Adventure Magazine Cover, November 10, 1924 — page 134: what you’re looking at

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

432 “In the first place,’”’ went on Bill, beam- ing broadly. at this encouragement, “‘we weren't more than hull down from La Guaira afore we found that there was a seaman missing. ‘There was his locker, and his duffle; and his ditty box—but no sea- man. Missin’. I think his- name was— I forget his name.. ‘‘We was bound for Rio. On the first night out a strange thmg happened. The cook owned a pig. Maybe I oughta say the cook had a pig. Anyway, the pig was tied by one aft leg to a ringbolt in the deck. ‘Long abeut two bells in. the midwatch there’s a terrible: screechin’ an’ hollerin’. The voice sounded like the voice of a pig. I says as soon as [ heard it, ‘That noise is a pig hollerin’.’ An’ sure enough, when all hands rushes on deck, the pig is gone; provin’ I was right.” “Wonderful,” said Jim. Bill glared and went on: “High and low, we looked. We looked in the galley. We looked in the hold. We looked ’tween decks. We goes through all hands’ dunnage in the fo’csle. No pig. An’, sir, that pig was never seen again. Two spots o’ blood was found on the deck, but that was all. Neither hide nor hair o’ that pig was ever more set eyes on.” ‘“‘Maybe he was ate,”’ suggested Sam. “Raw?” said Bill. Jim was seized with an hysterical chok- ing fit, and Sam sadly wagged his head, nonplused. “Well, mates,” Bill went on, “the very next night blew up black as a _ pocket. You couldn’t see your nose to spite your face, as the sayin’ goes. I was takin’ my reg’lar turn at the helm, when suddenly I sees a sight that makes me blink. Yes, sir, I actcherly stood right there at the wheel an’ blinked.” He paused, and seemed to meditate. ‘‘What was it?” asked Jim, at last. “Eyes,” said Bill. “A pair o’ green eyes, starin’ at me in the dark, with such a look to ’em as made my blood run cold. And there I stood. An’ there they stood.” “There who stood—the eyes?” asked Jim, winking again. “Aye,” said Bill, “an’ there they stood, an’ there I stood, me lookin’ at them, and them lookin’ at me, until the shivers run up and down my keel. I reckon we stood there upwards of a hour and a half. Then I ups with a belayin’ pin, and whangs it at Adventure them. But just as I heaves the pin, the eyes disappears, like anchor lights gone dry, only quicker. So, o’ course, I didn’t hit them. Right there I made my mistake.’ “How so?” “That pin is just in time to clop the Old Man alongside the head; just as he comes up the companionway,” said Bill. ‘Next I hears isa terrible cussin’ from the Old Man. I ’spose that was the terriblest cussin’ I ever heard in my life, an’ I’ve heard plenty. i ‘Then he comes. stompin’ back to the wheel, an’ I figures some on jumpin’ over- board; but I doesn’t. : ‘* “Who threw that?’ he asks, an’ as soon as I see its me he’s askin’, I tells him I don’t know. Then. [ tells him about them two green eyes, side by each there in the dark, an’ he cusses some more. So he goes to work an’ has me put in irons, on bread an’ water, for two days, or as long as it takes for the swellin’ to go down out of a man’s ear.”’ ‘Served you right,” said Sam solemnly. “Why?” asked Bill with indignation. “T don’t know,” Sam admitted. “Well, sir,” Bill went on, ‘‘there I sits in irons, in a black hole below decks, and thinkin’ o’ the sins o’ the worid. Up to that time I thought I had seen some rats aboard ships from time to time, but before I gets out o’ there I realizes I haven’t seen no rats before at all. All I ever see, up to that time, was just a few young mice. (oS in this hole, the rats all leaves there, sudden-like. Them rats didn’t just ooze away, one by one, neither. There’s maybe sixty of ’em all gathered round, like a coroner’s jury figurin’ on what to do with the remains, some of ’em sittin’ on my knees, you know, an’ the like, when all of a sudden —W hooshi!—they’re gone. An’ they don’t come back. “Which I thinks is fine at first, but pretty soon it sets me thinkin’. An’ the more I thinks, the more it seems to me like there’s somebody walkin’ round down there, soft- like, but I ain’t sure. I’m still thinkin’ that over when I goes to sleep. “T wakes up to find somebody’s sittin’ on my chest.” ‘Says which?” said Jim, roused to interest. ‘“Somebody’s sittin’? on my chest!’ re- peated Bill. “ON THE second night that I’m Comicboook A) CO 5}