Khan—adventurer, idealist, and true-believer—rising from a prayer-mat, facing Mecca. “Look!” said Dick, pointing through a rift in the mist to the plain below. “At what, bahadur?”’ ‘“Look!”’ Something moved, slowly, like a darker bank of mist amid the rest—half a thousand feet below, and ten miles distant—noiseless apparently; and yet there was a hint of something that suggested thunder. ‘“Allaht”’ said the Afghan. ‘See eur?” “By the blood of Allah’s prophet!”’ said the Afghan, “‘Guns!”’ ‘‘And we need artillery!” said Dick. “Bahadur iw “IT guessed it, Usbeg Ali—wasn’t sure. Now, hurry! Get word around among the men to make no noise—not a sound! I’m going down to warn the outposts to make sure no traitor gets away to warn the Rus- sians. Look! They’ve been traveling since midnight—they’re halting for breakfast!” “Bahadur,” said Usbeg Ali, ‘‘Ajlah fights on the right side—always! It was Allah made me Jove artillery!” “In a few hours we will have guns!” answered Dick. {I NEVER, probably, since in the dawn of ages Asia first began to ‘ writhe under the hates and loves, the devilish desires and passion-bred wars of Adventure individuals, had the hot plains outside Astrabad seen fury such as rent the Princess Olga Karageorgovich while Dick’s little army wound its way toward the hills. The Cossacks—peppered into a retreat by Andry’s machine-gun—routed by Dick’s charge—volleyed at until they dared not turn to look at what did, or did not pursue them—raced by her beyond control or prospect of it. ““Cowards!” she screamed. ‘‘Curs!” Spurring in among them, spitting scorn and screeching terrible, unfeminine abuse, she galloped to the low hill Dick had pointed out to her but twenty minutes gone, and toward which the men were now stampe- ding. Her horse was made frantic by the passion that exuded from her as lightning flickers from the storm-clouds. She was feeling still the pressure of Dick’s iron arm around her waist. It seemed to burn like a red-hot band. While he had held her on his horse she loved him—god of lost women, how she loved him! When he set her on another horse, and rode away, her hot she-tiger love turned into hate at last, and her teeth chattered at the thought of how she had risked authority, liberty, life itself for him. She did not stop to remember that Dick had never sought her help, or accepted even her acquaintance without protest. It was nothing to her, had no bearing on the case, that she had interfered with him, tricked him, ruined him, and thrust herself on him uninvited. She only hated him, and vowed that she would teach that proud Scots gentleman the difference between help from her and _ hindrance—between her friendship and her enmity—between her love that he had scorned and the full flood of her hate that he had brought down on himself. She looked around her, wild but yet un- blinded by her rage, and took in the situ- ation with a swift understanding that would have done credit to a war-scarred veteran. She saw a Cossack officer, half-way up the rising ground, doing his level best to rally the fleeing men. She rode to him—bumped her horse into him. He had a knout in his hand, as many Russian officers still do have, whatever printed regulations and the cen- sored news may say. “Give it to me!”’ she demanded; and he hesitated. So she leaned out of the saddle and MICLOOOK C@