Adventure Magazine Cover — page 143: what you’re looking at

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

~The Spider water and held the canoe where it was, for, though the things we had been sent for were few, they were badly needed at our tambo and we were under orders to waste no time. When Pedro scowled at me I reminded him of this and told him I had had enough of his foolishness and that we would go onat once. Still, we stayed there a few minutes, out on the water, while he and the woman talked back and forth without understanding each other at all. Then we went on, paddling fast to make up for lost time. The sight of this woman had surprized us much, for we knew of no Indians along that stream—their country was _ farther west and south. Had she been a man it would not have seemed so strange, for the savages are rovers and hunt for long dis- tances away from their homes; but a woman, all alone on the bank, was something to be wondered at. We puzzled about her as we went on and concluded that a band of the Indians must be living near the stream for a time, as she certainly would never be there unless some men were about. As I have said, she was the only person we saw on all our trip. The mysterious Death never molested us. So, when we neared our journey’s end, I said: “Let us now throw this bait overboard. It has caught no fish.”’ “Very well,” said Pedro, and we drew up to the bank to do so. But suddenly, as he reached for the first bag, a strange look dawned in his face, as if a great thought had struck him. “Lourenco!”’ he said hoarsely. “That woman—lI wonder if she too was bait!” I frowned at him, wondering what he meant, but he did not explain. Instead, he said: “We will not throw away our bait. We will hide it and use it again. Say nothing of the woman, Lourenco. I have an idea, and later you shall know what it is.”’ So we hid all the trash beside the water, and marked a tree so that we could find it again, and went on to the tambo. Now in this gang of ours there was a silent, surly man who had been a lone rubber-picker in very wild parts of Peru and Bolivia, and who knew Indian tongues. He was said to be a refugee from both coun- tries because he had killed men there, and most of us left him alone as much as possible. 9 129 Now I observed, however, that Pedro was with him a good deal. Pedro was the sort of man who can make friends with any one, and even this sour, suspicious killer liked him. What they talked about Pedro did not tell me, and I asked no questions. This went on for a time, and then one night Pedro took the gang-boss aside and talked with him. After that he came and told me to clean my rifle and prepare to go down- river, and in the morning we went. At the place where the marked tree stood we got our bait again, and arranged it so that it looked much different than before. Then we went on down-stream, ready for anything that might come, but nothing came. When we reached the place where we had seen the woman, we held the canoe, and Pedro gave an odd cry like a bird. I recognized the call as one he had been practising since he began talking wfth the Peruvian outlaw. We listened, but neither heard nor saw anything, so we went on. At intervals he called again, and at last there floated back the same call from the jungle. _We stopped the canoe where it it was. Pedro called again, and again came the reply. Soon a figure appeared among the trees, and we ‘saw the savage woman. “Hold your rifle ready, Lourengo,”’ he whispered. I seized the gun and cocked it, watching the shore. He began to talk to the woman, using strange words which meant nothing to me, but which she evidently understood, for she responded at once. Now I saw why he had spent so much time with the man from the west who knew Indian languages. He had been learning how to spcak the savage dialect himself. She laughed, that woman, and chattered eagerly to Pedro and waved to us to come to her. But that we did not do. Pedro shook his head, and once he pointed up- stream and said more things. After a time he began to paddle again and went on down the river and left her behind. We passed around a bend and then another, and when we were well out of sight, he turned the canoe toward the shore-——across the river from the bank where the woman had stood. At a good place we landed, and there he arranged our cargo again to suit himself. He laughed at all my questions and made no answer, but his — Eomicbooks.co m