Adventure Magazine Cover — page 8: what you’re looking at

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

6 both of us. Evidently he had a quick tem- per and was not exactly a coward. “Tf your Honor permits,” I spoke up, “I will ride the roan for a bit and bring him to hand.” “Five rix-dollars that you don’t The Englishman laughed as if he thought 1 were jesting, but he watched while I walked over to the roan. The horse tossed its head and wheeled off. A second time and a third I approached him, talking under my breath. Presently I had the rein, and the roan laid back its ears, but as I kept on talking without trying to gain the saddle, it fell to watching the grooms. Then I jumped into the saddle without Jaying hand on the horse. It reared and then kicked out, feeling the grip of my knees. Once I lashed it with the heavy Cossack whip, and all the infernal in it was loosed. The grooms scattered as we plunged here and there. Beyond keeping it away from the wall, there was little about the task to trouble a Cossack, since the muddy footing soon tired the roan. Many a time have my folk lassoed the wild horse on the steppe and ridden them into the villages. “Bravo!”’ cried the Englishman, after I had made the circuit of the place three times. ‘“‘Well done!” He himself held the rein while I dis- mounted, which was needless. And he had forgotten all about the whipping. The English are a strange folk, not unlik€ us, with a black temper and the stubbornness of an ox and a way of laughing readily. He ordered one of his men to fetch the rix- dollars for me—a thing I had not expected. A Muscovite officer would have forgotten the bet but not the punishment. When he ordered brandy he did not for- get a stoop for me. He asked who had sent me. and then who had issued the order. I drew myself up and said— -“The Empress.” This announcement made the Englishman thoughtful and, after he had seen that the roan was rubbed down, he looked around. ‘‘Where are your men, soinik?”’ “Your Honor sees that I am alone.” At this his quick temper struck spark again, and he demanded with many oaths how he could journey to the Black Sea with Pavel, with an escort of only one man. “True,” I assured him, nodding, for it 19) Adventure was unwonted. “Yet that man is Ivak, the galhard, the jzghtt, the outrider. I can lead you across the whole of the steppe by starlight; or you can bind up my eyes and arms, and I will race you to the camp on the Dnieper.” This was a good boast, because my Kabarda stallion would have picked its way unguided to the Cossack villages. But the Englishman was not in the mood for more wagers. “You can’t lead the way for Pavel,” he growled. And I wondered all the more who Pavel might be, and why he was not to be led. It was clear to me that many things had not been explained. My people have a saying that where there is much smoke in the air a fire is sure to be. I began to think about the fire that made all this smoke. “Pavel will never reach St. Petersburg.” The Englishman laughed as if that were a jest. ‘“‘He is beyond the sea and the ice is in the Gulf still. Pavel wrote that he would be here, but no vessel has put in to the har- bor. By the time the ice is gone many things will have happened, and Pavel will be wiser. Better for him if he never comes!”’ Ekh! My head sank lower when I heard this. My spirit was burning to be astir and flying toward the warm sun of the steppe. ; z, ‘Pardon, your Honor,” I said. ‘But this Pavel is a high officer and among these Muscovites the imperial one himself can not do more things than a high officer.” “But Pavel is not a Russian. He is—”’ the Englishman frowned and tossed away a glove that was a httle soiled with mud— ‘a pirate.” | fp NOW on our great rivers, the Volga gica{ and the Dnieper, we had many fem pirates, who took a toll from the merchants. They tossed the merchants overboard and made themselves gifts of the merchants’ money boxes and goods. That is how they took toll. So I knew what the Englishman meant, since I had happened in among the pirate bands a few times when they were off on a frolic. Aza, things warmed up then! Heads were bashed in, and boxes broken open. “On your faces, dogs!” And the hedgehogs, the boatmen, threw themselves down. Co DOOK C@