Adventure Magazine, December 10, 1924 — page 73: what you’re looking at

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

Stowed Away and him liable to murder somebody any minute, now could we?”’ A leer accompanied the words. Evi- dently the skipper was enjoying this mental torture, and yet Andy was conscious that in some queer way the other respected and even liked him. Not that that promised any hope for the future. Whatever else he might be, Stivers was no coward, and would admire a strong man even when he was forced to knock him on the head for interfering with his plans. ‘“‘Well then, what’s the answer?” asked Andy. “Wish I knew. You see how it is, Bud. I can’t bring you ashore, now can I?”’ The Captain’s voice became threatening. ‘But listen here! Keep quiet—don’t shout for the crew—and I’ll take care of you, for a while anyhow. One yell, and you'll be gagged. See?” The door closed behind him, and Andy heard the key turn in the lock. He tried to think. The ship was to be sunk. Stivers was capable of leaving him aboard “by accident,” ironed and locked in his stateroom when she went down. If he could get loose or warn the crew he might— but Andy’s head ached too intensely. Despite himself he dropped in a deep sleep. During the next six days, however, he had time enough to lay plans. There was nothing else to do from sunrise to midnight. His head healed rapidly, but the skin of his wrists became raw and chafed from his persistent efforts to pick or break the hand- cuffs. Except for a Philippine steward who brought him his meals and a half hour’s walk on deck every night handcuffed to the mate, he was left alone. The first day, Andy had mustered up enough Spanish to warn the steward that the ship was to be sunk, but the alarmed expression with which the man received his words was not, as Andy at first hoped, due to terror inspired by the warning. Instead, Alonso backed away cautiously, and his hand crept to the knife under his shirt lest this madman assault him as he had the mate. Stivers’ declaration that the stowaway was insane had seemed credible to the crew. No sane stowaway would punch a mate, and with a subtlety which one would not have expected from the captain’s brutal face, he had refused to allow Andy the use of a razor. 5! Therefore, at sunset when the ship was approximately thirty-six hours from port, the crew were idly watching a lean New Englander with a quarter of an inch of red- dish blond whiskers concealing everything about his face except a prominent nose and bloodshot gray eyes. His head was still bandaged. His wrists were bloody. He was pacing up and down the deck manacled to the mate, whose hand rested on his revolver, and whose black eye, now turning a greenish purple, was an object lesson in what this madman might be expected to do if he got loose. Andy’s eyes roved desperately from right to left; he walked nervously. With a sudden unexpected leap he dashed to the break of the well-deck, dragging the mate after him. “Men! The cargo’s nothing but rags!” he screamed. ‘‘The skipper’s going to sink her off New York for the insurance!’ With a snarl the mate snatched out his pistol and knocked Andy down. Stooping, he dragged him senseless along the deck and flung him into his cabin again. A quartermaster off duty. sprawled against the anchor windlass forward, shrug- ged, picked up the jacknife he had dropped at Andy’s shout, and resumed cutting up a pipeful of plug tobacco. “Crazy as a loon,” he commented. “Kind of bad actor, too, ain’t he, Swenson?”’ The Swede’s face was pale, and his jaws worked nervously. ‘‘He bane crazy, ja, und dot iss fery bad luck for der ships,” he ruminated. ‘Crazy volks haf second sight. Vat is der cargo?” : “Rags, for all I know,” chuckled the quartermaster. ‘Hey, Harrigan! Swenson here’s saying our Loony isa Jonah. He’sa_ prophet. You better wireless your girl in New York, for we'll never see port. The Loony says we’ll sink, and the Squarehead believes him!” “‘Squarehead yourselfs!’’ shouted Swenson belligerently; and that was the end of the discussion. Andy had played his last card, and the only change it mide was that he was no longer permitted to exercise on deck. Pre- viously there had been much discussion in the forecastle concerning kim; but that night the crew kidded Swenson until every man of them convinced himself that the skipper was right and Andy was crazy. The older and more superstitious sailors Comiclbook Wh) © 5}