Argosy All-Story Weekly, April 7, 1928 — page 108: what you’re looking at

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

98 Swope smoked contemplatively, one ear cocked for the return of those prancing feet. ex He heard something. The African cake-walker, he reflected, must have changed his step. The approaching footsteps lacked that shuffling synco- pation which tickles the marrow of your bones. They came hurriedly, with a thump, a trip, a pattering. Had the negro got a barrel of coals that he came so awkwardly? Brass was listening with red, terrified eyes. Swope was overconfident, but the cooperer was sensitive to every nu- ance of sound. ‘They were playing a game which might land them all on the gallows; that had been his attitude from the first. And now he realized that the footsteps coming aft were not the black’s! Swope caught the difference a mo- ment later. He jumped to his feet, holding that infernal smoke in between half-parted lips. As the two men dashed to the steer- age door, they were met by a peculiarly disconcerting apparition. A slim, beautiful woman was there, clothed brilliantly like a flame in a dress of silk that was trimmed with stripes of plaid and flowers. Paint was upon her lips and upon her cheeks. A fire that was dazzling burned in her big eyes. Behind her was the pimply-faced doughboy. It was his feet that had thumped along, stumbling in his ex- citement as he shoved the girl before him on the way to the steerage. From Swope’s open mouth came a gasp of smoke. ‘Tom Brass’s ungainly arm fell inertly to his side, the hand that held the pistol shaking like a leaf. The skipper held out his manacled wrists. “ Priscilla!’ he moaned. In that single word there was all the hopeless- ness, the tragedy of a father who knew that everything he possessed was to be destroyed. : How inconsequential was the jeop- ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. ardy of a moment before, when only his life was in danger. How trifling a matter it seemed to him to be tortured 7 to lose his life—when compared to this! CHAPTER XXIII. FASCINATION. [ was the first time that Priscilla ] had come aboard still wearing the costume with which they had be- decked her at the Gold Rocker. In her flight from the dance hall after the scene with Dorsey, she had given no thought as to how she looked. Hurrying to the waterfront, then sculling her boat toward the whale ship, she recalled the fact that she must not appear before her father in that cos- tume. The paint must be cleaned from her face. It would have been abhorrent for her even to stand before the pious old Joshua, accoutered as she was to win the hearts of roistering men. But here she was, in the garb of a cantina girl, standing before her father! Many emotions might have been stirred up in the hearts of both father and daughter in this dramatic meeting. But there was time only for the one simple act on the part of each: - The girl saw the handcuffs on her father’s wrist, and fell down on her knees before him with a heart-break- ing cry. The father inclined his head forward, his eyes closed, his lips pressing upon the golden locks. He pitied her with that divine intensity of a father for a child, which has been likened to the pity of God for those who fear Him. The doughboy was excitedly stam- mering out what had happened. “Saw her alone in the boat—alone. Saw her comin’ on alongside. Knew it was her, bareheaded, moonlight on her hair. Knew it well enough. And alone. Alone she was—see?” “You seem to be tryin’ to tell the' Gomichbooks (E@)