Adventure, August 3, 1919 — page 130: what you’re looking at

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

120 Adventure orchestra that furnished music for the nightly dance, for, now that he was in wealth and influence—if not officially—a king, he never sailed without companions, a half dozen or more guests. Trading- stations were to be visited, the Australian markets investigated and the footholds of independent traders to be jarred loose. He combined business with pleasure and carried new stocks for his traders, took on board the contents of their warehouses, was ever ready to carry out any new scheme that had money in it. And pearling had a peculiar fascination for him, not only be- cause the shell was valuable but because he seemed to have a genuine passion for pearls. He had luggers at 'Phursday Island and a schooner that every year visited Paumotu reefs. Any one who reported a new oyster- bed could always gain his ear. The sun disappeared with almost the suddenness of being swallowed by some black cosmic monster .that lurked near the western horizon just as the boat bearing Gilbert Lang approached the Bebe, but her poop was ablaze with lanterns, and the shadowy shapes of men and women could be seen through the rays of the lanterns; voices raised in laughter and bantering could be heard far out on the water. Gilbert Lang followed DuBeque up the sea-ladder and to the poop. After them came the burly, barrel body of Jackson. Gilbert Lang’s first impression was of some attractive though unreal world into which he had been thrown. Two white- coated Chinese boys moved about on noise- less feet with trays and glasses in which the tinkling of ice was heard. Women, beautiful women, white women, in brilliant gowns and jewels—scarcely less resplendent in the lantern-light than if they all had been genuine—were grouped about men in pressed duck suits. The soft lights took much of the hardness from the faces that he saw. The honest sun would have shown him that there was not a face there unmarked with a kind of cunning or without the sears of sin: no face but one, and hers was beautiful in the way that the evilest of women’s often are for some few years. Lania DuBeque had the flashing bizarre face that lures even the wise, the unillu- sioned, to folly. Some men, many in fact, might be sufficiently inexpert in character perception to believe her words and pose when she assumed a certain innocence. Others, most others, might know all there was to know about her and yet not care. Her voice, too, was soft and smooth; sweet and plausible her words—unless she spoke in anger, when a fishwife might well have shrunk. : She sat in a chair, a long wicker chair, and by her sat Winston Willerby, . Though it could at once be perceived that she bore a family resemblance to DuBeque, sull she did not have either his eyes or his mouth. Her face was not regular in the classical fashion. The faces of fascinating wo- menneverare. Insuch faces there isa unique irregularity that first arrests the surprized attention; then the beholder more or less swiftly is likely to come under the spell of her serpentine personality. There seems to be something serpentine, wicked, about all really fascinating women, “Hurricane Williams is over there!’ DuBeque shouted breathlessly to Willerby. The people about the deck drew near to listen. Most of them stared at Gilbert Lang, stared in that curious noncommital way that leaves people free to accept the stranger as a comrade or a spoil-sport. But their stares were not long nor steady. Most of them looked at DuBeque, whe was very much excited, and some of them who knew of Hurricane Williams glanced re- peatedly at Willerby to see how he was taking DuBeque's information. BUT Lania did not take her eyes off Gilbert Lang’s face. From un- = der her long lashes she watched him steadily. Two long pendant black pearls were at her ears—not pear-shaped pearls, but baroques that had been matched with some care and a great deal of luck. Any one finding a large, shield-like baroque would never expect to find its mate, and the chances would be infinitely reduced if the baroque were black. ‘Tis an old saying, and true; perhaps old as the pearl-fishers of Arabian waters from whence were drawn pearls of great price for Solomon, “Match a pearl, and you double the value of both.” Those pendant earrings were without price. They could not be purchased. Many women had worn them. They were, in a way, the tiara of Willerby’s court. If a herald had cried it forth in a stentorian voice, it would not have been better known that the woman who wore them was not to - comicboo! ss ~ Se om le A