The Argosy, Vol. 81, No. 4 — page 107: what you’re looking at

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

FOOLS OF SACRIFICE. Hooking her“lantern on her arm, she picked up the motley-colored cloths and rags that she had left at the foot of the bed and passed back softly into her room. These cloths she pinned over the connecting door in such a way as to screen any ray of light from penetrating to the timber shed. On tiptoe she advanced to the door out- side of which William Ransom ‘stood. Noiselessly she raised the wooden bar and slowly pulled back the door, remaining in’ the shadow behind it. : The overseer knew the signal. With an abrupt gasp in his breathing he stepped inside. The door was closed as noiselessly ‘as it had been opened. The giant’s height almost topped the lintel as he sank on his haunches and sat with crossed legs against the door. Mother Juliet took the pfeons from his extended hand. William, biting his thin lips, clutched his helmet against the pit of his stomach. The open fire on the hearth was burning very low. On either side two black globes were suspended from iron arms; they were iron pots. ‘One contained simmering milk, the other simmering water. About the room the cot of the seeress, her walnut clothes-closet, clothes on hooks along the wall, shelves with dishes and cook- ing-utensils, a chair or two—all showed merely as blacker spots in the gloom of the place. Yet Mother Juliet moved here and there lightly and with ease, crooning to herself in a voice so gentle and low that it seemed to be following her squat shape rather than issuing from her lips. She dipped a bowl into the pot contain- ing milk and broke some pieces of bread into it. This she gave to William. who waited until he saw her seated cross-legged before the fire, partaking of a similar dish, before he touched his own. His share he gulped in three-or four swallows, then laid the bowl against the wall on the far side of the door. Leisurely the seeress ate and drank. The . coiled things clustered near the hearth be- ' gan to unwind and veer toward her. When the bowl was empty she picked up ‘the two pigeons that had been lying on the hearth- stone and laid them in it. With a small shovel she piled ashes upon the small heap of fire until only a few sparks were visible. The darkness of the room was now such that William could - scarcely distinguish the form of Mother 7 A a 673 Juliet. As for light, the windows—one on each side of the door behind him—were blind with grime and soot. He heard her rubbing her hands together. Then he saw both her arms uplifted and moving now up, now down. Soon a brilliant curving line appeared on them. He could descry the movement of her hands presently as they rubbed a snake the full length of its arabesque form. The more she rubbed the brighter shone the snake. When it was shining from mouth to tail she wound the serpent round her neck. Ceaselessly she crooned her low, somnolent chant. Similarly she handled the other snakes until she had wound one round her waist, one on each arm and had stretched the largest of them in a hoop that surrounded her crouched shape. The head of the snake around her throat rose above the seeress’s ‘head as she leaned forward and with flying fingers began to pluck the feathers from the dead pigeons. The feathers she tossed into the fire. Those that were nipped by the smoldering embers flared up and burned, yielding a sickening odor. To William she was as a mound of snakes, winding in endless circles and glit- tering with a light that was cold as snow upon his small, sunken eyes. He heard her tear apart the bones of the pigeons. He saw her bend down low and knew from the softer tearing sound what she was doing. - The fateful moment of divi- nation was at hand. The overseer seated against the door clacked his teeth together and began to breathe in grunts through his flat nostrils. He was bent over now, unconsciously swing- sing his head from side to side with the swaying of the. flaming coils all about Mother Juliet. “What noise is that?” William asked in his high-pitched whisper. “Little birds’ bones that crack so loud in the chimney when the fire bites them means something going amiss, always, Wil- liam,” the seeress answered in singsong. The overseer paused before he dare in- quire: “But what goes amiss?” As they talked not once did she alter her position before the fire where she pored over the entrails of the pigeons. Nor did he venture more than to cast a glance oc- casionally at her illuminated bulk. Most of COMIC LOOKS (G i (E@)