Adventure Magazine, Mid-September 1917 — page 174: what you’re looking at

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

172 as it flapped in a tangle of lines. The brig- antine wavered but Todd straightened her and they rushed on toward the spouting reef. It opened ahead, a mere break in a wall of spume and they sped down a lane of wild water, less than a fathom of freeway on either hand, urged on by great billows that mounted behind them in the narrow chan- nel. The two palms came slowly into line and still they glided on, high-tossing seas raging over the rocks to right and left in: streaming cataracts, Denton’s finger on the last ounce of trigger-pull. The palms opened again. Todd gave orders to Denton who repeated them with a roar to the expectant men. A dozen leaped for every brace and sheet and the Venture shot up into the wind. The following breakers lost their crests and volume. Ahead, a green hummock of an island showed, one lone palm crowning it that slowly shifted until it held the center of the frame formed by the Kissing Palms while the brigantine fell slowly off and passed at last between reefs half submerged and hiss- ing with rapids into a central lagoon of which the tiny island was the hub to a rim of strips of land, reef-tops fringed here and there with palms and scrub. Todd brought the Venture to an anchorage off a tiny cove and the chain rattled out to sand in four fathoms. Bane smote him between the shoulders. ‘‘Well found, lad,” he cried. ‘“‘Now let the king’s ship play patrol, an she will. We'll stay inside till we are ready to leave, with two doors to our stable. Come below and prick it on the chart. There’s a tot for ye and for all hands besides. Give the order, Denton, and join us.”’ Scarry-Dick cast a sour look at Todd. The man had saved them but he liked him none the better. He beckoned to Spanish Jack. ‘“‘What was your quarrel with him?” he asked, jerking his thumb at Todd. The half-breed spilled a mouthful of ready oaths. : “‘A score of reasons. The man has the eyes of voodoo.” “Caught you cogging the dice, eh? Nay, frown not, man, I have no love for him. But ye know the rules. All quarrels must be settled on land. We stay here until tomorrow.” A crooked smile distorted the face of Adventure Spanish Jack. He tapped the hilt of the long, thin knife that he wore in his sash. ‘There are other games that I can play besides dice,” he said. Denton nodded and went below. They wanted no kill-joys aboard, he told himself. The skipper had promised Todd an extra share for successful pilotage. There was none too much for sharing with the big crew. I would that I could place the man, he thought. It is no pleasant memory he brings up, of that ’ll be sworn. The man hates himself and all the world. He’ll have the crew by the ears with-that skull-face of his. Beshrew me, but those eyes of his hold the look of a hangman.” CHAPTER VII KNIFE-PLAY 4 pirates sat and squatted in a big cir- cle where hummocks and dunes of sand formed the seats of a natural arena on the shore of the islet. The morning meal was over and the sun was well up. A man had hitched up the slender trunk of the palm and reported the topsails of the corvette showing on the horizon in the hope that the pirate would come out of his hide-out. What with the channel and the shallows they were in no fear of his guns. For safety’s sake the sails of the brigan- tine were close furled and the spars decked cleverly with fronds of palmetto. They could wait until the coast was clear, or, if the king’s ship proved too persistent, slip out to southward. This last Bane did not want to do unless he were pressed. He had to careen and the fresh-water creek he pre- ferred for the cleansing of the weeds and barnacles from the bottom of the brigantine was to the north and east on Great Exuma Isle. To go south would lose him valuable time and this was the best season for his piracies. The merchantman they had just captured and fired, after putting its crew into their own longboat, had carried several butts of wine and a day’s debauch was ahead. After the division of the spoils there was rare sport forward. Spanish Jack had given the new man the lie. To refuse a challenge meant that the flincher would lead the life of the ship’s cur and the recruit had taken it up. Wagers COmicloo C©