Adventure Magazine Cover — page 21: what you’re looking at

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

Forward 19 He did not mean that vultures were in the air. I saw at once what he had seen, and cried out to halt the ¢eraniass and turn back. We had come to the summit of a high knoll and less than a verst ahead of us, down under the knoll, men were sitting with horses picketed near at hand: I counted twenty and seven and the Tatar—who had eyes like a goshawk—said that they were armed, some having muskets. Their coats were of different colors. They did not look like a detachment of Russian soldiers nor Cossacks, who would have chosen the knoll for a halting place. Even as the taraniass was being turned a man stepped out of a growth of tall hemp, a pistol shot away, between us and the wait- ing band. He shouted and the men by the horses stood up. I took time to study the lay of the land before riding back after the carriage. It was ill luck that I had been asleep when we breasted the knoll or I should have gone ahead to look over before the carriage and the officers came upon the skyline. But it was good luck that the knoll should be where it was. The highway here followed the left bank of the wide Dnieper, which was about two versts away. To reach the knoll we had passed through a network of gullies, where an arm of the river had stretched across the trail into the steppe. We had forded this water and pushed through great patches of rushes as high as the head of a mounted man. From the summit of the hill where I was the ford and the rushes could not be seen, because clumps of willows hid them. Where the estuary joined Father Dnieper a great raft of logs was floating lazily down the river. My Tatars were already galloping the tarantass down toward the inlet and I soon saw that they would be hidden by the trees before the riders, who had been waiting by the highway, could come up to the summit of the hill. The man who had been on watch was standing still, because I had kept to my place. If I had rushed away wiih the carriage he would have run up, no doubt. Skulkers are bold when backs are turned. After observing all these things I wheeled my horse and cfapped in the spurs, over- taking the carriage at the river and bidding it halt. | “What the —— are you about, Ivak? What has happened?”’ Edwards who was dozing in the carriage had been wakened by the jolting. “Bandits or foemen have happened,” I explained quickly. ‘‘We can not gain the last zamora ahead of them. Our beasts are tired and theirs are fresh. What is’ your will?” “That we make a stand, Ivak. Tsob- tsob, Tsoboe! Hustle! Better to make a stand and greet them with bullets than rush into these infernal gullies that lead nowhere but out into your cursed steppe.” ‘‘And what does the admiral say?”’ Edwards spoke to John Paul quickly and the American cast a glance around, ap- parently not in the least disturbed. “He says to go down this inlet to the river. We might slip past the stand-and- deliver chaps along the river.” Now there was truth in Edwards’ choice, to stand and face our pursuers, and there was more wisdom in John Paul’s advice to take to the riverbank, but I had a better plan. Pulling Edwards out of the ¢arantass and calling to the Tatars who were riding the horses attached to it, I jerked the heads of the leaders to the right and lashed the beasts until they started off, dragging the carriage into the rushes toward the steppe. Meanwhile Edwards had climbed into my saddle and the Tatars and I each took a stirrup—the servant being the third rider. Then we waded into the water and began to trot off, around a bend toward the river. The bottom was hard here and we raised little mud, while the track of the carriage going in the other direction was clear as a cattle path. All this had taken not two minutes and we were well out of sight when we heard the horses of the band splash into the ford. Although the two officers had left behind valuable baggage and clothing they had not bickered for a second. For a moment I wondered if my suspicions were false—the™ band might have been vagabonds or de- serters who would have left us alone for a little silver. I thought to myself: ‘‘When a plan is made and a path chosen, only a fool loiters to think of other paths. The outlaws will divide at the ford, some going after the wagon, some coming this way. It is better to deal with a dozen than with them all.” COMIGDOOKSEEO inn