Adventure Magazine Cover — page 10: what you’re looking at

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

8 at a time. Always high officers were with him, and I grew very weary of saluting, for I was stationed at the door of his house. Every morning there was a heyduke with a letter from the empress and because hey- dukes like to lick up mead I Jearned many things. The man from the sea was high in favor at court because he was to be sent down through the steppe to the far-off Black Sea, to take command of the Russian fleet and pound to pieces the fleet of the sultan who was at war with the empress. John Paul had pounded the English ships, and burnt them; afterward he had been given a gold sword for bravery for other deeds by the hetman of the French; so the empress had called him and he had come. Time pressed, for he was needed by the Mus- covites, who were expecting an attack by the ships of the Turks, down where Father Dneiper loses himself in the Black Sea. This pleased me because it meant that we would soon show our heels to the accursed city of fogs and snow. Edwards gave orders to get together a half-dozen horses, with two Tatars to act as followers, and the necessary highway passes and order for post horses. He was to be John Paul’s aide- de-camp, and he told me to go to Strelsky for the passes. I found the ensign of the Guards sitting in his quarters by a tile stove, with his fur greatcoat thrown open and a glass of brandy near his hand. When he saw me he told me to close the door; then he took a pinch of snuff and dusted it off his silk neck-cloth. “You start at dawn to-morrow, Ivak. This order is for yamshiks—the pick of the post horses.’ He sharpened a quill pen and cleaned his teeth with it, while I drew a wooden splinter from the stove and lighted my pipe. “You're a golden fellow, Ivak. I warrant you’ve stolen Tatar horses from across the border. They tell me you can use a sword, too. Well, you’re lucky.” “Allah birdut,”’ I responded. gives.” “Well, you’re no skirted choir singer, blast me if you are. [I like your sort, Ivak. You have a head on you as well as a sword hand. Tch—tch!” We shook his head admiringly. “Have you got together enough men and horses for the journey? Sometimes your Father Dnieper—that cursedly treacherous river—is a stepfather? Eh? Pirates and “God Adventure roving Tatars swarm like bees around a clover patch.” ‘‘We have a change of mounts and two Talmak Tatars for dragomen,”’ I answered. “How large will the escort of soldiers be?” Strelsky looked over at a high lacquer screen that stood in one corner of the cham- ber, and wiped the brown dust again from his chin. ‘No other escort goes with you, Ivak. Haste is imperative, and you must not spare the horses. A great number of fol- lowers would delay the march.” I bent my head as if that were most true. Instead, I was wondering why not even a vedette of hussars accompanied us. Paul was high in favor with her Majesty, and surely the empress would not let him ride forth without a retinue. But so it was. Strelsky pushed the flagon of brandy toward me, and we looked at the bottom of the glasses several times, each busied with his own thoughts. “You Cossack chaps like to go it, and warm up in the taverns on the road,” he said after a while. ‘‘How would you like a hundred rix-dollars to weight down your wallet—eh?”’ 3 “Allah birdui!”’ Without getting up he opened the lid of a box on the table and motioned for me to take what was inside. It was a sack of sil- ver coins of the kind Edwards had used to pay his bet. I put it in my belt and the en- sign nodded. “Harken, Ivak,’’ he went on in a lower voice, ‘“we understand each other, I think. There is more to the order, about your jour- ney, and it is secret. You serve the Em- press?” ‘“‘We have taken her bread and salt.” “And silver. Good! Well, John Paul must not reach the Black Sea.’’ “‘How—not reach the Black Sea?” For a long moment he stared at the paint- ing on the screen, and I noticed the toes of a pair of boots showing underneath the screen. “Do not our ships there wait for him to take command, aye, to show the gunners how to point the cannon, and the sailors how to guide the ships without running aground?” I asked. “We have Muscovite commanders—bet- ter ones.” Strelsky scowled, because more than once comicloool< John | C@