Adventure Magazine Cover — page 141: what you’re looking at

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

Micky’s. Marquis six inches, and his own swift return smacked sharply against Micky’s neck. “Begob! Thot’s a beauty!” grinned Micky, happily. He danced out of range, fiddling for an opening, and instructed the Marquis to lead now. Before the words were well uttered, the little Frenchman slipped inside his tutor’s guard, and whacked with both hands at the broad Trish chest before him. Micky’s eyes were dancing; the thing looked like the beginning of a fight, for the Marquis had been suddenly seized by the lust of battle, and his dark eyes glit- tered keenly out ofga face gone white. “Come, Meecky!” he cried sharply, flash- ing a swift smile. “‘Zis is ze stuff, no? I like well me ze scrap-box. Ha!” . Micky backed away, laughing at his pupil’s excitement, and tried to hold him off long enough to get in a word of advice. He found his hands full. ‘“Whist!”’ he panted at last, guarding a flurry of wild punches, “‘go aisy, Marquis, till Oi tell yez. Yer guarrd’s all wide open, me boy. Oi c’d wallop yez, roight on the chin anny minute, an’ sure Oi'll have to av ye don’t back up a bit. ’Tis too ex- cited yez are. Whist, Oi say!” Micky found himself in a fix. Unless he punched hard and straight he’d either be hacked clear off the hatch, or be floored by one of those flying wallops, for the French- man was carried wholly away by the excite- ment of battle. Micky decided to use the opportunity of finding out whether the Marquis would stand up under punishment. One shrewd punch would serve, if placed where it would sting yet not numb. As he circled around, with double guard covering stomach and jaw, his keen eyes, peeped through his hands watching for the opening. “Holal” cried the Marquis, and attacked furiously. “Murdher!”’ growled Micky, catching a swing on the top of his towseled head, and countering lke a streak of light with a hard right to the cheekbone which sent the Marquis sprawling to the hatch in an amazed, shocked heap. Micky stepped forward to help him up, grinning cheerfully, and as swift as his own cross-counter had been came the Marquis’ right foot, clear from the hatch, where the Frenchman had turned face downward in a flash, hands supporting his weight. The heel took Micky under the chin, and he N 135 spun lengthwise through the air and landed in. a tangle of ropes at the fore- rigging. As soon as he could shake the cobwebs from his blurred brain, Micky picked him- self up, spat out a tooth, and lurched towards the hatch, bent upon the annihi- lation of his enemy. At the edge of the hatch the Marquis met him, hand outstretched, all the lust of fight gone out of his face, and only shy apology remaining. “My ir’en’ Meecky!” he cried. _* desolate! Eet is a peety. I am so soree!”’ He looked so utterly wobegone, that even Micky’s fighting fury could not withstand him. Micky took the proffered hand, gripped it fast, and shook his aching head. “Begob, ’tis loike foightin’ a ruddy horrse!”’ he said. ‘‘Annyway, ye did well f’r a forrst lesson, me boy. Next toime Oi shall anchor thim hoofs to ringbolts, and yez’'ll Varn yet, Marquis, yez’ll l’arn, f’r yez have the guts, begob, even av yez don’t quite savvee all at wance. giv’s wan av thim scenty little cigaroots ye smoke. Me jaw’s too sore to hould me pope.” | “T am S| THAT was but the beginning®of the iS) Marquis’s education. Micky per- xa severed, and found his reward in the rapid advance his pupil made. True, half the passage had been covered before the Marquis could be taught finally to keep his feet out of an opponent’s face, and Micky still carried on the job of benevolent tyrant of the forecastle,* seeing that the weaker men got their fair, whacks, and the stronger shouldered their share of the meaner jobs of the watch; but’ there Now - was no longer any thought in the crew of humiliating or beating up the Marquis, unless, perhaps, Big Bill still nursed such a desire at times. Even Skimps had grown fat and saucy by the time the Hesperides reached the roaring forties and squared yards and set up preventer backstays for the long run before strong gales and heavy seas to Cape Otway. The boy was a true son of the White- chapel gutter: shrewd, bright as a new dollar, fearless, and impudent, yet having no real vice, beyond that of inherent ignorance and all that goes with it. “Vez’ll be gittin’ yer block knocked off COMIC OOO KS (E@)