Adventure Magazine Cover — page 28: what you’re looking at

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

22 Impatiently Demid ordered his men to disarm the mutes without slaying them, and the Cossacks sprang forward obediently. The slaves struck out wildly, and defended themselves with fingers and teeth after they were thrown to the deck. It was more diffi- cult to break down the wooden bars that had been built into place without any door as far as Demid could see. He tore down a damask hanging within the lattice, and stared in silence: at the treasure of the galley. At the end of the cabin and raised above it by several steps was a large recess made comfortable with silk rugs, draperies of cloth sewn with gold, and pillowed couches. ‘““Women!”’ Balaban’s voice was exultant. Straight as a spear, a young girl stood beside an older woman who crouched, wail- ing and tearing at her hair. One glance the serving maid cast at the Cossacks, and straightway ripped off her jade armlets, her rings and even the long earrings. These trinkets she pushed toward them, on the floor, and fell to beating her forehead against the rug. The Cossacks glanced inquiringly at De- mid who shook his head without speaking. Balaban stepped forward and thrust his knee against the attendant, rolling her over on the floor; then, turning up her face with his foot, he pulled off her veil and stared at her, scowling. 3 ‘‘Wrinkled as a quince,” he observed in disgust, ‘‘and boney as a camel, by the Unshriven One. A scavenger of —— would flee from her if she smiled.” And he stooped to pick up the ornaments, muttering at their poor quality as he put them into his pocket. His eyes gleamed as he contemplated the young girl. ‘“‘A veritable moon of delight,” he leered. ‘Surely the angel Riwah hath opened the gates of paradise and let out this houri.”’ And he made a motion to pull aside the yasmag, the veil which all Moslem women must wear before the eyes of men. “It is death to touch me,” the girl cried, in a clear, high voice. Balaban, a little disconcerted, glanced at her robe of flowered silk, her tiny slippérs, embroidered with diamonds, and the [sng sleeves that concealed her hands. “On her girdle—the writing on her girdle!” He pointed at several Turkish words sewn upon the length of green silk that Adventure wrapped the body of the girl under the breast. | “The treasure of the lerd of lords.’ Oat, my Falcon, that means the Sultan and this is one of his women.” Even Balaban hesitated to set a rude hand on one who had been taken into the household of Mustapha, knowing that to do so would be to place upon his own head a price so great that life would be sought of him in the uttermost corners of the earth. “What is your name?’ Demid asked the girl. “‘Lalt el Ntksar—Lali, the Armenian.” “Are you a sultana?” She shook her head, the dark eyes watch- ful and defiant. “A slave?” “f ab—true.” Hereupon the maid saw fit to voice the importance of her mistress, hoping to im- press it upon the Cossacks. “Yah khawand —my lord, she is a pearl of the palace, a favorite singing girl. How many times has she been given a robe of honor! How often have noblemen offered a thousand dinars for her! She knows the rarest Persian verses, aye, the blandishments of the Greeks, and the dances of the Cairenes. The child can wag her tongue with priests, even as she can confound the wits of the young warriors - ‘Peace, or your tongue will wag no more. Is she a captive?” The old woman hesitated for a bare instant. “O captain of a host, it is not so with her. They call her the Armenian, but she was raised from childheod im the imperial seraglio. May I burn, but that ts truth. Now she is sent as a gift to Sidi Ahmad, Pasha of Aleppo, as a token of the favor of the Sultan to that great lord.” “Was a writing sent with the girl?” asked Balaban, frowning. “Beyond a doubt, the aga of the janizaries had it upon him. He was our leader.”’ Demid gave command to his followers to search for the body of the officer and retrieve all papers before it was thrown into the sea; also to ransack the quarters of the revs. The serving woman grew bolder because no harm had been done to her mistress, and plucked Demid’s sleeve. “OQ thou captain of men, take thought for the profit thou canst garner. Turn the ship back to Constantinople; ask what oO COMmIGHOO <S (©