Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 172: what you’re looking at

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

9A By picked up the chicken. - Then 2 shrugged my shoulder; and to = Bee myself smiled. “ What does it matter,” I nated. as “ From a man I should feel hurt, but this Barlow is not a man. Yet, aya, gracias a Dios, he can shoot! It is well. Let El Carnicero be- - ware!” - Jt was not a kilo more, se#or, when we descended from the hot dry hill bamboo to the low land that followed the Rio Boton. And how green and cool it was there after our sweating in the afternoon sun. Be- neath was the earth damp and soft to the foot. Above the branches of the tall trees met and formed a green mat through which the sun could not penetrate. All about us everything was green, and the light it- - self was of the same color, and the green ~ air smelled good, and cooled the throat and Jungs. Monkeys swung above us, following our way, and chattering in their ereat -euridsity over what we might be and what we were about to do. - The paymaster did not like this. And he cursed them for the noise they made. | = ney tell everything within ten resftes that we’re coming,” he snarled. “Tl! kill a couple of them to teach them a lesson. “Why can’t they Jet us hunt in peace. Like = = those damn Negrit’s back at Gordon's. Curse them.” 7 And he raised his rifle. But I bade him stop a minute. - Jt js bad luck to kill a monkey, sevor, when we are on the hunt for pig. Let them go. They tell nothing. They are always ee talking and fighting together, and no crea- ture takes fright at the chatter.” He glared at me, his rifle still raised toward the green roof of the bosque. ~ “What the hell difference does a monkey or two matter?” he snarled again. “ By Heaven, they even look like those cursed Negrit’s too. And I only broke even in that game, when that infernal fool Chief Augustin, or whatever they call him, butted in with his bleeding brat. Stand stil, and - PIE teach them a lesson.” What could I do? 7 I seized his arm, expecting that he would attempt to strike 1 me a blow with the rifle butt. 7 -ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. 2 “ Senor Barlow,” = 5 ciel in @ wae “do not shoot. It is not far now to the open flats near the rio where the pigs feed.” For a moment he glared at me, and senor, my hand slipped back to my bamboo bolo, there was such a look in his eyes. Then he gritted out another curse, and dropped his rifle to the crook of his arm. “ That’s all that'll save them,” he cried fiercely. ‘‘ Come along then.” Of a truth the devil was in that brute! And yet, what a man to shoot. I felt within me that I wished I were in better company. And yet, too, I felt that no charging baubui would have a chance to rip my body into pieces. So on we went. } The meadow land So out eee after we had made another two kilos, and I cautioned the paymaster that he must be on the watch now. For the sun had dropped behind the hills to the west, and the pig would be feeding in the soft earth where the meadow and the bosque met. Also they had ears that could hear the crawling of a python a hundred paces away, and compared to man the python makes but the sound of a fluttering moth. Slowly, slowly, we crept along,. leaving the trail now, and following the edge of this meadow. Twice we saw movement, and heard a scuttling through the brush. And each time the paymaster became like a statue, balanced; and the safety latch of his rifle dropped without a sound. Aye, he knew well the manner of the hunt. But each time was he disappointed—and I, too, if the truth must be told. Then once he stopped short again, his : head cocked to one side, listening, Slowly his head swung about to me, while his body remained, one foot in advance, Again he did this. 7 And this time he whispered to me. ‘“ What was that?” I shook my head. “T heard nothing, senor,” His eyes bulged at me. “Damn you; keep your ears clean! There’s something behind us... ‘Heard At twice.” J felt the blood = to my = again. But it is not for nothing that I have my T replied. oO === com cboo S com