Adventure Magazine Cover — page 30: what you’re looking at

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

all the more a gentleman. 24 “Now, senhor,”’ Pedro said when we had eaten, ‘‘we leave you fora time. This morn- ing we would not do so. But things have changed. You now have food and cart- ridges, your gun and your hammock and tobacco, and z. ““All the comforts of home,’’ Senhor Tom interrupted. “Go ahead, fellows. I'll be here when you get back. Only—bring back our lady.” “We shall try,’ I told him. “Be of good heart, comrade.” And we left him; left him in a safe secret camp, but alone and in pain of head and pain of heart; left him to dreary hours of blackness. Yet it was the only way. We knew he was sick from headache and strain, and that he must rest. He knew we could move much more freely without him, and that on this spying trip of ours he would be worse than useless. So, with no adeos, we slipped away into the wilderness. With us we carried the rifle given us by Andirah. It was a battered, dirty old weapon, badly in need of a thorough clean- ing; but we had not taken time to do more than oil it a little and test the lever action. As long as it would throw a bullet it was good enough for our present use. We hoped we should not have to use it at all, but if we did we should undoubtedly shoot at such close quarters that we could not miss, no matter how worn and foul its barrel was. With it and our machetes we were well armed against anything likely to oppose us. “A miserable old gun,” I said as we started. “Yet, from a chief, a princely gift. It is the first time I have ever known an Indian to give away a rifle. I wonder if the old fellow suspected that we had none?” “Possibly,” Pedro granted. “If so, he is Or it may be only that he felt it was fitting to give Senhor Tom the gun that had struck him down. An Indian has queer ideas sometimes.” With that we stopped talking and gave all our attention to the task of finding the maloca again without being seen. Though we now were hunting the tribal house from a new direction and had no trail to follow, we worked onward with good speed and confidence; for both of us had ranged the jungle too much to be easily confused in finding a place where we once had been. The slant of the shadows and of the scattered sun-rays boring through the leafy top overhead was all we needed to Adventure guide our course. And though we had traveled some distance down-stream after leaving the inlet where the dead man lay, we were little farther from the tribal house than before. After threading the forest for awhile, hear- 3 ing only a few scattered bird-calls, we almost jumped when a sudden. outbreak of noise. ahead struck sharply on our ears.. Then we recognized it as the yapping of that cur which we had heard before. It seemed so close that I feared the brute was prowling the bush and that he now would run back to the house, barking so hard as to alarm the Indians. But a little more cautious ad- vancing brought us to a point where we saw light beyond the trees, and we realized that the dog was only fussing around in the clearing. We had almost reached the maloca. A few minutes more, and we were crouch- ing at the edge of the open space. But now that we had arrived, we saw nothing worth looking at. One side of the building was toward us, the door was around the corner and out of sight, and all we observed was the noisy dog—a yellow pup—and some small children chasing him about. Yet the fact that only a few children were outside was in itself worth noticing. Usually some women would be at work near a tribal house and men would be moving about; but no grown person was in sight here. That could mean only one of two things; either every one had left the place, or something inside the house was so interest- ing that the usual tasks of the tribe were: being neglected. Since the children were here, their elders also must be here. So we began trying to find a way to look into the maloca without being seen by the children or the dog. The best plan, we decided, would be to | work around to the rear, creep along the ground to the thatch wall, and cut our way into it until we could see. Retreating a few steps, we slipped along just inside the edge of the trees until we found the back of the house facing us. The children and the dog were out of our sight now, though we still heard their cries beyond the house. We dropped to hands and knees and began crawling out into the clearing. But our advance ended almost as soon as it began. Before we had gone a dozen feet we stopped short, listened, looked, and went - swiftly creeping back to cover. Gomichooks (E()