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

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

88 mah ditty-box, belongin’ to you. It’s in on mah cot. Go get it.” With which Dixie set out up the street toward Germ Junction. “What photo?” Snoots shouted after him. “It’s in on mah cot,” Dixie flung back without stopping. “Go get it. I don’t want the dawg-gawn thing.” Puzzled, Snoots turned to me. ‘What the ? I gave him a picture o’ my sister one time. Wonder if that’s what he means.” ““Go ahead over and see,” I said. “Don’t expect me to cipher out the workings of that bird’s nut.” Snoots crossed the street and entered the enemy’s camp. He wasn’t in that tent longer than five seconds. When he returned I noted that he held a small photograph. “It’s my sister’s picture,” he said, hold- ing it out to me. “I gave it to him a long time ago. But what’s the idear? He gits it in his nut all of a sudden that he don’t want my sister’s picture, an’ comes out of his tent yellin’ fer me to come an’ git it.” “Wait a minute,” I cut in. ‘“There’s a hen on somewhere. Are the other two in that tent?” “Gillen an’ Johnson? Sure. Both layin’ on their cots, snoring’.” “Yeah?” I pointed across the street. “Then they snapped out of it pretty sud- den.” Gillen and Johnson had just emerged from their tent and were starting in the di- rection of Germ Junction. if i FIVE minutes later Doc Waldo, Hal trailing Gillen, Johnson and Dixie, = came down Lily White Street and turned in at our tent. Snoots and I stood to one side as the procession filed in. Doc halted before Snoots, looking him straight in the eyes, as if trying to read what lay behind them. Snootful returned his gaze without the quiver of an eyelid. The rest stood about promiscuously. Dixie’s face was as unreadable as stone. Johnson fidgeted on his feet, his eyes wandering restlessly about. Gillen stood with his hands behind him, looking at Snootful’s knees. Finally the doctor broke the silence. “Bennet, I’m sorry for this.” His voice was slightly husky. ‘‘You’re the last man in the camp I’d expect anything like this from. it, Bennet, I’d have staked my commission on you being white!” i Adventure Snoots blinked stupidly, as if he’d re- ceived a tap over the head. “But what the did I do, sir?” “Now cut it right there!’ Doc’s eyes tlashed like diamonds. ‘Don’t stand there and fire lies into my teeth! If you’re a thief own up to it! You'll get off lighter.” He shook a big forefinger under Snoot- ful’s nose. “But get this: I’m less in sympathy with a liar than I am with a thief!” Snoots was lobster-red, and his eyes seemed about to pop out. His jaws began chop-chopping up and down in a gush of denial. “That'll do!” to me— ‘Were you in on this too?” I looked around. Gillen, his arms folded now, cocksure, complacent, stood regarding me with narrow, glittering eyes. Johnson, too, now wore an all’s-well expression on his pink-skinned face. The doctor was with them. They had their man. Dixie stared stubbornly and unblinkingly at the floor. “I don’t know yet, sir, what it’s all about,” I replied. ‘Aw, the —— you don’t!” Gillen spoke up. “The two of you were in here together. You saw him cross the street and go in our tent. You were with him here after he came back.” “That’s right,” I admitted. ‘But what did he do in your tent? I didn’t follow him over there, you know.”’ The pup horned in. “What we want to know is, what did he do when he came back here?”’ ‘Yes,”’ Gillen followed him up. ‘What did he do with my watch?” “Bennet,” said Doc, ‘“‘you’re accused of stealing a gold watch from the head of Gil- len’s cot, about ten minutes ago. What have you got to say?” “Itsa lie, sir!” “Doctor, this is a frame!” I oared in. ‘That pair has been trying to get Bennet for about three months—ever since the afternoon es ‘That’s enough out of you,”’ Doc cut me off. “You were in their tent,” he resumed to Snoots. 7 ‘Yes, sir. I went in there to git a picture o’ my sister that Dixie had hollered over fer me to come an’ git.” ‘‘Now that’s an honest-to-goodness fact,”’ confirmed Dixie, without raising his eyes. Doc checked him. Then oO cComicboooks C©