Adventure Magazine Cover — page 109: what you’re looking at

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

Next in Command ‘Or else tell it to Napoleon and the other nutty one! By the light that never lit on Moses or the sea, you’ve all gone daft as Daniel! I wonder,” he finished wanly, “‘is the gang gettin’ it, or is it only catchin’ among off’cers?”’ Another glance aft nearly cost Looky his own sanity. Lieutenant Deeswah, the adi- pose engineer officer, was coming puffingly out of the wardroom hatch, Binoculars and the Captain, Commander Peppiter, trailing grim-faced after him. Mr. Deeswah, im- mediately he had cleared the hatch-combing, stooped down, put his palms to the deck, lowered his massive head between them and executed a slow, clumsy somersault. He arose, gravely examined the spot where he had floundered, and proceeded to repeat the performance indefinitely, working forward, his evident intention being to make the engine-room hatch by progressive somer- saulting. Captain Peppiter, impassively observing these awkward antics, despatched his orderly for the ship’s doctor and the chief master- at-arms. When these functionaries ap- peared, the master-at-arms, one ‘‘ Dopey” Desmond, proceeded promptly and effec- tively to obey orders, which were to conduct the engineer to the sick-bay. ‘The surgeon, however, listening abstractedly to the Cap- tain’s statement of the case, carefully picked a hair from his lovelock, scrutinized it min- utely, tossed it into air, caught at it, and began dog-trotting about the deck, plucking imaginary hairs out of the sunlight. At this juncture Ensign Boies came on deck and started shrieking with laughter. Hands on legs, he leaned backward and laughed so violently as to precipitate him- self across the wardroom skylight, where he lay like a bug on its back, arms and legs threshing the air, laughing more convul- sively than ever. He got to his feet, laughed until his knees gave way, and slumped down cross-legged on the deck, where he rocked back and forth, laughing. He continued to laugh until, in the hospital quarters half an hour later, he succumbed to a fainting spell. Under the Captain’s direction, the two masters-at-arms that the ship rated, as- sisted by a dozen hastily designated depu- ties, now hustled the doctor, Ensign Boies and Midshipman Shea, as well as the navi- gator and Napoleon, who were still holding the bridge, to the sick-bay, where they were locked in with the hospital steward and his 865 apprentice assistant, under the protection of a squad of husky sailors and coal-passers. ) cended the bridge ladder the helms- man greeted him with a salivary gurgle and pointed aft. The Captain looked back and saw Junior Lieutenant Lytemose, the last officer to be accounted for, sitting astride the skylight, a huve soup- tureen in front of him, the contents of which he was solemnly and methodically ladling into his service-cap. His soulful employ- ment was gently interrupted by two addi- tional deputies, who led him below. The Captain, after doffing his cap to wipe the sweatband and his moist brow, ap- proached the helmsman and peered into the binnacle. Bidding the befuddled Looky stand aside, he took the wheel himself and set the helm hard aport. In less than a minute the Memphis was leaping porpoise- like in a circle the diameter of which was scarcely more than twice the ship’s length. Looky sat down on the after side of the bridge with his legs hanging over the edge. ‘“Hey! what you doin’ there, Looky?” in- quired chief master-at-arms Desmond, pok- ing his head out of the forward hatch. ‘Just stayin’ here,’’ whined Looky de- spondently. “The world’s turned turtle, and there ain’t nowhere left to swim for!” He pointed to the Commander, who, in- clined to the careening of the ship like a child on a merry-go-round, was watching the bone in her port teeth witheyes of insane exultation. A few minutes later he was with the other prisoners in the hospital compartments, and the gunboat was on her chartered course, Looky at the wheel, visi- bly relieved, and Quartermaster Quinlan doing duty as watch officer. A hasty council of war, held behind closed doors in the pilot-house, was participated in by the senior petty officers of the various branches of the service except Quinlan, who as a student navigator, the only one on the ship, objected to leaving the bridge. When the members came out of the council- chamber, all were wearing side-arms and things began to happen. Chief boatswain’s mate Frank Gerlack piped to quarters, and immediately after- ward sonorously passed the word for a gen- eral muster. When the divisions had marched from their respective parts of the ship to the quarterdeck the assembled crew AS CAPTAIN PEPPITER as- cComicbook (©