Adventure Magazine Cover — page 164: what you’re looking at

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

_ above two legs,” he muttered soberly. 158 | THE endless day dragged on and tie i; the two men sat fitfully talking. The Kaffirs, but for their breathing, had long since given up every sign of life. “A whole month with that poor, crazy —— yelping round here,” Bertie broke out disgustedly for the dozenth time. ‘“The thought of that poor brute gives me the creeps.” “Oh, well, it isn’t so bad now we know what it is,” the graybeard said consolingly. “That’s right enough, Frank. But the expectation of hearing that thing cackling at any moment sends cold shivers racing up and down my spine.” “Let it cackle, Bertie. we don’t annoy it.” But Bertie wasn’t satisfied. “Tt’s hard to say it, Frank, but I wish the Kaffirs had killed the darned thing. I won- der why they haven't.” The old man’s eyes, in the blackness, looked far into the distance. \ “Human nature, Bertie. Just human nature. People always either destroy or adore those things which they least under- stand. And Kaffirs are only people.” “T know, Frank. But that thing?” “That thing to them’s a puzzle, Bertie. A madman—and a mad white man at that— must be possessed by witches. To them he’s supernatural. They don’t dare to offend him, and his crazy word is law.” j —_!” Bertie said in awed amazement. “Then I hope the darned thing’s struck eternally dumb.” “That’ sit. By that crazy laugh perhaps he is.’ “T don’t know, Frank. When I lit up his whiskers he cursed me in Kaffir. And he seemed pretty fluent.” The old man pondered deeply. “He’s harmless as a kitten, Bertie. He’s too far gone even to think up trouble.” But Bertie wasn’t satisfied. “T don’t trust any madness that’s carried His head shook with the vast widsom of a sage. In the long, still, eery wait night was day and day was night. Numbly the men slept and woke and slept. Hunger was always worrying, and. thirst was a continual trou- ble. Only the feed of meal-once a day, and the pot of water was never left behind. “____ it, but I’m hollow,” Bertie groaned as he lay with eyes open and listened to gage the graybeard’s breathing. It’s harmless if Adventure “Hollow! If I get up I'll fall apart,” the graybeard whispered weakly. “What time is itp” Without the faintest interest Bertie pro- duced his watch and struck a match. “Ten o'clock, Frank. Morning or night?” “Morning, Bertie. It must be. By my stomach.”’ “Strange, isn’t it, Frank, they haven’t brought in food yet?” “Tt is, rather. Perhaps——” ‘HTa-ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha!” The watch fell flat, so did the match, And just twelve feet away the horrid laugh rasped out again. ““Ha-ha-ha-ha!”’ Away in the distance a dim, dim wraith of light filtered into the chamber—a dim, small mist of wavering brightness. The wraith grew brighter, came closer. A shaft of brilliant light shot from the passage. Torches in many hands came in, torches almost uncountable. And as they came the cavern grew lighter and lighter, and still more light. And still there was no roof above, and the high far walls were lost in blackness. The scores of torches approached and scores and scores of men. Men all armed, all serious, all with a savage gleam upon their faces which meant no good. Weakly the white men rose and as they rose the mad thing jumped before them and mouthed and grinned and slavered. ‘““Ha-ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha!’’ The armed men quickly crowded round, Quickly, roughly, they pushed the white men’s hands behind them, and tied them tightly. Quickly they fastened up the quaking Kaffirs and prodded them into a line And with the madman dancing before them they moved off. With a man each side to grip an arm, and the tickling point of an assagai touching each back they kept on marching. ZZ pitiless glare. The earth, one huge bright sparkling sheet, shot its rays back in dazzling, shimmering shafts. Like owls blinking in the gleam of a suddenly- turned-on searchlight the men struggled and THE sun was beating down in a strained to look about. and get their eyes . attuned. | With one vast, glowering mob ahead, be- side and all round them the small procession OL MIG OOOKS (@) (EO)