Adventure Magazine Cover — page 20: what you’re looking at

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

few seconds at a time. They raised their ds, let go, and struggled up again to tch the approaching boats, which came ery slowly, for lack of enough paddles and scause of the overload and the strength of he tide in midstream. On the far shore the Britons were using horses to drag felled trees into the water, laboring shoulder-deep to lash a raft to- gether on which enough of them might cross to dare to give the Northmen battle. - But that was a work that required time; the Northmen had burned all the buildings Within reach, so there were no doors or hewn timber available. The Northmen appeared to have no in- formation about arrow-engines, but they seemed to expect ordinary arrow-fire. As they won their way across-stream in slow procession, more than fifty yards apart, and the distance between them increasing, they kept their boats’ heads pointed toward the ships’ sterns to reduce the breadth of the target, and the men in the bows raised a sloping barricade of locked shields; but they were wooden shields. Tros’ engine could have shot a flight of arrows through them as easily as an ordinary arrow goes through leather jerkins. The Northman chief chose to lighten his boat. He growled an order and six men leaped into the water, leaving only twelve and three women. The six, along with those who had swum alongside all the way, turned back and made for the second boat, which was already overcrowded. Leaning his weight against the table on which the arrow-engine turned, Tros.let the leading boat approach within two ships’ lengths before he tried conclusions. “Who comes here to yield himself?” he shouted then in the Gaulish tongue, for he _ knew neither Norse nor any of the dialects - of Northern Britain, which a Northman might possibly have understood. That leading boat was at his mercy; it was a frail thing, nearly awash with the weight of men; but he could see those fair- haired women ‘crouching among the men’s legs, and though he would have taken oath before a pantheon of gods that his own heart was invulnerable—that whether a foe was male or female was all one to him—he held his finger on the trigger yet a while. The Northmen seemed to hesitate. They let their boat turn sidewise, head upstream, ir chins above the bulwark for more than Adventure exposing its whole flank to Tros. The chieftain in the midst uphove a _ great two-headed ax and gestured at the bi- reme’s stern, shouting strange words in a voice that resembled waves echoing in caverns. It appeared he was defying Tros to single combat, a disturbing possibility that Tros had overlooked. He was under no com- pulsion to accept a challenge, but he knew what the Britons—and their women in par- ticular—would say of any man who should refuse one. It was part of the tactics of war so to fight as to provide an enemy no op- portunity to issue such a challenge until the outcome of single combat could not affect the issue either way. However, Tros was not sure he had under- stood yet; and there were no women in the third boat, which was laboring in mid- stream, losing headway against the tide. They were rowing with a pole and broken branches. He loosed the flight of arrows at it, plunking the whole dozen square amid- . ships. The wounded Britons yelled delight. The arrows pierced the shields and struck men down, who fell against the farther gun- wale and upset the crowded boat. The others, jumping to save themselves, cap- sized it, and it drifted down-stream, bot- tom upward. The second boat backed out. of range, avoiding the men in the water because there was noroomforthem. It was nearly awash already without the added burden of strong hands on the gunwale and heavy men seek- ing to clamber overside; its crew of dis- couraged Northmen elected presently to drift down-stream, hoping perhaps to make connection with the crew of the other long- ship lower down. So there was only one boat left to deal with for the moment, one boat, eleven men, and that great, grim Northman captain, with the women crouching at his knees, The Northman’s eyes were on the long- ship; he was close enough for Tros to see them and to recognize despair, the mother of forlorn hope. No ruler loves a kingdom as the true sea- captain loves a ship he built and navigated through the rock-staked seas. Tros knew that blue-eyed yearning; he could ever feel it in his own bones when he planned the queen of all ships he would some day build and sail into the unknown. Eomireboo <S;CO