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

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

DARK O’ “Aunt Jury, do you remember the man that came here when I was a little girl to look at the coal seam under Loch Lyn?” “Yas’m, an’ Miss Ma’y swap him de coal rights fer a gol’ mine—I mind it well.” ‘He wants to buy back the shares,” said Lynnie. ‘“ But he didn’t say what he’d pay for them.” ‘““Qught to make us mighty rich, ’pears like—sellin’ a gol’ mine. What you gwine- ter tell him, Miss Lynnie?” Lynnie now delivered her master stroke. “T thought, Aunt Jury, that we might start out to visit Cousin Horace in Cali- fornia and stop on our way to see the gold mine. Then we could have more idea of what it is worth.” “Vea, Lawd,” Aunt Jury exclaimed with unction. “ I’se willin’.” “ Of course, we could send for Cousin Horace and go straight on to California—”’ ‘No, ma’am. We'll bodaceously trabbel to de gol’ mine! We'll see Misto’ Horace an’ den journey on to de Holy Lan’. Dey somepin else I wants to see which I clean fergit to mention.”’ A curious glint came into Aunt Jury’s eyes. ‘ Hit’s de Hangin’ Gyardens 0’ Babylon.” When she spoke again it was with a touch of wistfulness: ‘“ Hit’s been a mighty long time,” said old Aunt Jury, ‘“‘ sence I seen a hangin’.” Il. LYNNIE wrote to her Cousin Horace, tell- ing him that she and Aunt Jury were com- ing to California in the course of a month. She set no definite date, nor did she tell him of her other plans. Her letter said that she would let him know just when to expect them. Her preparations for the journey were soon made. She packed her few simple frocks into an old trunk, and then, a little wistfully, for she had no finery of her own, she brought down from the attic, gowns that had belonged to her great-aunt, the beautiful Fanny Locklyn. They might come in handy, she told herself—for prevailing styles meant nothing at all to Fanny Lock- lyn Brooke. These gowns were the only ones of all the array in the attic that would THE MOON. 825 fit. For her Aunt Fanny had been just such a straight, tall, full figure as Lynnie herself, with just such red gold hair. And Lynnie, folding the garments of brocades and satins and thin tissue, marveled at their beauty—and wondered about her who had worn them, Aunt Jury’s wardrobe stowed away in a huge canvas “ telescope,” she joyously add- ed other equipment bearing on the health of herself and her young mistress—and on their general happiness and good luck. There was the “ potato” which Aunt Jury fondly believed had turned to stone and which, carried in the pocket, would ward off rheumatism; and a buzzard’s tail feather to be worn behind the ear for sores and swell- ings; her collection of roots and herbs; boneset, golden seal, peach tree bark, cala- mus root, and sassafras. Aunt Jury was pre- pared for everything short of sudden death. ‘Ol’ man Norah hisself,”’ she compla- cently remarked as she sat on the telescope to buckle in its bulging girth, “ ol’ man Norah, hisself, when he furnish de ark never had a mo’ complete travelin’ outfit.” And so one morning they started out: the young girl in old-fashioned clothes, her gray eyes shining serene and tranquil. Aunt Jury, tall, resolute, bearing herself as be- fitting the granddaughter of a queen. Only the Prophet Daniel, Lynnie’s pet crow that she had raised from a crippled fledgling, evinced excitement. Whirling feverishly in his new traveling cage of willow saplings he voiced his entire vocabulary: “ Dark-o’-de-moon, Sho’ly—sho’ly.” And then: -f Y-a-s-m.” III. THE railway into the desert ended at Coyote Wells. When they entered the battered auto stage for the last lap of their journey, Lyn- nie and Aunt Jury were rich in experience. They had journeyed over mountains and plains, crossed wide rivers, seen great cities. Lynnie, possessed of tremendous vitality, was as fresh and unwearied as when she started out. Aunt Jury, a little tired and bewildered by the sights she had seen, and shaken by emotional experiences, was never- theless undaunted. But the Prophet Daniel Comicwiooks (CO) in