Adventure Magazine Cover, October 30, 1924 — page 55: what you’re looking at

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

South, West and North and rather gloomily reviewed the events of the afternoon. He was beginning to feel afraid of Dofia Hermana; he felt more afraid of her in kindness than in anger. This, in fact, was one reason for his words to her. He felt very certain that within a few hours she would know much of all of the truth about him, and he desired to leave her in no doubt of his own position. His pipe was not yet finished when Job came into the room, shut the door, and then dropped into a chair. “Done it! Found him still at monte and in a run of bad luck,”’ Warlock announced without preamble. ‘‘He’s agreed to sail at dawn, and.will have a boat waiting for us then; we’re to flash a light twice on the beach. Passage to Mazatlan will cost us two hundred each. I paid him half down, and it cleaned me out. Lord help us if he discovers that we’re Americans and not Basques! He hates gringos like poison. Well, matey, what’s the good word?”’ Hampton knocked out his pipe, and re- counted his experiences of the afternoon. When he told about the inquiring peon, Warlock let out a whistle. “Tittle black bull came over the moun- tain’—oh, I savvy plenty, Dick! Old Dias left word to look out for us if we ever did show up, and you can gamble on it. But why tell the sefiora all that stuff?” “Tf the peon was a spy, won’t he report to her—probably this evening?” countered Hampton. ‘‘Job, there’s only one word to apply to the lady; she’s plumb bad! She’ll find soon enough that we’ve skipped town —then what?” “‘— to pay, I reckon.” ‘Sure; but we’ll be heading north and she’ll be laid up here until her schooner comes back ina week. Meantime, she’ll be boiling about her precious husband. Also, the chances are she’ll know that we’ve started north, and she’ll drop in an Acapulco and Mazatlan to look us up. All in all, she’ll waste a lot of time before she gets home, and we'll have a chance to work at Dias. I don’t mind saying that I’d like to leave her out of the scrap; at the same time, I’d sooner have her enmity than her friendship.”’ Warlock grinned at this. “Injun does it, matey! You played her, all right—and I don’t know as I blame you for being scared of her. She has her eye on you, right enough. Still, that tobacco was 49 pretty good stuff. What was it she slipped into your hand during that affectionate adios you exchanged?”’ Hampton grunted disgustedly, and pro- duced the bone tablet. Warlock examined it, and frowned over the characters. “Yd like to know what this writing means! Well, take care of the thing; we may need it yet. Now, see here—what about guns? We can’t get any more am- munition for these durned French re- volvers; but if we look sharp, we can rustle up some real American style pistols and rifles tonight. The town’s full of would-be Injun hunters, and there’s plenty of men will be glad to cash in on the guns they can’t use. Guns ain’t grub, as the Injun said when he rubbed his belly.” “Good idea,” approved Hampton, and got out his money-belt. ‘Suppose you at- tend to it right after dinner, will your Here’s enough money to see you through; we'll reach Mazatlan with a slim purse, but I think we’ll scrape along all right. Here’s dinner now.” Their host entered, himself bearing the meal Hampton had ordered, and the two friends discussed a simple but excellent dinner. When he had finished, Job War- lock girded up his loins and departed on his errand. Hampton, finding himself with half an hour to spare, donned his hat and went out in search of a razor, for he was de- termined to be rid of his beard before the next sun. He sauntered up toward the plaza, and found the gay night life of Panama in full blast—the streets thronged with natives and gold-hunters, music-halls and drink- shops riotous with loud voices, palaces of chance crowded to the doors with seekers after sudden wealth at dice or cards. Guitars thrummed and voices thundered “Susannah” with every known variation, for here were the men with money to spend, the still eager and hopeful ones— that horrible camp near the beach was far from this bright scene. Hampton saw nothing of his French friends, who had probably not yet arrived from Gorgona. He wandered on, and behind the cathe- dral found a shop where he purchased a razor and other toilet articles. Then, re- tracing his steps toward the plaza, he came to the squalid little tavern known as the Astor House, and was passing it when he caught a sudden shrill shout from close at micloool C© inn