Adventure, July 1, 1928 — page 101: what you’re looking at

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

THE ROARING HORN 95 “Come, come,” he made a shift of saying in a voice that tried to soothe. He laid an ape paw on her shoulder as the girl knelt beside the bunk where lay the dead man. “Come now, miss, this here don’t do no good, grievin’ don’t. We all has to go by the board, all come to anchor forever, one time another. Takin’ on, that don’t help none. What’s done is done, ain’t it? Well then, buck up! That’s what I say, miss—buck up!” She looked at him a silent moment, with a courage that nobly partnered her grief. Then she reached for his hand, pressed it. Bohannon dribbled out a few more words of cant: “IT know it’s tough, miss. It’s all fired, awful tough, but—” “You’re good to me,” she whispered. “Forgive me if I’m weak.’ Her lip trembled. “I—oughtn’t to be weak. I’m a sea captain’s daughter myself. So I know—” “Eh, what? He had a ship? What name?” “Viajero. Our yacht. My father was navigating her when she burned. I'll tell you about it later. But now—what must be done—it must be. That’s what you mean?” “Ah, now you're talkin’ like a woman of. humgumption! "A complete hand you are, that’s what. Come on, miss, heave up out o’ there. Don’t stay there, the like o’ that. Go on back to your own berth and have a lay down. Hungry, eh? Plenty to eat, here, and then some.. Drink, too. Anything you want, we’re fair glad and happy to give it to you. Best we got!” “As if I wanted anything but my father!” She yielded, though, as he drew her up and away. “It’s rough, miss. Dog fired rough. But you know how things is, aboard ship.” “Yes. You mean—” “Sure! It wouldn’t do, y’know, keepin’ him. Not with a crew like what we got forrard. They’re that superstitious! Trouble enough as it is, without addin’ none to it. And besides,” he added with fine tact, “this hot weather—and no ice—” . “T understand. So, it’s got to be right away?” “Yes, miss. might say.” She sighed heartbrokenly. “Just go out a minute, Captain. Please! Just till I say goodby to him. Then it—it’ll be all right.” He left her alone, closed the door and stood waiting. His eye gleamed with mercenary calculation. “A game ’un!” he pondered. “Sea cap’n’s daughter, too. Hmmm! That’s bad. No easy mark, this here female ain’t.” He scratched his baldish head with some displeasure. “But arfter all, that don’t make a damn’s odds. She’s only a gal. And there’s ways, ways.” Presently she came out of the cabin, stood a moment with her hand lingering against the door, then walked to her own room. Even in those few steps, as Bohannon watched her slim grace, he knew she had spoken truth. No woman walks like that, who has not long been familiar with the sea. Right off the bat, as you HEN she had vanished into her cabin Bohannon went to his own for a welt of rum, and—thus fortified—sought Leadspitter in the mate’s room. He found Leadspitter barefoot and in only undershirt and trousers. The mate, stretched out in his bunk, was brooding in a smoky atmosphere. “Time to give the old son of a one a sea, toss,” began the captain. “Quicker the better. They don’t keep long, this hot weather. They get high, mighty all fired quick.” “O. K., sir. Dll have the stiff sewed up right away.” lLeadspitter grinned with yellow teeth. “That’s one of ’em, anyhow, got rid of.” And expectantly Leadspitter sat up. “Y’know, Mr. Furlong, he was some kind o’ deep water man, himself. A skip, 9°92. or somethin’. *So pr “Yes, she told me. ~She’s a seafarin’ comlicloooks.com