Adventure Magazine Cover — page 149: what you’re looking at

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

“Privit Morey, the Pair o’ Thim”’ his voice cut through the hide of the en- listed man like a knife. It was never sharper except when he filed it up a bit to “shave the tail” of some young graduate just out from the Point. “T do not know, sir.” “Vis, yis, I know ye don’t know. Ye don’t know beans in yer own spune whin ye don’t want to, the pair o’ ye, but if ye don’t till me where he sid he was goin’, or the guard-house for yours.” ‘The guard-house is as the major wishes,” came the quiet response. “I have never peached——”’ ‘Shut up now, shut up I say! Take him away sargint, take him away, before I say something thot will land him in Bilibid, his eyes!” The sergeant departed, Morey falling close on his heels. The major’s muttering interfering with his shaving, he gave his stubble one last long sweep, and as he dipped his gory face in the basin he spouted words in angry profusion. It was getting a little too warm for the lieutenant, who slid for the door just in time to catch the last tirading effort. “Sure and he will land in Bilibid, the pair o’ thim. The impidence of him! He had niver ‘peached!’ And he knew thot was jist the answer I might have ixpected whin I let me old fool tongue run away wid me! I'll keep him under arrist for a day or two, just to tell old Wooley thot I have punished him for his brither’s helpin’ the Chink—bad cess to th’ yeller divil—lift his own money out from under the eyes of the Washingtons’ guard last week.” The storm was over and the old boy be- gan to chuckle. “And after stirrin’ up all their camp, he had the gall to tell me about it, the cheek o’ him! He’ll be the dith of me yit, the pair 0’ thim!”’ A beautiful calm descended upon the camp, as it always did after one of the major’s stormy outbreaks. The men drilled ‘Sist right,” the dinner was “‘foine,” and the peace of the tropics had settled down upon the little village of Pateros long be- fore Tommy’s bugle sounded the melan- choly “Taps,” sweetest and saddest of army calls, that night. Ray Morey, after the guard—its reliefs all posted for the second time—had settled down for a catnap, worked quietly under 143 the edge of the guard tent, rolled carefully in its shadow to a nearby gully, and stole stealthily down the river to intercept his brother, due from Manila that night. His departure was unnoticed, and the Washington guards overlooked a chance for revenge when they failed to halt the canoe carrying “the pair o’ thim” toward the mouth of the Laguna de Bay in the early morning hours. Juan de Taal, amigo when it suited his convenience, imsurreclo at other times, spied the pair as they pushed steadily toward the lake. He began studying how he could turn this knowledge to his own advantage and long before the brothers had passed the first bend in the Pasig just below the Laguna, he had decided to call on the major before the day was much older. Again Tommy blew the men of Com- pany E to reveille, and again Sergeant Luttge reported, but “prisoner,” not “pri- vate’? was the appellation he gave Morey, First, who had committed that most un- pardonable military offense of breaking guard and quitting camp while under arrest. | Lieutenant Miles dismissed the company and walked slowly toward the padre’s. He wanted the major to finish shaving before he broke the news that Private Raymond Morey had followed his brother, Peter, ‘‘over the hill.” “Mr. Miles, Mr. Miles, why. don’t ye report the company?” The major’s head stuck out of the window, his red flannel undershirt and lathered face standing out in vivid contrast to the cool green of the sash with its tiny squares of opalescent shell which framed him on each side. “One prisoner missing, is it? Don’t till me who ’tis before I finish foolin’ me beard with this safety contraption 0’ yours. Was it by any chance the ither Morey? Don’t till me now I say, list I fly in a rage and cut mesilf again. I know who it is, bad cess to him! Ill tighten the screws on him till he wishes he was a blasted marine, his eyes, the pair o’ thim!”’ Juan de Taal followed the lieutenant quietly into the room. He had some in- formation for the major. It might mean an order on the commissary for a few cans of salmon, so dear to his fish-loving heart. “What the are ye doing here, ye imp o’ the divil?”’ It did not take Juan long to tell his little story. COMIC DOOKS He added to it that the Moreys ._ (©)