Argosy, Vol. 123, No. 2 — page 96: what you’re looking at

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

228 It bulged, ripped, and a man dropped to the floor as lightly as an acrobat. A negro followed him, and after the negro an owl’s nest tumbled in a brown heap to the floor. The white man darted to the door, and peered into the lane; then came back into the room and picked up the bundle which had fallen from the ceiling with him. He was a short, stocky man with a high- bridged nose and a pair of pale blue eyes, small, but at the same time very clear. The short, strong limbs were clad in a pair of denim overalls through the belt of which he carried Tony Dagon’s curved sword. About his neck hung a water bottle. The white man spit the dust from his lips and scratched himself while Tony Dagon turned the leaves of his book fe- verishly, ; ‘“‘ Anne says,” he stuttered, “ Anne says —‘' He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.’ ”’ Jack Houston spoke to the black with- out heeding Tony Dagon. ‘Listen, tin-head,” he said, “did you hear what that beef-neck said about mutiny and hanging and the boat to patrol the coast ?”’ “Yeah, boss,” said the negro softly. He had never moved his eyes from his master. ‘Black Adam, we’ve got to slog it to Kettoree.”’ ‘“‘'Yeah, boss, we got to slog it.” “And quick.” Houston turned his pale, unwinking eyes on Tony Dagon. : “Why didn’t you tell him we crawled up under the thatch?” he said mildly. ‘“Didn’t you hear him say there was a hundred pounds’ reward for us? What’s the matter with you?” Tony Dagon shrank under the stare, but said with timid triumph at not reading it from his book: ‘‘ Of two evils, choose that . which is the lesser.” 3 Houston laughed silently, and turned to- ward the door. With the negro following him, he dropped off to the ground and disappeared into the thick growth. ‘“‘ Anne says,” murmured the yellow man, ‘‘ Anne says—good night!” It is not the purpose of this narrative to tell the story of that fifty miles between THE ARGOSY. Dasson and Kettoree, except that it must be proved that within certain limits, and those very wide, Houston was a brave man. He set his will against two things—the damning, sapping forces of the country— heat, humidity, and the unending irritation of tripping over a million little tendrils that the foot slogger never sees until they catch him. It was time for the monsoon to break, the clouds hung over the tree-tops big with the hundred and fifty inches of rain which the country must swallow in a few weeks. Behind them the sun blazed, nickel white. And Houston set his will against the animal life of a country which spawned those things naturally hateful to man— obscene apes that threw filth at them from tree-tops, things that crawled or darted from under their feet with a hiss. If Black Adam had lived to tell the story, out of the numberless incidents, such as the time when Houston, by driving bamboo | pegs into a smooth tree trunk, climbed sixty feet to gather honey that hung there in two-foot combs, there would have been two, which, in Black Adam’s mind at least, would have proved Jack Houston a great man. | They came to high land in which occa- sional outcroppings of rock gave them good walking. They paused at one ledge—across from them jutted another twenty feet away, and between lay a floor of loose earth thinly overgrown with vines and creepers. Houston scrambled down to it with the faithful negro at his side, but he had not taken over a half dozen steps when he heard a chuk, chuk, chuk, followed by a faint whoosh, and a few seconds later an in- distinct boom. He stopped dead—at his left he saw a tiny hole appear in the ground, and about it the earth became suddenly alive and moved in a small whirlpool. ‘“Lie down, tin-head!” said Houston quietly, and let himself down on his face carefully and wriggled toward the opposite ledge of rock. Black Adam, without under- standing, did as he was told, and both climbed up on the opposite ledge of rock. Houston took a stone not much larger than his two fists and threw it down upon the track they had just covered; it caved COMMICLOO SS C©