Adventure Magazine Cover — page 167: what you’re looking at

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

166 will carry the line of boats Bayezid has drawn up along the farther bank and filled with archers, hidden from your sight. Aye, my lord khan. Your warriors of Turan and Iran and the Horde will not be stayed by the trap that Bayezid has set for them in the tents on the shore. Within the tents is an entrenchment of lances sunk into the ground. It will not check ur myrmidons.”’ He tarahed in the face of the old Con- queror. ‘And then, verily, your Tatars will carry the town. By midday they will have beat- en back the Sipahis stationed on the crest of the Angora plateau. Aye, Timur. But then what? Your ranks will be faced by forty thousand fresh cavalry—the Janis- series. Aye,and by the Mamelukes, hidden in the valleys beyond—the pick of Pays zid’s army.’ The black eyes of Tamerlane riveted on Michael’s face. “More than that,” cried Michael, “the line of boats will be ablaze, my Conqueror. Casks of naphtha are hidden within them, to be set alight. Your men will find no water to drink upon the plain of Angora; the river is foul. Your back will be to the river. Bayezid will turn aside from his hunt, which is meant but to cast dust in your eyes, and set his heavy cavalry against your tired and thirsty followers. By night- fall the riders of Turan will be slain or in the river. Aye, there are war-galleys awaiting you, around the upper bend of the Khabur. Your men have never fought against the Turkish ships.” At this Tamerlane brushed his hand across his near-sighted eyes, and a: hissing breath escaped his hard lips. “Bayezid revels—to make you the blind- er,” concluded Michael bitterly. ‘He or- dered your emissaries slain, to anger you to attack. In this manner, not otherwise, will he make of your name a mockery, O Kha Khan, and of your empire—dust.” For the space of several moments there was complete silence, while a dozen men hung upon the next word of the old Conqueror. Instead of speaking, Tamerlane rose and limped to the tent entrance, while the guards fell back with lowered heads. He glanced at the stars, marking the hour, and at the dark masses of men assembling under the ’ wan gleam of the new moon, low on the horizon. Adventure “Take the captives hence,” he said at last to his attendants, ‘‘save the Frank in the kaftan. Summon Mirza Rustem, my grandson, Mahmoud Khan, and the noyans (barons). Take through the camp the new command of Tamerlane; my men are to sleep. The order of battle is to be changed,” B= ALONE with Michael and a single { J servant in his tent, Tamerlane ~ Signed to his cup-bearer to fill two bowls with wine. Obeying the request which was virtually a command, Michael bent one knee, touched the cup to his chest and forehead and put it briefly to his lips: The Tatar emptied his with a single gulp. “Have you a thought,” he asked bluntly, “how this sultan who has seta trap may be caught in his own deceit?” Michael looked at the old Tatar thought- fully, and smiled, reading the purpose un- der the other’s words. “Does a sparrow,” he countered, “give counsel to a falcon—when the hood is re- moved from the eyes of the falcon?” If he had made a suggestion, it would in all probability have been futile and would have opened him to the suspicion of being, after all, a secret agent of Bayezid, who had many such. “Aye, if Tamerlane commands!” “Then send a hundred of your horsemen to cut out a river-galley, to learn whether the boats be not manned and equipped as I said. Dispatch another hundred up the Khabur, to locate the war-galleys that I have seen.’ Tamerlane tossed the empty bowl from him and poured Michael’s scarcely tasted wine upon the rugs of the tent. It was an unpardonable offense to fail to empty a bowl bestowed by the khan; but Tamer- lane dealt with such things in his own way. “Those men have already been sent,” he grunted. “I bade you spit out your thought how Bayezid may be attacked, He is too shrewd to force the crossing of the Khabur, and by the sun of heaven, my Tatars would throw dirt in my face if I sit here in my tents like a woman with child.” Thoughtfully Michael traced out the imaginary line of the river upon the chess- board. “The sultan has shaped his strength to meet an attack,” he responded slowly.. Eomichooks:co ~