Argosy, Vol. 123, No. 2 — page 123: what you’re looking at

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

be: Author of ° Marching Sands,” “The Sunwise Turn,” ete. “The stars are setting, and the caravan Starts for the dawn of Nothing. CHAPTER XXX. THE VULTURE GLOATS. Y and by Monsey noticed the evidence . of dawn. He buttoned his Jacket at the throat and beckoned her.. “Come! You can see now.” Her limbs stiff with cold, Edith followed hiny out into the still more desolate en- trance-chamber of the castle hold. Gray light from the embrasures illumined it. She saw a reughly made ladder of saplings rest- ing against the massive sandstone of the wall. Up this Monsey motioned her to climb. : He followed the girl into a square hole in the ceiling. Rotting timbers on the floor below afforded evidence that once a stair- way had penetrated where the ladder led. They stood in a very small, dark space. “ The first floor of the tower itself,’ ex- plained Monsey. ‘Go on.” A winding stair, broken down in places and illumined only by thin arrow slits in the wall, conducted them to the tower top —a nest of tumbled cedar timbers. Edith looked out upon the dawn. Mountain ranges were tipped by vivid, ruddy light. The ravine below was in dark- ness. The courtyard of the kurgan was a gray square with shadowy corners. “Look,” said Monsey, pointing down- ward. On one side of the enclosure some fifty horses were lined, with piles of forage at O, make hastel’’ either end of the line. On the other side, the roofless shelters and the open clay of the court itself were filled with sleeping men. Along the walls several sentries paced. In the darkness, close to midnight, when they had arrived at the castle, Edith had noticed little of this. She had supposed that the only men in the kurgan were those who had been in Monsey’s raiding party. - Now she realized that the place sheltered no fewer than two hundred or more. Monsey pointed out a dozen rifle stacks before the shelters. “A company of soldiers,’ he whispered. “'Tartars, who were once part of the Turk- ish army. They know that I am a leader who rewards his men. They came with me from the Caucasus pean walled around Khokand. Look there!” He indicated a huddle of figures in sheep- skin coats and black hats, each one sleeping with a musket in hand, their dark faces upturned to the sky. ‘“‘ Alamans, who came with Abbas from Kashgar. And, at the foot of the tower wandering Kurds, and Turkomans—all armed. The Tartars have Mauser rifles, with magazines.” The men were sprawled about the clay, around some ashes of fires, between piles of littered garments, bags of grain, some stacks of women’s silk garments, and an occasional heap of copper and silver vessels, candlesticks, and glittering cloths. This story began in The Argosy for June 12. NOOK C@