Adventure Magazine Cover, April 3, 1918 — page 157: what you’re looking at

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

The Man Who Whipped a City an hour before the appointed time, and sat down on a stone to wait. The old sycamore was to him the same gaunt, good friend it had been in his earlier youth; the only change he noticed was that the initials and the date he had cut in the white bark exactly five years before were now grown over and dim. Peter rose, took out his knife and renewed the letters and figures. Then he sat down and began to watch his gold repeater religiously. He tried to prepare himself for disappointment by saying over and over: “A girl of eighteen doesn’t know herself. I needn’t hope. It’s silly.” And each time there came, like an echo, this from his memory: “Tf I’m alive, Peter, I’ll meet you here at three o’clock, five years from today.” When at last his watch told him it was three, he rose disheartenedly. Though he had tried hard to brace himself for the blow, he hadn’t done it; it staggered him. He became bitter. What a fool’s paradise he had been living in! All women were like that, of course. Not only this woman, but all women. ... There was the sound of dragging foot- steps out to his right, and his heart paused in its beating. He half turned and looked. “Marian!” And then he stood aghast at that which he saw. It was Marian who stood there before him, but it was not the Marian that he had known. The other Marian had been supple and roundish, bright-eyed and laughing, full of life as a robin, pretty as a dawn in June. This girl was death- white and pitifully thin; she was like the ghost of the other Marian. “T’ve had typhoid, Peter,”’ she explained, in a voice that he barely heard. “Peter, dear,’’ she went on in the same weak voice, “T told you I’d be here to meet you at three this afternoon if I were alive, didn’t I? Well, I am here; but I’m afraid you'll have to carry me back. I got out of bed and stole away—I could hardly dress myselfi—Peter, I didn’t forget my promise to you = She was in his arms long before she finished speaking. Then she collapsed. Huntley was a strong man; he carried her as he would have carried a baby, only more tenderly. And as he went down the 159 river, he swore at himself because he had doubted that she would come. When he reached the big brick and granite home of Judge Urhart and his daughter, the neighborhood had _ been alarmed by the nurse. Word had been telephoned to Marian’s father, and he was just arriving, with the doctor beside him, in his automobile. Huntley carried the limp figure to a bed the nurse showed him, and put it down carefully. The doctor stepped to the bedside, and at that moment the girl opened her eyes. “T’m all right now,” she said. Urhart hastily questioned the nurse. ‘She must have been delirious,” the white-clad woman told them. “She sent me on an errand, and went out while I was gone.” Urhart seemed satisfied with the explana- tion; but the doctor narrowed his gaze and shook his head. “She was getting along so well,” he muttered. “TI don’t see how she could be delirious at this stage.” After receiving assurance that his daugh- ter was not much the worse for her exertion, Urhart motioned to Huntley to follow and then led the way to the library. The old ex-judge was a tall, lean man with mutton- chop whiskers, a sharp profile and a hard mouth. In the library he turned upon Huntley with a frown that would have disconcerted a lesser man. ‘“‘Whom,” he asked, “‘have I to thank for this service?” “Don’t you know me, Judge?” smiled Peter. That smile was like pulling front teeth, but the other happened to be Marian’s father. “I’m Peter Huntley.” The older man had not forgotten—and, indeed, few other Westoverites had for- gotten—the youthful peccadilloes of Peter Huntley, whom they had named a brawler and a ruffian because he had fought so much. But now Urhart forced himself to appear both grateful and glad to see Hunt- ley. They shook hands. The rather strained situation was relieved a few minutes later by the abrupt entrance of the Urhart family physician. ‘Miss Urhart wishes to see the gentleman who brought her back,” he said. “She wishes to thank you personally, Huntley,” the girl’s father chose to believe. “Go on.” COnniclo@ol< (C@