Adventure Magazine Cover — page 26: what you’re looking at

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

20 | revolvers and Dorkin’s rifle beneath the blankets went peacefully to sleep. The difficulty of realizing that the springs of action in other people are not necessarily the same motives as one’s own is well known to psychologists, and this fact faintly dawned upon Dorsay as they made their way to the village for the interview with the chief. He began to doubt whether he had not after all made an error in the night; allowed his jumpy nerves to imagine the creaking of the bed and the thud of the falling revolver. Perhaps the latter had just naturally slid off the bed or from under the pillow. As men of. Dorkin’s caliber were new to him, Dorsay found it impossible not to credit him with some sense of fair play; also, he very badly wanted to believe, for his own sake, inasmuch as his position was so very much the worse if that were so. Without even sufficient knowledge of the language to ask his way, and little idea at all of the lay of the country, for Dorkin had not supplied him with a map, he was in pretty bad case. The more he pondered the matter the more he persuaded himself that Dorkin, at any rate, would play the game in inter- nreting, for the sake of getting him away. They found the chief Yamba with his elders under the shade of the council club-house. After the preliminary greetings of native etiquette had been passed and the usual fencing around the actual subject in hand, Dorkin, pointing to Dorsay, began a long harangue, listened to with great attention by the assembled chiefs. Dorsay, wonder- ing what it was all about, noticed that the chief Yamba—he with the big-bore cart- ridge stuck through his ear—regarded him with the masked curiosity of the native. After some crude rhetoric, compliment- ing the chiefs, and principally himself, Dorkin was saying: ‘And as for this white man here who is no true brother of mine but an outcast, one driven from his own tribe, disgraced before his people, I deliver him back into thine hands as thou dost desire, O Black Ele- ‘phant, son of Bafala. By reason of the water which floweth from my heart (pity) have I bestowed upon him a few incon- siderable trifles, which, at thy will, are thine. Let not his magic stick with five voices cause thy heart to stick to thy ribs, for truly are they so bewitched that they will be like the spittle of a jealous woman. Adventure “And so as it seemeth good unto thee, take him away and make him a slave unto thy gods or take his body to make good medicine. one thing, O great chief; that I may trade peaceably among thy people as thou hast already granted me, and moreover that I be free to wander where I list, seeking to harm none and friendly with thy people of the mountains.”’ “What have you said?” inquired Dorsay anxiously, as the corpulent chief solemnly regarded the man who wore his safety- razor for an ear-piece and a shriveled old man wearing three black feathers. “Don’t yew worry abaht it,” returned Dorkin. “I’ve been tellin’ ’im orf proper. "E’s got to tike yew dahn to where they fahnd yer and find that there bloomin’ Camp jus’ as yew says, see?” “And then?” “Tf yer carn’t find yer dotty doctor, they’ll set yer over on the Nairobi road.” “Is that true, Dorkin?” “See me wet!’ exclaimed Dorkin, elo- quently, spitting on his fingers and wiping them across his throat. “See me dry! Cut me froat if I tell a lie! Swelp me!” “F’m! Well, what have I got to donow?” “Vew go along wif them fellas when I beggar orf, and they’ll show yer the road.” “As Broken Teeth hath said, so shall it be,” returned Yamba, the chief. ‘‘He shall be free to trade, as we have sworn, through- out our country, even to the mountains where no ivory is——” “That’s where the bloomin’ muttered Dorkin. ‘“Wot-O!” “And with the inferior white man shall we do that which shall seem good unto us.” “As long as yer keeps ’im busy for a month or two I don’t give a his bloomin’ liver aht,’””? mumbled Dorkin. “What did you say?” asked Dorsay. “Nufhin’! Jigger bitin’ me.”’ He rose, holding out his hand. “Good luck, ole top. ’Ope yer git ’ome orl right. Sorry we didn’t seem ter ’it it off.”’ “Tf only,’ said Dorsay, accepting the hand diffidently, ‘if only I could talk the lingo! By ,’ he added suddenly, sus- picious of the man’s grin, “if you’ve put me in, I’ll come back and get you.” “Don’t lose yer ’air, sonny,” jeered Dor- kin; and, turning on his heel, he walked stuff is!” For this do I ask of thee but if yer cuts © back to his camp, leaving Dorsay with his . few trade-goods and blankets. Gomichbook (E@) s