Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 35: what you’re looking at

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TWENTY-STICK ISLAND. _ Jimmy Thorpe nodded. He guessed about what had happened. He was white hot with indignation, and he showed it.. It wasn’t hard te imagine what. had oc- curred to drive a decent girl te a midnight — swim through what—for all she knew—was . Shark infested water to a landing in the middle of the night on what she undoubt- edly considered a savage island, with an unknown quantity in the shape of one white man who might or might not offer her pro- tection. “Youre safe enough now,” he said. ‘“ They haven’t missed you so far, and they won’t until‘morning—not too early then.” *“* Not until nine or ten o’clock.” *“* So you can roll in and have a night’s . sleep. Ill bring Faata in to bunk on the Lots. couch, and Ill roll up in the store. of bedding there. Or Pll bring some of it up on the veranda.” — She didn’t argue the point, as most girls would, he told himself. She accepted his hospitality in the knowledge that he want-. ed her to have the best he had and that she could thank him most satisfactorily by acceptance. “ You said your name was Thorpe,” she said as she finished her coffee. * Jimmy Thorpe.” “ My name is Margaret Dineen, Jimmy Thorpe. Peggy Dineen to correspond with Jimmy. I used to be a stenographer—in New York City. My people came from Danbury, Connecticut. I am a country virl—or was—and I did not like office work. I—I did not get along very well with my employer, and when I left he refused to give — me any recommendation. That did not help matters any with the agencies or when I answered advertisements. I was getting down to the very last dollar, and I had about made-up my mind to go back to Danbury.” “* Home.” “No.” She shook her head. “ Not ex- actly. My felks were dead and the farm was sold, but I had relations there who would have given me board and lodging. It meant admitting that I was a failure, and I hated to doe that.” Thorpe once again noted the firm, well shaped chin, and indorsed her last remark. hostess needs a rest once in a while. “T’ve been up against it myself,” he said. “It’s a bit ticklish when the last dollar grins at you. And you were only a kid.” ie She laughed at him. “Tm twenty-two, Mr. Jimmy Thorpe.” Color had come into her cheeks, to stay, with the: vigor supplied by the hot coffee, and she still looked absurdly young to Jimmy in the print gown he had furnished her. “The last dollar was grinning at me sarcastically,” she went on, ‘‘ when I saw an advertisement in the paper for ‘a com- panion to accompany lady—vwife of owner’ that was just how it was worded—‘ on the voyage of a pleasure yacht to the South Seas and Orient via the Panama Canal. Good salary and treatment. Applicant must be young, good natured and well man- ‘nered,’ ‘“T read that in Childs restaurant, and I broke that last dollar to pay for my breakfast and the bus fare to an apartment house on Riverside Drive. It was a gor- geous affair, and their apartment must have cost a tremendous rent. I didn’t know how long that advertisement had been in the paper, and I was anxious until the girl at the telephone exchange told me the sition was not, filled. — “¢T should think you'd get it, deary,’ she told me. ‘ There’s been 2 farnible look- ing bunch after it, and Mrs. Melville’s al- most crazy. You look like you’d suit. _ They’re sailing to-morrow morning. You'll get along with her fine if you humor her a bit and ain’t too fussy.’ ““* What’s she like?’ I asked her. Some- how I wasn’t so sure I wanted the place. *** Oh, just like all the rest of ’*em now- adays, deary,’ she told me, and then said I was to go upstairs. Mrs. Melville rushed me into taking the place. She was accus- tomed to having her own way, and she ~ begged and pouted and practically told me to name my own ees ** * IT get nervous,’ she told me, ‘ and then. T don’t want to be alone and I shall want to get away from our guests because the are perpetually wanting to be amused and entertained and don’t understand that a So 505. Gomicbooks (E®)