Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 18, 1928 — page 34: what you’re looking at

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

? By GORDON STILES Author of ‘‘ The Call to Arms,*’ ‘‘A Sweet Voyage,"’ ete. ‘ A NOVELETTE—COMPLETE IN THIS ISSUE . ERLE WENTWORTH rose from | his chair in the “ side-arm ” lunch room where he usually took his breakfast and, with his throat still warm from the final draft of coffee, made his way into the biting cold of the street and turned his footsteps in the direction of the subway station at Broadway and One Hun- dred and Thirty-Seventh Street. With the patience which New York’s great tunnels have bred in millions of free-born citizens, he allowed himself to be herded into an already over-jammed express where he stood, wedged in too tightly to read the newspaper, scanning the array of old famil- iar advertising cards that extended the length of the car on either side. Tampers Pills—Hold-Fast Shoe Laces— Armor Brand Underwear—Dotty Dimple Soap—all there. No new ones this morn- ing. Merle knew the list by heart. He knew every curl and quirk in the de- corative borders, every comma in the text matter. So, by the time the train had reached Seventy-Second Street, he had withdrawn his attention from the signs and had given himself over to thought. 832 That was what happened most mornings and his cogitations almost invariably ran along the same line. The mental process naturally began with Clare Hollis and, in his mind, Merle checked off her outstanding qualities, to wit: Beautiful, graceful, sweet, charming, bright, poised—well, that was a beginning. She had a lot of others which were simply indefinable! You had to see her eager, lovely face, her soft, brown hair and her adorable lips, to understand. And hear her marvelous, liquid voice! She liked him. Merle felt sure of that. Still “ liking ” was not “ loving.” She prob- ably liked a number of fellows—among them, Harvey Sykes, blast him! Merle thought that, if he had a decent income, he might perhaps pull away from the field. But what could a chap do on thirty-seven dollars and fifty cents a week, the sum which Merle drew every Saturday from the thin-hpped cashier of the Wilmot Office Supply Company, Fulton Street? In that connection, there was a bit of consolation in the fact that Harvey Sykes 2A VOO (EOLA cS G (E(@)