Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 123, No. 3 — page 98: what you’re looking at

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

380 ARGOSY¥-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. Margaret drew her chair beside him and took his hand. ‘ Now,” she asked, with the _ quiet insistence which he remembered in her, usually—“ now, Hal, will you tell me what all this is about?” “My trip West?” he RKked vaguely. “Why does this Mr. Garth keep you out here in the desert?” she asked, and all the time her eyes examining him, and be- hind her eyes there was a promise of dan- ger for some one. The fighting blood of the Tysons was in her in full measure, as Hal knew well enough. ‘““He doesn’t keep, me here, Margaret. I stay of my own fyte will.” “ He only told me that you were thm— not like this!” she said angrily. ‘ Why hasn’t he sent a doctor to-you?” ° “ Ah?” muttered Tyson. ‘“ You’ve talked with him. Did he say that I was weakening on the job?” He chuckled. “He only said that you were working too hard.” ce Ah?” His eyes shone with gratification. “ But why has he let you get in this con- dition?” Her voice rang dangerously, The rough-handed vulgarian!”’ Tyson queried: -“‘ Didn’t I write to you that I was trying myself out at a man’s work?” _ “It was an amusing letter,” said Mar- garet Tyson. She turned his palm up... “Oh, Hal!” ‘The rough sacking of the cement had torn away the skin inside his hand and left it almost raw, and there were blisters at the finger-tips. . “ Manual labor?” said Margaret. He began to laugh again. It pleased him to see how completely she had mis- judged him. She thought of him as of a sort of hot-house, decorated specie? of man, not fit for the labors of the world.. ‘“‘And Mr. Garth knows you're in this condition?” asked the girl with ominous calms. 2 “¥ tell you, he has nothing to do with it, except that he first suggested nat I come out here.” “What in the world, Hal, could make you torture yourself of your own free will?” ~~ “T want to show you something,” he _murmured, rising. ‘““ Come over to the win- dow.” He pushed aside the curtain and re- mained clinging to it for support. With the other hand he gestured out over the desert. “Look!” he commanded. The view carried down over the roofs of La Blanca and then shelved rapfdly away across the desert. In the infinite distance the gray-black of the sky met the blue- black of the land, and everywhere the desert was dotted with lights; some of them moved, but almost as slowly as stars, at that distance; and those lights which were fartherest away seemed solitary, single rays. It looked like a harbor, with ships at anchor. . “It’s the work of the night shift,” he satd. “I see it every evening from this window. And when I’m tired out, as I am now, it puts new life into me. Do you wonder that I stay with this game?” “I’m trying to understand,” said Mar- garet, “but you never were interested in thingwlike this before.” “You never can teil what sort of a’sol- dier a man will make until he gets into a war,” answered Tyson calmly. “ But out here I feel as if I were one of the ranks— a unit in a marching column. - Can you guess at what I mean?” J She lifted her face from the ,desert-scene to Tyson, and mines as she saw his sunken eyes. “* There is something fine in it,” she ad- mitted. ‘‘ It means so nrch to you, Hal?” “Tm a small part—the very smallest part,” he said humbly, “ but for the first time in my life I’m a constructive, not a destructive force. That means a good deal.” He encountered her critical eyes, shrewd with suspicion. | | “Don’t laugh at me,” he challefiged. “T feel rather deeply about all this.” She looked away, smiling. “ And Garth?” she said. Tyson drew a quick breath, and then looked straight in the eyes of Margaret. ‘“‘T suppose you think it’s odd that such a fellow could influence me?”’ —— Onin Fito Aoolercn - mr CDOOKS.CO