Adventure Magazine Cover, April 1916 — page 28: what you’re looking at

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

26 “So that’s it!’ cried d’Ogeron, the im- petuous lover getting the better of the pru- dent Governor. ‘Off with you, fellow, and let me not see your hideous face again!”’ He offered Nancy his arm and escorted her across the open space between the store- houses and the rough huts which composed the settlement. The day had run its course, and the tropic night which drops so quickly when the sun goes down was all about them with its ' blackness, shot here and there by murky glares where bonfires blazed on the beach, and by the flickering light of torches. The rough cattle-hunters, who played as strenu- ously as they worked at their trade in the forests, were still making the island re- sound with their song and laughter. Now and then they were obliged to step over the recumbent forms of men who had stretched themselves upon the ground to rest from their mad pleasures, or else be- cause of the wine and brandy which had been drunk in such vast quantities that day. It is doubtful if ever an equal number of men and women in all the world had ever consumed so much in the same space of time. Nancy, looking about as she walked along, saw neither Cherie nor Bras-de- Mort. She hoped that they had withdrawn from the scene of these orgies, for she had come to feel for the little Parisienne a deep sympathy, and wished that she would be happy with her husband, so strangely found in the New World. Most of the other wo- men were keeping up the festivities as eag- erly as their companions, nor were they the less backward at the wine-casks. At the foot of the cliff, where a well-worn path led upward through the trees, the Gov- ernor, in his hand a torch he had taken from the crotch of a cedar, went ahead, and, bid- ding her follow, began the ascent, not with- out many gasps and sighs, for he was a portly fellow with a big paunch and short legs, and the way was steep. Never a word they said as they toiled upward. After pursuing the path for some little distance, they came to rough steps hewn in the rock, and climbing these for about half the height of the promontory, d’Ogeron came to a halt upon a little platform, puffing from his exertions. “From here we climb,” he announced briefly, holding the torch aloft, and Nancy saw the rungs of an iron ladder leading up- Adventure ward through the trees and heavy under- growth which clung to the sides of the cliff. “Very good, Monsieur,” she answered him; and so they started once more, hand over hand, foot over foot, until at last they came out into a little clearing where the trees had been hacked away. The girl, straining her eyes to take in every detail, noted closely the position of the rude fort, or castle as the Governor called it, perched upon the mountainside, its gray walls of stone and heavy timbers bathed in a flood of moonlight. In the har- bor below them she saw the ghostly out- lines of the ship, swinging at her cables, every mast and spar outlined in the soft, silvery radiance. One part of the fort she observed—all this while the Governor struggled to regain his breath—was on a lower level than the rest, being flush with the precipice, which dropped off abruptly at its foundations; for this reason, and because there were no win- dows in it that she could see, she concluded that in this part was located the pit that Barney had spoken of, by which she sup- posed he had meant a dungeon. Through portholes showed the muzzles of two can- non, commanding the harbor. D’Ogeron beckoned to her, and, still in silence, for he needed his breath for other purposes, marched with a great show of dignity to the heavy oaken door of the place, and pounding upon it with the hilt of his sword, motioned her in when it had swung open. A black man with a torch stood in the gloomy aperture. He fastened the door be- hind them by dropping a heavy bar into place through iron hooks on either side of the frame, and then showed the way down a long stone - flagged passageway, and, through another door, which opened off at one side, into a large chamber with a ceil- ing of hewn beams in the French style, pan- els of the same wood, and a stone floor cov- ered with sand and rushes. In the center was a table laid with covers for three, and at the place at the side sat the round-faced monk, the leg of a roasted fowl in one hand and a goblet of wine in the other. Beside his chair in a deferential attitude stood a little chap in a dirty smock, with a platter of meat in his hands from which he was preparing to serve the guest, who was clam- oring loudly for food. At the fireplace on the other side of the room a young pig was CoOMmichoooks (CO