Argosy All-Story Weekly, December 4, 1926 — page 125: what you’re looking at

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

ROLL YOUR OWN. Dorothy Cranning leaned back, and sighed quite languidly, and laid aside her magazine. ‘Jim, I’ve been thinking it over, and I can see now that in some ways I have been foolish,” she said slowly. “Or perhaps more unjust than foolish. And I wish at least to be just.” “What does it mean?” James asked bluntly. “Why, mainly, I suppose, that I have been wrong in refusing to hear whatever it is that you wish to tell me,” said pretty Mrs. Cranning, and her smile was more than merely supercilious; it held indeed a quality which started every hair on James Cranning to bristling with blind fury. “ So you may tell me now, I think,” said Dor- othy. “I will listen.” Again—at least to some extent—James had mastered himself. A few seconds, he panted; a few more he devoted to a quite emotional gritting of his teeth. Then, his fists upon his hips, young Mr. Cranning permitted his own eyes to do some really remarkable blazing at Dorothy! “Well, is—that—so?” he roared. “Oh, don’t! Pray, don’t shout like that!”’ Mrs. Cranning implored, and deli- cately raised her pretty hands to her ears. “Really, Jim, if you can’t use an ordinary tone—” “Say! Cut that stuff out, woman, and listen to me!”? James Cranning cried fero- ciously, and very noisily. “If you’re going to wait for me to tell you anything now, you'll be sitting right there in that same chair seventy million years after hell freezes over! And I won’t begin talking till a couple of centuries after that; and when I do, young lady, I'll let you tell me a few things first! Do you get that?” White, utterly dumfounded, Mrs. Cran- ning had risen. “Why, how—how dare you use that tone to me?” she gasped. “Tone! Hah! Dorothy, when I really get to going, you'll think that tone was just the chirping of a little bit of a baby canary bird! Because—” “Stop! Do you hear? Stop!” Dorothy cried regally. “I shall scream for help if you don’t stop this instant! And what is 435 more, now I refuse absolutely to hear you. Just in that one minute, you have proved the whole case against yourself! No in- nocent man in this world ever could—” ‘““Tnnocent man be—” James began in a tactful shout. ‘Jim Cranning, just one more of your filthy curses—” Dorothy said, and then she turned her back upon him, obviously over- whelmed with disgust. ‘‘ Oh, go—go,” she cried. “Go to your woman!” “Yes, and that’s exactly where I’m go- ing!” was the happy truth that James yelled at his wife, and he turned about with a violent jerk, and so pounded once more from his home! Choking audibly, mumbling and mutter- ing in the most absurd way, he banged down behind the wheel of the new car, and sent the vehicle whizzing up the square. Well— things were settled! It had been a very brief, very unlovely sort of interview, but at least, things were settled now, and all hands knew just where they stood. Dorothy Cranning was entirely through with her present husband. That had been in her eyes, and on her lips, and every- where about her. In cold fact, Irma Budlong had no more to do with the matter than had tne Sunnyvale station- master; she was merely the excuse for that pose which Dorothy had adopted to veil her own complete change. Actually—it oc- curred rather bewilderingly to James—the girl did not now care enough about her hus- band to loathe him honestly! As to whether James himself was com- pletely heartbroken or completely con- sumed with rage, he could not have told. It was even possible that he himself hated little Dot! Assuredly at this moment mighty few of the old warm sentiments to- ward that young woman were making them- selves felt within him. So maybe, incredible as it would have seemed a week ago, they had made a serious mistake in ever marry- ing. All the evidence seemed to point in that direction, this very early evening! Maybe she’d be happier with Fred Bud- long and —no, no! Young Mr. Cranning, having missed a parked car by about one centimeter, slowed down, and looked about him, wild-eyed and breathing heavily. The comilebooks: <=