Argosy and Railroad Man's Magazine, Vol. 107 No. 3 — page 123: what you’re looking at

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

THE DEVIL’S RIDDLE. 465 Ma turned like an enraged dragon. ‘* Get out, every one of you! What do you mean, buttin’ into a lady’s room like this, anyways?” “Yes, get out, everybody,” Belle echoed importantly. ‘‘Who do you think you are to come butting into a lady’s room like this? Get out, everybody! It’s stifling in here.” Everybody turned to go as Belle sailed over to the window, threw it up with a Pan —then stood still. “Well, I’! be damned!” she exploded aftér a full minute. The departing company turned back. * | ‘* You all see that girl there?” she hissed. ‘“‘ Well, come here.” They crowded over to the window. ‘“ Look down there on that fire-escape! My husband!” She turned back toward Esther and made a sort of running leap for her. As she reach€® for the girl’s throat, Harold Weatherby’s arms closed around Belle from behind. ~ ‘““Let me gob” shrieked the infuriated woman. ‘* Come to me, deary.” Ma Frank opened her arms, and the poor, bruised girl stag- gered into them. “ I wouldn’t believe wrong of you sweety, not if I saw it with my own eyes. ? “My husband on_ the fire-escape!” screamed Belle. “What’s the row?” Maida Ayers, the two-dollar star, arrived in curl papers, with kimono half-caught together over her trail- ing gown. Her ‘bitter eyes searched the room. “Tt iss ze big bell-cow woman,” volun- teered the Princess Rachel with a shrug. . Slowly Maida made her way to the storm- ing woman and stood looking at her with a smile of unutterable triumph. When Belle’s eyes rested on her she became suddenly quiet. The two stared silently at each other. The whispering and jabbering ceased. Everybody felt that something important was going to happen. Esther’s face was hidden on Ma Frank’s voluminous bosom; Harold Weatherby still held Belle’s arms to her side. ‘‘ Maida!” Harold cooed, when the si- lence became oppressive, “I love this wo- man, and I don’t care who knows it. That’s. 8 ARcOosY why I hold her in my arms thus and before al) the world.” ‘* So!” Maida barked at Belle, taking no notice of the frivolous youth. ‘‘ So!” Her voice was pitched in her deepest contralto, her curl papers were at their most_queenly height. ‘“‘ Your chickens have come home to roost, Belle Benton! Big bell-cow! Ha, ha! It takes the French to fit the word to the deed. And you bawled, did you? Years ago, when J found my husband in your closet I told you that your chickens would come home to roost! But I didn’t make a bell-cow of myself! I didn’t baw. I just walked out. And I loved him. I loved him as you never could love any- body.” ‘* And I loved you, Maida—as God is my witness, I did!” Burt had come quietly into the room. “She tricked me—pushed me _into that closet just as you came in.” ‘Yes, I believe you did love me, Burt. You were just a boy. Twenty-two years old, and so irresponsible! ” A tender light came into the woman’s hard face. “ Just a boy, and like all men, easily flattered. Well, it fixed me; I didn’t bawl; but it made a wreck of me. I didn’t care for anything. Yes, Belle Benton, I threw my career, my morals and my looks away when you stole my husband and my faith in humanity. ‘“* People’? — she turned to the eager listeners—‘‘ you’ve heard me boast of being a two-dollar star. I was, for one season— fifteen years ago. I was to make my Broad- way début the following season. You proba- bly wouldn’t think it now; but I was said to be the most beautiful girl on the Ameri- can stage. You see these lines? Age didn’t put them there. Drink, smoke, sleepless nights did it—yes, and dope. I’m two years younger than Burt, and ten years younger than this creature, this viper, for all I look twenty years older. I had more than beauty in those days—I had personality and mag- netism. I drewthen as powerfully as I now repel. All the bitterness and hardness of me now was then sweetness and softness.” Burt sat down on the foot of the bed and sobbed aloud. The woman turned and looked at him. The softness crept back into her eyes. She reached out and laid her hand gently on his head. There was a CELDOO© = O) Co S Co mM