The Argosy, Christmas 1912 — page 81: what you’re looking at

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

LOOSING THE TEMPEST. told me if I would marry him he would see that Mark was set free, and make him a partner in the airship company.” “Vl kill the lot of you,” howled Joloff with another curse. He was struggling, and he was a powerful man. But Ordway and I were no weaklings, and we kept him down. | suddenly a hand of steel gripped me. I was lifted, borne aloft in the air as though I was a stuffed pillow, and slung with a terrible impact against a tree. I was half stunned, but conscious enough to see the islander stoop, pick up Ord- way, wrench loose his hold on Joloff, and lift him in the air above his head as he had me. Ordway landed in a mass of ice and snow and frozen mud, and went slithering about twenty feet before he came to a stop on clean ground. Then the irresistible tempest of the islander’s rage broke entirely loose. With a roar like that of an enraged beast he picked Joloff from the ground, perfectly helpless in those arms and hands of iron. He turned till he faced a rock, a bare rock that rose about twelve feet above the ground, presenting a straight front. Joloff, squirming like a worm on a hook, and uttering frightful curses and cries, was lifted above the islander’s head. I shuddered and froze with horror, but my tongue refused to utter asound. I heard Ordway gurgling and trying to shout, but all the noise he made was like the driveling of an idiot. One second more and the body of Joloff would be smashed beyond all recognition on the rock, and all hope for the islander would be lost. I felt that I was fainting. My heart actually ceased to beat for a short space of time. Ordway made a run, slipped on the ooze he had already skated across, and came down on top of me with a grunt. Sanderman’s eyes were wide open with horror, but he was unable to move. His mouth twitched and twisted, but no sound came from his lips. 67 Then Alma Sanderman jumped to the islander’s side. Her right arm went around his neck. “ Don’t!” she cried. For my sake, don’t!” The rigid arms _ relaxed. The squirming form of Joloff was lowered. It hung a moment in the giant’s grasp while he looked into the girl's eyes. “You love him? He is yours.’ And Joloff was tossed aside like a cork, landing ten feet away. “* Please don’ t! CHAPTER XXXII. A TRUCE. THE Satanic rage melted from the islander’s expression and left it calm, but his burning eyes were fixed on Alma Sanderman’s face. something like returning life sent the blood surging through my body once more, and the two of us, Ordway and I, got to our feet at the same moment. In his struggles Joloff had dropped his automatic. I stepped to where it lay on the ground, picked it up, and slipped it into my pocket. Joloff, gasping, sputtering, and in- flamed with a rage for which he could not find adequate expression, slowly got to his feet, slipped on the black ooze, and went down again. Picking himself up he joined the group. He glared at Donaldson with a venom equaled only by that which the islander turned on him. “What are you, man or devil?” gasped Joloff. “T am a man,” calmly answered Crusoe. “ But you—you are a—a—”’ He was at a loss for a fitting simile. All the animals and birds he knew were, in their own way, too high in animal nobility for him to liken them to this man who would have shot him. He could not say he was a bear, for there is nothing ignoble nor nasty about a bear. He certainly could not com- pare the gasping, yellow-faced would- be murderer to the Arctic eagle. Not CoOMmicbook CO