Argosy All-Story Weekly, April 7, 1928 — page 103: what you’re looking at

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

GOLD. ment, joy, bewilderment, apprehension, adoration swept across it like a succes- sion of stormy clouds over placid water. “You know what I’m saying to you —a child like you entertaining these gin-guzzling rozzers!” The flush left her cheeks, giving way to a sudden pallor. Her eyes widened. “Who let you run off? Where's your father?” “On board.” “And he let you run away. Jove, it’s outrageous. You shan’t stay here. I'll take you to my lodgings at the City Hotel.” “ No, no, I can’t go there—” “Very well, to your ship then?” The men in the forefront of the audience saw the change that came over the girl’s face. Evidently the in- truder was not so welcome as at first it had seemed. Here was some tipsy Sydney Duck trying to break up a show. The audience was nonplused. Was it a meeting of long lost lovers? Or was it some one arising from the girl’s past to confront her in the hour of her great triumph? One man seemed to come to a deci- sion while the others were still dum- founded. It was Steve Lukon, the proprietor. He stepped from one of the booths to the stage and shoved his massive shoulder against the shoulder of the unwelcome guest. “T’d admire to sit in on this game, stranger,” he said quietly. Dorsey did not turn toward him. He did not hear him, even though the words were spoken in his very ear. “T’m seeing you back to your ship, my child,’ he announced to Priscilla. “Yes, yes—l'll go!” “TI said I’m sittin’ in on the game, stranger.” Dorsey felt a hand on his arm. The arm that was reached out with iron muscles taut, clinging to the girl’s hands. 93 “Tl go back—” the girl stammered. * Not until you finish out the eve- ning’s service,’ Steve Lukon said. The Englishman whirled about. “Look here, I say! Who the devil are your” “Tukon. I own this joint.” Dorsey’s fury at the scene of this girl entertaining a house of sousing hellions was concerted now, focusing itself upon this one man. The owner of the joint? Well, then, that meant he was responsible for the girl’s ap- pearance. still holding the girl with his right hand, he shot a left uppercut at the square jaw of the proprietor. Steve Lukon reeled back, knocking over candles and bottles, and hurtling into the mass of spectators on the dance floor. 3 He did not reach the floor. The men down there were so jammed that he was held bodily in the air, and then shoved back to the stage. It was precisely like a boxer who had tripped backward into the ropes and then been pushed into the ring again. The big smoke-befogged room seemed like a maelstrom of lights, of bearded faces whirling about. Steve Lukon. A bedlam of shouts deafened him. His head was swimming. His insensate fury burst as he saw Dorsey and the girl flee to the door at the back of the stage. Reeling like a drunkard on the empty stage, Lukon drew his pistol. He lurched forward toward the door. There was an exchange of shots. Lukon had fired point-blank into the darkness of the hallwav into which Dorsey and the girl had disappeared. A flash of light answered his shot, and he fell. Out in the mud and slush of the lot behind the big shack Dorsey fotind himself plowing along, tripping over tent ropes, sheering up sharp against an outhouse. “ Had to doit. Dare say I finished him. The bally old rozzer was going EOLPMICL OOO KS (E@)