Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 6, 1923 — page 178: what you’re looking at

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

= then. 2 = | hov I felt that it was well. % 260 I could not gadesiand any more than I = could move. In a moment more I Spaced to see that great tusk rip open the flying woman. But, Took you, senor, El Carnicero passed her by without another snort, and straight upon - the paymaster he risked. : __ And this Barlow shot again, and by an- other marvel he missed again; and look you, senor, I had seen him cut a chicken’s throat at fifty steps, his only target being the red of its comb behind the clump of bamboo root. And with that miss, he gave a great = ‘curse, and snatched the bolo from my belt, and fushed to meet El Carnicero. _“By the holies,” he cried, “ the gun’s _ Til rip him — Fight him with. his” again. I elanced at Chief Augustin. And then I knew. For about his neck was a bewitched. Til kill the up as he would rip me. own weapons, by Heaven!” 3 _ And with a great leap the two met. — Aye, it was terrible, that fight. Like a statue of stone I stood through it all. My arms. were like stone, too, and I could not have raised my rifle had I thought a And perhaps it was well that. I did — -. mot, for I was as likely to hit the paymaster of at. as to kill El Carnicero. And through it all Chief Augustin sat there quietly on the earth, with the smoke = = _ from his cigarette drifting from his nostrils, watching, watching, , watching, with that ing the night. “strange glitter in his eyes. -— __ Aye, I can see now that what-was in hs | eyes was the knowledge of triumph, and that he, with the aid of el Suen Dios, was being eeteed Yet I did not understand All his people now stood about, watching the man who was not a man, and the pig who was half devil, in their great - fight. And none showed fear. ‘Then came a great curse, and I saw that paymaster fall to the eround, the red blood fiowing from his leg, and with one hand __ pressing against his stomach, where I could _ see his shict was ripped open, and quickly becoming red, too. And El Camicers was running in circles, = = Z with my great bamboo dele that the pay-- master had snatched from my belt, deep _ stuck in his neck. Aye, I tell you, sefor, it was a sight to make men fear. are those Negrits. ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, — Yet I wondered. I wondered why it was that the paymaster had missed his shots. I wondered why El Carnicero had passed the woman by; and rushed — upon him. | A moment more — it was all over. EY Carnicero, blinded by blood, and squealing with pain and rage, stumbled over this paymaster, and stumbling, could not arise. And that paymaster, with a last curse, seized upon the handle of the bolo. And thus they died. Yes, senor, they both — died. And that El Cassicero had revenge, and that Barlow had his other tusk. But. that did him no good, — Yet £ wondered. But that wonder ceased when. the ‘strug-— = gle was ‘over, and I found I could move cord, and from the cord hung a great tusk that I thought, aye, I knew, I recognized. And I quickly ran to the body of that man of evil and took the leather case from his neck and tore it open. . | And instead of the broken tusk of El Carnicero being inside it, there was nothing but a piece of narra wood, carved WO: see = same size. Aye, they are quick with their “fitigets wild things of the bosque than men. I could see now how it. was that the paymaster was awakened dur-— Quick they are, and more | But how El Carnicero knew that the = change had been made, that, sewor, I can- not tell, for I do not know. I can just say what I said in the beginning: that this El Carnicero was a great one, great in body, and with the eye of a fiend, the memory of _ @ money lender, and the cunning of a fox. And I know, now that I have finished, that you, too, will never again say that ‘these creatures of the bosque go only by this what you call instinct, and that they have — no such thing in them as hate and fear and courage and memory and a thirst for re-— venge. For to say that would not be of the truth, and it is of true happening, sefior, I = “Swear it again by the name of Jose Rizal, _of the most true happening, that I speak Yet some-_ , and a will tell you i do not lie. Ask them here in this. Olongapo ie 10 A omic boo GS com