Adventure Magazine Cover — page 146: what you’re looking at

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

| 140 anxious steward who ran aft to bring the officer of the watch. Skimps screamed again, and his face had gone white as bleached bone with pain and terror. Chivers laughed contemptuously and seized the other ear. “Stop where y’ are, Irish,” he warned. “VY? had yer turn all the voyage. It’s my turn now. Ill teach boys an’ frogs to keep civil tongues towards men.” * AS HE twisted the boy’s ears, the 45 bully dragged him over to the rig- > ging, where he took up a coil of small line and cast a turn about the quiv- ering lad. His brutal face was red, and his eyes glittered with sheer cruelty; even his comrades had stopped their chasing of the Marquis, their roaring merriment had dropped to a murmur. “T’ll get th’ Marquis next—” blustered Big Bill, turning the rope about a pin. Then, from ten feet up the ratlines dropped the Marquis himself, not waiting to be got, and Micky yelled delightedly as the French- man crumpled Bill under him. “Thot’s th’ bhoy! Oji’ll forgive yez this toime av yez kick th’ everlashtin’ stuffin’ outa the big swine, Marquis. Go to him wid both feet, me brave lad. Sure, ’tis excusable wid a big stiff loike him!” But the Marquis leaped clear as Bill stumbled to his feet cursing bitterly, and though his small face was pale, and his lips tight and colorless, it was in the fashion taught by Micky that he faced the big fellow, with balled fists, a half crouch, and feet sliding swiftly on the deck carrying him forward to lead with a snappy left that caught Bill under the chin with a crack like a shot and sent him back to the boards. “Thot’s the stuff!” howled Micky, de- lirious with joy. ‘Git in wid another wan loikeethot before he gits sot fer a wallop!” The Marquis got in with another pun- ishing lead, but his weight was against him. Big Bill brushed another punch aside, fioundered forward, and planted a wallop into the Marquis’s middle that hurled him like a half-filled sack clear across the deck. And Bill followed up, willing to finish the job with the boots. Then the Marquis’s ability made up for his lack of poundage, and before Bill recovered from missing a terrific kick the Frenchman slipped out Adventure sideways, crouched, and leaped in with oth small fists balled tightly together to land simultaneously under the big fellow’s right ear. Bill crashed to.the deck in a heap at the moment when the mate started forward to stop the fight, and the steward caught Micky’s arm and started to drag him back to the half-deck. And above the shouted orders of the officer was the shrill yell of Micky as his conductor hauled him away: “Be ! Th’ little felly beat him wid his hands! Niver kicked him wanst! Hoo- rooo-oo!”’ Then he halted, and the steward could not force him to move. Even the mate stopped on the edge of the crowd to grin behind his hands before proceeding to carry out his intention; for the Marquis, cocky as a bantam rooster, was gracefully dancing up to the subdued seamen in turn, and paying off the scores that had accrued while they were chasing him. “Hal? he cried, snapping his fingers before a startled seaman. “Ha! Eet is you zat keecked me, yes? Zen I keeck, too, see?’ And his foot shot out like lightning, taking the fellow in the rear with a spank like the slam of a board. Un- erringly he seemed to pick out men who had kicked him. To each he returned the debt in kind. Then he went to the others, who had pummelled him with fists or rope- ends. “See,” he smiled, “eef you keeck, I keeck. You poonsh me by ze face, I smack ze noz’, comme cal Weel you scrap ze box, or shall you ’ave sufficient? Spik, for ze officer he waits.” One by one the men slunk away, and the decks resounded with the roaring mirth of Micky. To the mate went the Marquis last of all. ‘Sar, ze fracas ees fineesh!” he said with a smile and a bow. ‘“’Ave no uneasiness, messieu’, Zere shall be no more of ze bloominrow, vat you call heem, for I, ze Marquis, am now ze cock of ze forecastle. Big Beel, eet is you zat shall bring ze hash for ze watch ontil ze poor Skimps recover, yes?” The mate hurried aft shaking with glee, Micky followed his attendant like a lamb, and Skimps forgot the pain of his torn and bruised ears; for Big Bill Chivers, the ter- rible Bill, turned without a word and fetched forward the supper. \ COPMICLOOO KS / com