Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 105: what you’re looking at

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

A MARKET FOR STORIES. ain’t like that, Abner,” she said softly. ‘“ And ’most everybody does like your sto- ries. Ido, you know.” Abner was obviously pleased, but he shook his head modestly. ‘“That’s nice of you to say so, Lucy,” he replied, ‘‘ but I guess my stories don’t get me anywhere much. And yet I don’t know,” he went on, brightening. ‘“‘ There was Tunk Hancock. Did I ever tell you about Tunk? Used to live over to Gilman- ville and Jet on that he was an inventor, though so far as anybody could see he done all his inventing sitting in a chair in Nat Quimby’s cobbler shop with some other fellers just about as active as he was. Well, one day somebody read a piece in the paper about lightning striking an apple tree and baking all the apples on it, and Tunk he sighed sort of weary like and says he: ‘Old stuff,’ he says. ‘I was about twenty years ahead of that lightning. Why,’ he says, ‘when I was a boy only eighteen years old, I built me an electric dynamo and rigged her up so’s I could shoot the juice into a branch of the old apple tree out back of the house, and just as soon as them apples was ripe we had baked apples any time we wanted ’em,’ he says, ‘by just pushing a button in the kitchen. And what’s more,’ says Tunk, ‘I grafted some milkweed and sugar cane onto one of the branches, and blessed if I didn’t get baked apples with cream and sugar off that limb,’ he says. “Well, Lucy, there was a stranger in Quimby’s that day, sort of a quiet feller with a powerful loud vest, and he spoke up and he says: ‘ Young feller, I need an in- ventor like you in my business. Do you want to make twenty dollars a week and commissions?’ he says; and that being more money than Tunk had ever earned in his life, he says ‘ Yes’ quick, and then asked what he would have to do. Well, it turned out the stranger was one of these here Indian doctors that sells medicine from a street stand with a torch on it, and he wanted Tunk to help him hypnotize the crowd before he took their money away from them for his bottles of sassafras tea or whatever it was. And Tunk tried it and made a hit with his stories, and he’s still 895 doing it and making a pile of money. So you see, Lucy,” concluded Mr. Hitchcock humorously, “ maybe there’s hope for me yet.” “Lucy!” shrilled Salviny from the din- ing room, “ are you going to stand there gabbing all day? Don’t you know it’s al- most twelve o’clock and the tables ain’t set yet?” Lucy’s sniff was far-reaching, but she could not afford to lose her job. So she paused only long enough to _ whisper: “Youll get something good, Abner—I know you will.” Then she disappeared into the dining room. And as she set about her work she broke into a cheerful whistle. IV. By the end of another two weeks the vis- ible evidence of alteration in the situation was slight, but its significance was large. It consisted, in two rings. One, a flashing diamond affair, took the place of Abner’s modest gold band on Salviny’s third finger. Need it be said that it was placed there by Tom Gilmore, who, when he slipped it on, varied his tender remarks with some sta- tistics about its value and the reduction at which he had obtained it? The other—a much more modest band, decorated with a stone of unknown value, appeared upon Lucy’s engagement finger—the first that finger had ever worn. Nor was Lucy in the least ashamed to say that Abner Hitchcock had placed it there. On the contrary, she seemed quite happy about it. She had need of such armor as her hap- piness provided, for Salviny’s verdict that Lucy’s engagement to Abner was a perfect scream met with general approval. ‘‘ Should I say anything to her about it?” said Sam Taug to Mr. Gilmore. ‘“‘ No. So long as she stays here and does her work, I ain’t got no call to horn in. She can throw herself away on that shif’less feller if she wants to; it ain’t no affair of mine. But all the same, Tom, Salviny showed good sense. I always mistrusted Lucy had a queer streak in her.” Salviny, however, was not so reticent. “°Lo, Lucy,” she would say casually. CoOmiclbookks.€©