Adventure Magazine Cover, October 30, 1924 — page 171: what you’re looking at

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

Tub Tobin Repeats which fell short of its intended destination. Tub Tobin, who had leaped lightly aside, hustled over to the firing mound, and there, with utter disregard for his musketry man- ual’s innumerable ‘‘Dont’s”, dropped his rifle kerplunk in the sand. “Hey, you,” remonstrated the non-com. “Hay for yourself, you big mule,” came Tobin’s retort. Tub streaked it for the white walls on which his eyes had been feasting all after- noon. Half way to the road he bumped into two chaps lugging up fresh ammuni- tion for the firing practises. ‘To one of the pair he whispered— “You’re on ‘twenty,’ ain’t you, Mac?” The fellow nodded. “That’s my number,” said Tobin, draw- ing closer. ‘An’ you know I can’t hit the broad side of a barn. Get me? It’s up to you—see?” The ammunition carrier drew back. “Nothing doing,” he said, half indig- nantly, for he had divined what Tobin was driving at. “Suit y’ erself,”’ snapped Tub, bringing his hand away from his belt. “Get the color of that?” he asked, offering a handful of franc bills for inspection. He gave the other chap no chance to reply but sing-songed on: ‘‘Yours for the trouble, Mac. An’ double it, if my red-dog luck’s up to snuff tonight.” “You want?” This came after some hesitation. | .““Jus’ this. Make ’em all saucer-busters, every shot that’s fired on your target. See? This old Birdseed is a peculiar guy. I’m wised to what he’s cracked on an’ I’m takin’ no chances.” Tobin wrung the target tender’s hand and moved on. ‘“‘Ain’t it the how money gets ’em,”’ he mused as he crawled through the hedge and headed for his port of desire. Back on the firing mound, the non-com instructor was in a state of nervous col- lapse. Ten, twenty, thirty, forty minutes had passed, and the door of the estaminet through which that tough, Tobin, had passed had not reopened. “You’d think they was makin’ that beer,” he fussed. The beer, however,wasn’t his chief cause for worry. A short while back, a bugle call—badly blown—had winged up from beyond the hill where a a uarver guar was stationed. 1 161 “The guy that tooted that horn,” de- bated the non-com, ‘“‘had a frog in his throat. Somethin’ was worryin’ him. [ll bet it was Birdseed. “Holy smoke! Here he comes.”’ From over the distant hill there sped toward Masniéres a long lean car, pennon fluttering from the radiator cap. The non-com instructor threw a last despairing glance at the estaminet door. Then tightening his belt and switching his cap from its rakish to a more suitable angle he let loose. “On your feet, youdubs. Fallin. Shun! In twos—number. Ash’aware. In twos— number. For ’s sake stiffen up, there. Hey, there, you fat ass, swallow that chew. Pick up that gun, you wooden head. Open ranks, mar-r-r-cha. Ash’aware. Open ranks, mar-r-r-cha!”’ Mitieae CHE five-hundred yard range of the e74een Masniéres Musketry school was a am busy beehive when the long lean car, with its burden of brass hats, hummed in. Old Birdseed’s blue eyes took in things at a glance. Before him stretched a line of keen candidates—no lead swingers, there, by thunder!—firing with that clock-like preci- sion so manifested by the British old guard in the retreat from Mons. Signal discs of varied colors waved jerkily in synchron- ism. Register keepers, coolly calculative, droned behind the line of marksmen. “Pr-r-r-vate Smith—the thir-r-d shot on the score—a miss.”’ “Bah!” ejaculated old Birdseed. His school, if he had one, wouldn’t tol- erate misses. He strode forward, spurs jangling. The non-com instructor kept his eyes “front” till he heard the briga- dier’s “bah!”? Then he jumped like a fliv- ver going into reverse, and saluted with a flourish. ‘“‘Yes, sir?” he enquired. Old Birdseed wanted the floor and he ex- pressed himself accordingly. The non-com took on a new lease of life, inflated his lungs, and let go hike thunder— “Cease fire-a! Un-de-load-a! Rest-a!”’ Again he wheeled about, repeating his hand-waving. Old Birdseed returned the compliment with an idle flip of his riding crop. Running a critical eye the length of the firing squad he tersely remarked— | ‘““Man missing.” comicbooks.cO in