Argosy, Vol. 122, No. 1 — page 118: what you’re looking at

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

108 ceed in freeing his wrists. Yet the other’s words, whatever obscure and sinister pur- pose lay behind them, opened springs of hope; he was not to be slain at once, and where there was delay there were aanys seeds of opportunity. He had no intention that his enemies should find him dismayed or fearful. ‘“So this is your brother, is it, friend Emilio, who put his big bear limbs about me so affectionately?” he remarked. ‘Tt is he, and he could have cracked your ribs had it been his wish.” “T haven’t a doubt of it. His arms are very strong, but I presume his head’s corre- spondingly weak. That’s sometimes the case: all muscle and no brain.” “ No Gaillard ever had more of the latter than he,” Emilio Barbanera exclaimed. ‘Take warning if you would not suffer, and reserve your impudence.” “Akh, well. As you please. Now that you have me, I suppose no one on your side will be more delighted than your fair cousin, Isabel Zorrilla, especially since it was only last evening that she was forced to bear with my assistance in the face of the hurri- cane, a very annoying circumstance.” ‘Naturally she'll be delighted,” said Emilio. ‘‘ What person with Zorrilla blood inghis or her vems would not be in removing . the family’s last enemy? All day she and Felipa have been mocking you in saving them in order that they should triumph over you.” — ‘* Indeed.” “Tt was very amusing to listen to their words and watch how they took you off, my conceited fellow. If you could have heard and beheld for yourself, it would have set your crest drooping. Wasn’t it exceed- ingly comical, José?” - ‘“ Most comical, Emilio,” said the other brother, who was still at Gaillard’s back, in deliberate tones. “ Cousin Isabel im par- ticular never finished laughing at this clown’s antics. And she was very witty.” ‘‘ What was it she said of his feet?” “That they were like a duck’s, and that he waddled about like a duck. Yes, it was ta a duck she compared him, though Felipa thought he had ears and a bray lke an ass’s. i myself prefer Felipa’s description.” “You would,” said Gaillard. “For Bses would come first into the mind of a mule- teer.” A blow on the side of his head was José Barbanera’s answer. | “You dog of a Frenchman, guard your tongue when addressing a Spanish gentle- man,” said the Cuban a growl, “or I shall take you in my two hands and break you apart. You may imagine you have wit, but it’s not so. Therefore, silence.” The two brothers now exchanged a few words, after which they caught Gaillard by the arm and led him to the bank of the bayou. The beam ef the electric-torch played upon the latter brought into view Gaillard’s skiff, with a black-bearded, roughly man seated in it, who at once began to row the craft back whence Into this captors and captive entered: Then the oarsman. began to pull southward, the light was extinguished, and the ride pro- ceeded in silence. Gaillard recognized the futility of raising a cry for help; one. of José Barbanera’s great hands would in- stantly close on his throat, shutting off breath as well as sound. If an escape were to be made it must be by some exercise of cunning, and an appearance of docility, of yielding to the inevitable, might lull his foes vigilance so that it could be accom- plished. ~ Gaillard’s mind was in a sense partitioned between hot resentment, curiosity, and pre- occupation; reséntment at the girl who had tricked him, and at himself, too, for being so easily tricked; curiosity to learn where these men were taking him, instead of con- gucting their prisoner to Hernando Zorrilla, their master, as was naturally to be ex- pected; and a certain absorption in tentative lines of action and in a weighing of chances. For Isabel Zorrilla he imagined himself possessed of a hatred, and with her all of her family, that never again would permit inaction on his part if he should slip free from this predicament. Henceforth it should ‘be war—war im secret, but, nevertheless, war without mercy. He should devise some means by which to wipe eut Hernando Zorrilla and the Barbaneras one after an- other, and so fill the heart of the beautiful cComiclbooks.com