Adventure Magazine Cover — page 63: what you’re looking at

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

THE WOLF MASTER 57 Only a few years ago Kirdy had been in some bitter fighting against the Turko- man marauders, and he knew that these tribes were justly feared. But their home- land should lie well to the south along the great Syr-Darya. “Why?” he wondered. “May they die without offspring! May their bones wither, and their eyes cease to see! The Turkoman dogs be Sunnites— may they bellow in their graves!”’ A light dawned on the Cossack, who knew that Sunnite and Shiite—although both zealous Muhammadans—love each other as a wildcat lovesa wolf. In the eyes of an orthodox Sunnite, a Persian Shiite is more to be scorned than a gzour, an unbeliever. “Within two days, when I wandered with- out food these un-eyelashed Tatars rode up and seized me, putting me to many indig- nities—”’ “Enough! Sleep—hold thy tongue!” Kirdy sprang up and seized his fur mantle. When he strode to the door, Al- Tabir wailed and scrambled forward to clutch his girdle. ‘“‘Nay, what dost thou seek? I tell thee, these Tatars are all sons of devils! They look in and poke at me with spears— Their eyes are like cats’—” Kirdy thrust him aside and threw back the flap, to listen. ‘“Hearken, Al-Tabir,” he said grimly, “dost thou yearn for Turkomans—a whole horde of Turkomans? Then abide with thy milk and prayers. I must go to Teva- kel Khan. Dost thou hear the drums? They are horse drums, and the song they sing is of war.” CHAPTER XIV THE DRINK OF THE FANGA NIALMA aj ECAUSE on the far side of the border dignity rides in a saddle and disgrace walks afoot, Kirdy =) lingered at the wagon tent until one of his horses was brought. This in it- self was little less than a miracle, since the whole plain seemed to be alive with beasts. The rain had ceased; mist lay in the hol- lows, and under a murky sky an orange glow spread in the east. Against this light the Cossack made out the dome-like tops of kibitkas, the tossing horns of multitudes of cattle, the black shapes of riders. He heard the harsh grunting of camels, the squealing of stallions, the bellowing of bulls, the incessant, plaintive crying of thousands of sheep and unnumbered goats. His nostrils tingled with the acrid smoke of dung and damp wood fires, the warm breath of trampled grass, and the reek of wet leather. Axles creaked, dogs howled and unseen men shouted. It was a dawn of calamity, as if these inhabitants of the steppe had been driven together by flood or fire. But there was order in the chaos. Near at hand an old woman milked a com- plaining camel, and out of the nearest herd his black kabarda was led up, saddled. Two warriors waited to see what he would do next—two broad and silent men clad in wolfskins, with lacquer helmets topped by a horsetail plume, with a leather drop that came down over their shoulders. Bows and arrows rested in carved wooden cases at their hips, and each held a weapon Kirdy had never seen before. This weapon was a battle-ax—a four-and- half-foot staff, of ivory or bamboo, with a leather thong that passed around the wrist. The head was long, the cutting edge slightly curved, the butt a steel point. ““Oucheha kert kart,” the Cossack said to the Tatars. “Itis the dawn, and the drums summon to saddle.” The swift roll of the horse drums had ceased near him, but had been taken up in distant kibitkas, and he knew it must be a summons to muster. Knew, too, that it was infinitely better to make this assertion than to ask the question—because uncer- tainty is cousin to fear, and for a captive to show fear is to invite taunts. The Tatars regarded him impassively. ““Ay-a, the weapon-bearing men ride from the yuria.”’ “‘Then I must speak with Tevakel Khan.” To a black dome rising out of a cleared space in the encampment they led him, and he loosed the girdle of his sword at the threshold. Older than the blade itself is the tabu against carrying so much as a stick into a tent of the Hordes of high Asia— and not for the khan’s herd of ponies would any Tatar have stolen a weapon so left at the entrance. The dome was of felt, rising on inter- lashed wattles, and a squadron could have formed beneath it. Within, it was divided by partitions of painted leather into many compartments. By the fire in the central COnmclboookks.G© 5}