Adventure Magazine Cover, December 10, 1922 — page 19: what you’re looking at

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

Benefit of Doubt “The Romans used to call the birds good prophets. What do you think of them?” he asked. ‘They expect you to die. Will you oblige them, Mahommed?” “Tnshallah, sahib.” (If God wills.) The tom-tom rattled again two or three times, and Ommony seemed familiar with its code, for he motioned.to King to take his stand on the far side of the lane by which they had entered the clearing. He took the near side and stood with legs apart and his rifle balanced loosely in the crook of his right arm. “Shere Ali will be here in a minute,” he said. “I want to try him out, Ma- hommed. Will you go and stand fifty yards away—not on rising ground—the lower you are the more helpless you'll look. See if he'll kill man without being attacked.” Mahommed Babar glanced at King, who detected the northerner’s look of unfinished argument. It was not fear. It might be doubt. : “Take my rifle, if you like, and I'll go instead,” King volunteered. Mahommed Babar smiled. So did Om- mony. The rattle of the tom-tom was repeated five or six times. “Better be quick, whichever’s going,” said Ommony, and if there had been any doubt that ended it. Mahommed’s face cleared. ‘Those five words of Ommony’s, added to King’s offer had established him as an equal as far as essentials were con- cerned. He moved his hand cavalierly and strode forward to play in the presence of death, unarmed. The tom-tom rattled again, three times, more loudly. King opened his breech to make sure, being an army man. Ommony knew. His rifle lay along his forearm and he never once glanced at it. Meee MAHOMMED BABAR walked to- ward the apex of an isosceles tri- ) angle, of which Ommony and King were the base, and stopped at the end of fifty yards, looking up. There was a lump of ground in front of him, three or four yards high, with a tangle of dead bushes on top. Shere Ali had come silently from the direction Ommony predicted and stood looking down at all three men with his head thrust out through a clump of high grass. King’s hands fidgeted with the Express. Ommony remained stock-still. The more or less unexpected had hap- pened, as always in tiger land. Shere Ali looked down on Mahommed Babar, mea- . suring the distance, snarling, one ear for- ~ ward and the other back, and looked al- together too long for his own reputation. A tiger whose hand was not against man would have taken the clear road to safety along the watercourse, after one swift survey. Then Mahommed Babar did either a very bold and confident or a very afraid and foolish thing. He began retreating, backward. King swore between his teeth and raised his rifle mid-way. Ommony continued to stand still. Mahommed came very slowly, feelmg his way behind him with each foot—trod in a hole, lost balance, staggered, and fell. The rest was all instantaneous. Yellow as sunlight, in his prime, magnificent, Shere Ali launched himself hke a flash to wreak murder. Both rifles spoke at once. An express bullet and a 404 went home and the tiger fell short, writhing with a smashed shoulder and paralyzed hind legs. Getting to his knees Mahommed Babar stared across a scant yard into the brute’s eyes, and Shere Ali struck with the one uninjured forepaw, missing by itmeches and then trying to struggle nearer. Aiming very carefully King sent his second bullet exactly between the tiger’s eyes. Trial, sentence and execution were all over in less than sixty seconds, and the jungli appeared between two trees, looking about as enthusiastic as a stuffed museum specimen. His only comment was to rattle his- strange little tom-tom; then he went to count the dead brute’s claws and whisk- ers. Ommony must have moved, for it was his bullet that smashed Shere Ali’s backbone and paralyzed the hind legs, but he was standing exactly as he stood at first, with the rifle lying on his forearm, legs apart. He ejected the empty cartridge-case, reloaded and strode forward, for one thing to make sure that the jungli did not steal claws and whiskers; for the superstition is that those things are good against devils, which, as every jungli knows, are all too plentiful. King reloaded the express and followed Ommony, neither man having spoken a word since Shere Ali showed him- self. It was Ommony who spoke at last. He came to a halt midway and felt for his cigar-case. (eo) oe fo) mic <=) (e{0)