Adventure, January 20, 1922 — page 14: what you’re looking at

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

I2 great shoulders, and she suddenly resigned herself to his hands with a different ex- pression on her face after she had caught a whispered word of encouragement from his thick lips in the darkness while he held her suspended over the boat below. She made no further protest as the boat sped away shoreward. Cook sat beside her, but he was too intent upon his steering to take notice of her then; and Goliath pulled the stroke oar, his ebony visage within three feet of her own pale face. And the island seemed to leap up from the sea to meet them under the lashing oars. Soon the boat was discerned by the pirates ashore, and then they saw too Cook’s schooner in the windless offing; and they gathered on the beach, suddenly fearful of the results of their frolic. Besides the wreckage of his boats, strewn by storm along the beach, their captain must step ashore to find his settlement half-destroyed by fire, started by the idle rogues he had left behind to guard his interests and their own. As the boat grated on the pebbles, Dog- gett stepped among his fellows and growled fiercely: “Nell started it; d’ye understand? Nell Clark and the Schoolmaster. Cook’s wo- man philandered with our prisoner, and they started the fire and perished in it. Stick to .the tale, bullies, and we’ll pull clear yet.”’ td iN THEN John Cook strode into their midst, and his path was clogged by “A Shattered timbers and smoking deé- bris; his nostrils were assailed by the reek of burning fagots; his eyes smarted with the smoke of his houses, his stores, his powder magazine. And it was the latter which touched spark to his seething fury ane caused it to explode. “What dog’s trick have ye played me now?” he demanded, and his fierce gaze, sweeping the crowd, sent a shiver through the hardiest. Rando and Doggett, bold leaders of the rabble in the master’s absence, skulked be- hind the rest like the veriest curs now that John Cook confronted them. The captain uttered his demand again; his cutlas rasped from the scabbard and he seized the nearest ruffian by the neckerchief. ‘“°Twas the woman, captain; ’twas Pirate Nell,” the man choked, fear of death in his bloodshot eyes. Adventure “What d’ye mean, hound? Speak truth, and quickly, if ye have a liking for life.” “The woman and the Schoolmaster, cap- tain. They set fire to the powder- house. They were inside, captain. Oh, ’s truth!” “Liar!” Cook spat. He flung the man from him; his cutlas whistled in the air, and cleft the falling rascal from crown to collar. “Step up, Doggett!’ he cried sharply. “T’ll have the truth o’ this scurvy home- coming from somebody, or all shall hang by the thumbs over such a fire as this can never grow to!” : Doggett slouched forward, his hangdog face downcast, but with hope in his gloomy eyes. “What means this bloody destruction, Doggett? Where is Nell Clark, and who is this pestilent Schoolmaster yonder liar spoke of?” “He spoke true, cap’n, for most part,” replied Doggett sullenly. “A half-wit man with a parrot on’s shoulder, drifted in here in a small boat alone, just after you sailed. He was no sailor, but a pretty, throstle- throated puppy who amused us with his singing. We called him Schoolmaster, for . he soon began to teach our Nell fine lessons. “T told him to lay off from boardin’ your craft, cap’n, and the men handled him rough enough for his free-and-easy imperence to them and us all. But Nell sort 0’ took a slant to him, did the wench, cap’n, so I says to Rando, says I, ‘We ought to see as our cappen’s property ain’t stole. And Rando says, ‘Right.’ So we lays for the Schoolmaster, and gives him a deal about it. Then Nell comes between us, and knifes Rando here. *Most kills him, she does, and she and the Schoolmaster runs to the powder- house and defies all your men, cappen.”’ “By the gratings of Eblis! Tf you speak truth I’ll flay them both alive,” swore Cook, purple with rage. “If you lie——” “T don’t lie, cappen,” Doggett hastened to vow. ‘She told him she’d make him cappen instead o’ you. Then after a bit they opens the door, the chap comes out trundlin’ a cask o’ powder with a fuse alight, and tries to blow yer loyal men to bits, cappen. “They dodges back, but the fuse was short. The blessed bomb blew up, set fire to the stdre and the houses and scorched a hundred good lads, cappen. And by the same token it blewthem two sky-high, tool’: COmmicloookKks (C@