Adventure Magazine, Mid-September 1917 — page 116: what you’re looking at

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

114 Brock flicked the ash from his cigaret into his saucer. “So?” he said. And after a moment he added as though thinking aloud, ‘“‘Yes there would be time. I wonder——” “Any more dope about the plans?” I asked, when he had lapsed into another period of musing. He leaned toward me, and the earnest- ness in his tone was unmistakable. “Don’t ever, here or anywhere else, mention those papers, Peel. There is big game afoot, and you can never tell what walls have ears.” ““No,”’ he went on in answer to my in- quiry of what had happened. ‘Colonel Levin is not under arrest, though it is under- stood he will only visit the club and his office. Between ourselves the general has a man shadowing him, and I suspect the colonel knows it. ““Maxwell, by the way, is at the division hospital with a bad case of ptomaine. The general insisted on the hospital, because the clerk knows of the loss, although Max- well did not want to go. I myself may take a few days leave, I am not sure yet, and if I do, keep your eyes open. You journalist fellows tumble on to things occasionally. And now, Peel, promise me that unless something transpires, or I give you leave, you will forget this whole matter.” I promised readily enough, but it proved to be a promise I could not carry out. _ I turned in about eleven, and shortly afterwards I became conscious that Colonel Levin, whose room at the club adjoined my own, was methodically pacing the floor. From the window to the door and back again, the steps were so regular that I found myself counting the number it took to measure the distance. Occasionally there came a pause at one end or the other; and then, as I was on the point of falling asleep, the pacing would recommence. Whether he continued his march all night I donot know. He was at it when I awoke at three o’clock—I looked at my watch out of curiosity—but I dropped to sleep again, and when my boy called me for breakfast, the steps had ceased. As I entered the dining-room the next morning, the first man I saw was Colonel Levin. He was sitting at a small table in the furthest corner of the room. A Cable- news, on which he kept his eyes rigidly fixed, was propped up by a glass in front of him; ‘night. Adventure but although I lingered over my coffee long enough to read mine through, he did not turn the pages of his own. I did not see Brock again until after- noon, when, as I was leaving the club, I found him waiting in the doorway for his carromata. “T haven’t seen you around much lately,” I said. ‘No, I’m pretty busy,” he answered. He leaned down to adjust the strap of his boot, and I caught a look of speculation in his eyes as he glanced up at me. The big, American horse with its heavy, two-wheeled vehicle, came lumbering around the corner and drew up at the curb. He straightened up and in that brisk manner which later I came to recognize as a sign that he had made a decision and was acting on it, said: ‘Are you interested in birds, Peel? Iam on my way to the Botanical Gardens to see a new species of cockatoo, from the Celebes I think. Want to join me?” I admitted a keen interest in cockatoos, and climbed into the carromata. A strange boy was in the driver’s seat. ‘“‘Where is Segundo?”’ I asked, as we jolted over the cobblestones toward Bagumbayan. “Off for a few days—one of those periodic visits to their partentes which these boys like to make,”’ he returned. And with the obvious purpose of changing the conversa- tion, he asked, “‘Are you entering the chess tournament this week?” I had no desire to discuss the chess tour- nament. I wanted to know whether the papers had been found, or any further evi- dence against Colonel Levin. The pacing of the floor had continued the preceding It was getting on my nerves. But something in Brock’s manner warned me not to put the questions. The carromata halted at the entrance to the gardens and, still talking chess, we made our way along graveled walks bordered with the brilliant scarlet and green of tropical shrubbery, to the big wire cages where the birds and animals are kept. The cockatoo was there, a large, white bird, with a yellow crest, and bandy legs too short for its body. To me he did not differ from other cock- atoos, and after a moment, I turned to watch the visitors instead. But it was three o’clock and the gardens were fairly deserted. One man attracted my notice, an American, wearing a some- what soiled khaki coat, with its military CoOmiclasoo ©