Adventure Magazine Cover — page 36: what you’re looking at

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

34 WILKESON tility and craft that I have ever seen in coun- cil hall, or about the council fire, there is none to match with that of your kin, the Allens! They plan to rook their friends, their allies, and their enemies as a pair of Greeks will rook one pigeon after another in the gaming-houses of London town. The very brazen impudence of the coup insures its success!— And all for a tuppenny, hapenny bit of rocky countryside they call Vermont! Ye’d conceit it was Hy-Brasyl, itself, or the Land of Women, from the fuss they raise over it!’’ ‘Vermont? Vermont!’ Allen’s laugh was loverlike. ‘‘Give me that letter, Jemmy!”’ Jemmy tossed it to him, and he tore the first sheet in his haste to be rid of the wax. The Commodore opened the door, and then turned on the threshold, crow’s-feet limning about his eyes. “Floyd boy,” he averred solemnly, wag- ging a finger in time to his words, “‘they’re calling me mad in the huts, but let me tell you there’s a madder man than meself in these Continental Armies, and his name is Anthony Wayne! Och, and the astonishing devices of the man, the strange precautions, and the extraordinary revenges that he does be taking! ‘They prove plain as the nose on your face that he’s as crazy as a loon in May, moonstruck as a hero of eld, mad as a drunken god! May the devil admire him, for the rest of us must!’ With which he withdrew, for he saw that his words went unattended. Alone, Allen laughed the low and tender laugh again and again, as his eyes raced across the closely written sheets. It was the grand passion of his breed that moved him. He was in love with a lake and a mountain range, and suddenly foresaw the consumma- tion of his hope. He chuckled and crooned over the screed for three readings; and then another, less pleasing, thought brought a petulant gloom to his brow, which he tried to shrug off impatiently. Finally he rapped out the devil’s tattoo on the boards, while he muttered irritably: ‘Eh, and what makes him so obstinate! There will be heartbreak in it for him, if they turn this trick.’”’ And he continued to meditate gloomily until hur- ried footsteps sounded on the slippery path outside the door. Instantly he turned, all expectation, to- ward it, but his face fell once more when Barstow and Maine entered in a hot haste, O’CONNELL “Floyd, boy,” he mused, ‘‘of all the sub- — and his thought drifted again as he absently answered Barstow’s query— “‘No, no news as yet.” Barstow looked at Maine in astonish- ment. “What!” he demanded. ‘‘Why I saw the couriers’ horses, myself, being led off smoking hot!” ‘“‘And it’s all over camp that they’ve come in,’ Maine confirmed him. Again the door burst open, and the rest of the board crowded in; Riddle crying out, even as he rubbed the dazzle from his eyes: ‘“What’s the word from Congress, Fallen? Have ye opened the dispatches yet?”’ “Fallen says the couriers have not been here,” said Barstow, before he could answer the question. ‘Sure they have had time enough, and to spare,” said Bannock, “if we have.”’ “Ay,” muttered Barstow suspiciously, “‘there’s been time for them to come and 9 And the others all turned on the sergeant- major a look that might well have caused him a grim unease, if he had seen it. But he was righting an upset chair, and now sat down in it, slipping a letter into a pocket of his coat as he said indifferently: ‘“‘No one has come in here, save Jemmy the Commodore, some half an hour since. He was asking for Wayne, and carried a let- ter from my folks to me; but he’s the only soul I have seen all morning.” “But the horses,” insisted Barstow, as he took his place at the foot of the table, and the rest settled down along the sides. “‘Jem- my does not ride.” ‘“Ye don’t suppose they were taken to the manse, do ye?” suggested Riddle. “By ——, if they have—”’ Allen sprang angrily to his feet, and marched to the door, but before he reached it, it was shaken by a tremendous and im- portunate salute. ‘Come in!”’ he shouted, and flung it wide IX WO blue-cloaked strangers stepped ; by him, and halted uncertainly, blind in the comparative dark of the room after the dazzle from the meadows with- out. Their black hats were pulled low over their eyes to shield them from the blaze on the snow, their collars were high about their chins to shut out the brisk cold of the COMICLOO© S CO