Argosy All-Story Weekly — "Sea Marauders" — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

SEA MARAUDERS. 437 “Very good. We'll tell the Amert- can rum chaser that we are going to Nassau for supplies,”’ said Pedro. CHAPTER II. GASCON ISLAND. HEN the Spanish pirate told his companions that Peter H. Lov- ering had turned Gascon Island into a paradise he had not exaggerated in any respect. It was a coral island, about six miles in circumference and about a mile wide in its thickest part. During the thou- sand or more years since the coral in- sects had reached the surface with their atoll the sea had deposited much earth upon it, and there was a hill at its widest part seventy-five feet high. Upon the summit of this elevation he had built his house so that, from his windows, he might look down upon the lagoon, which was about two miles in circumference, and out upon the boundless ocean. There was a natural growth of co- conut and date palms upom the island, and Lovering had uprooted and trans- ported from Cuba several score royal palms, which formed an avenue from his main entrance down a gentle slope to the lagoon. The house was a long, two-story white structure, with red tiled roof, which was built like a Southern Cali- fornia villa, with very broad porches, front and back, and with a capacity for forty guests and their retinue. There were gardens of great extent on either side of the house; a long one- story building for servants’ quarters located a couple of hundred feet below the house on the ocean side; a great white-tiled swimming pool for those whose fear of savage fish would keep them out of the lagoon; tennis courts; a boathouse containing half a dozen small launches, row boats and outrig- eer canoes, and a farm where tropic fruit, melons and vegetables were —— eee am a — ” ht 7 e > a So - oe ts" pa eee 2 - SSe> et ES en Se ee Se ee a = BF SRE em grown, which was about twenty acres in extent. | There were bridle paths cut through the jungle which covered a large part of the island, a dozen saddle horses in the stable, and a wireless house, where a broadcasting station was installed, so that Mr. Lovering might always be in touch with the New York market. He had expended upon this remote coral island something over two million dollars during the past three years, and here he planned to spend three or four months each winter with a house full of guests. He arranged to-use his yacht like a ferryboat, bringing down newcomers and taking home those who could remain no longer. He was as happy as a child with a new toy. Lovering, unlike many multimillion- aire Americans, was not self-made. He was a graduate of Harvard Uni- versity, his father had been wealthy, and he inherited an excellent social position. When he had taken over the bond business upon the death of Lovering senior, he had found it flourishing, and he had lifted it, until it was one of the three or four great banking houses of © New York. HEN he arrived at Gascon Island he was sixty-four years old, a tall, thin, clean-shaved, pink-cheeked old young man, in per- fect health, able to play a fair game of tennis and do eighteen holes of golf in three or four strokes above par. He was a widower with one daughter, and he was not sure he might not marry again. Mildred Lovering was so beautiful it was hard to believe that she was the daughter of a multimillionaire. She was only five feet one inch in high heels, not much bigger than a big doll, and she resembleed a doll in every re- spect except that there was the light of intelligence in her big blue eyes. She was twenty-four years old and was fre- quently mistaken for seventeen.