Adventure Magazine Cover — page 60: what you’re looking at

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

‘4 ad) : : i. ( Fate “Mebbe I made a mistake, laughin’ at him, but honest, captain, I never give him another thought. I hadn’t nothin’ to do fer an hour or two an’ I went fer a walk round the water-front. An’ then—why, then, Palling come up an’ tried to killme. When I seen he was dead, I got scairt an’ beat it. “That night I met a friend, captain uh the El Dorado, an’ went aboard. Yuh know the rest, don’t yuh? I’m goin’ back to San Francisco. Fate, ain’t it? Id be obliged, captain, if you’d send fer the police soon’s we get there.”’ “Worst of it is,’ said the captain, “the day we picked you up I signaled the mail- boat to say you were safe—they’d pass it on by wireless.” Drixley laughed. “Clinched it, I guess.” “Mr. Drixley,” said the captain, “there’s always a chance. If you’d care to try it— You needn’t tell me, you know.” Drixley shook his head. “No, cap, I can’t dodge what’s comin’. I got away in the El Dorado—burnt. I get picked up by the Sussex Bride, bound fer San Francisco. Yuh tell the mail-boat yuh got me. Don’t it look like fate, hey? “They'll know it was me killed Palling. I went around leavin’ clues a-plenty. ‘There was my hat with my name init. I dropped that, —— knows where; but when I got _back to the Embarcadero I was_bare- headed. Palling killed—me the last person he was seen with—me missin’. No, sir; no use dodgin’. I’m goin’ back, an’ then He smiled grimly. “Outen sabe by vin THE captain of the Sussex Bride % was not happy; the thought of what might happen to Drixley de- pressed him. Yet the meeting between the detectives and Drixley, soon after the Sussex Bride was tied up alongside the pier, was not quite what he had pictured. Afterward he had a confused impression in his mind that half the officials of the port of San Francisco, medical, immigration and cus- toms, plain-clothes detectives, newspaper- men, representatives of the British consul- general, the consignees, the ship’s agents, as well as one of the owners of the schooner El Dorado and various weeping relatives of the El Dorado crew, had managed to force oo their way past the steward into the little mess-room where every one had talked and it was impossible to make out who they all were and what business they had on board his ship. To the captain the: most perplexing part of the whole affair was that the detectives had to be persuaded to take Drixley away. One of them, a big man with a round face, asked why he had sent for them. “I sent word we had Drixley for you, though—you must have known a “I don’t understand,” said the round- faced man. No one else seemed to understand, either. And then Drixley said that he had killed Palling and that they had better arrest him. The detectives looked at him as if they thought he was crazy. They knew he had been saved from the El Dorado, but who was Palling? Some one said, wasn’t Pall- ing the man who was missing? His wife had been making inquiries. And at last after a good deal of arguing it was decided to do as Drixley asked. Drixley seemed relieved by the decision. “T killed him anyway,” he said. The crew of the Sussex Bride crowded the rail to watch him go ashore. ““Good-by all,” he said. “So long, cap. Thanks fer what yuh done.” “Good-by,” said the captain. ‘An’ best of luck.” : Drixley turned away. All at once he stopped. “My ——!” he said in a strangled tone.. “Look!” He pointed to a shabby-looking man with a white face and stubbly black beard, a mean-looking man with mean eyes. “Jack!” said the man with the stubbly beard. “Jack!” His voice broke. “You—you keep off, —— yuh! oft! }?? “Tt’s Palling,” chustited Drixley. ing, gol-darn him—alive!”’ He grabbed at Palling’s-throat and shook him till he began to screech. “What happened?” “You leave me alone. Stop him. I been through ——. You hit me—I didn’t do nothin’. Ow! You’re chokin’ me. When I come to, Jack, you wasn’t there—only yer hat—an’ I—I thought yuh was dead an’ fallen into the water——’” Keep “Pall- (S@) CoOTpnicoookS.