Argosy All-Story Weekly — "The Purple Limited" — page 176: what you’re looking at

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

142 “When do you think we can have our opening, Fred?” Fred pondered a moment. “It ‘ll be a month, anyway. If I send this out to-mor- row, it ought to be printed next Sunday, if they hold it for the Sunday edition. Well, it ‘ll take a week or two for it to take ef- fect, and a week or two to complete our beokings. I think we can open it in about a month.” ““Make it Thanksgiving Day, then— four weeks from next Thursday,” said Bert. “You can include that in your article to hurry up the slow ones. How about it?”’ “‘ Great!” roared Fred. ‘‘ Couldn’t pick out a better day.. Lord knows we'll have - something to be thankful for. And as for our guests— why, they'll eat the first Thanksgiving Day dinner they’ve eaten since they got fat, and not have a guilty conscience afterwards!” The article that Fred wrote that night was — to use his own phrase — “a lulu.” The syndicate to which he submitted it welcomed it enthusiastically, and the edi- tors of Sunday supplements, from Maine to California, featured it across two pages. The result was the expected one. ters, addressed to “ Manager, Majestic Ho- tel,” came pouring into The Punch office, and each of the writers was answered with a booklet whose Fredonian phraseology dispelled any doubts to which the newspa- per article might have given rise. - Two weeks before the day set for the Majestic’s opening every room had been reserved, and the number of additional ap- plications for accommodations promised an endless stream of pilgrims to this new mec- ca of the middle west. “It’s a shame we can’t accommodate more people,” Fred declared one day. “ It hurts me to have to write so many of these two-hundred pounders that they must wait from six months to a year before they can hepe to become perfect thirty-sixes! We ought to tell em to come anyway, Bert, and let ’em find rooms wherever they can; and then we could charge so much for the right to drink the water.” So it was agreed; and when the tidings were sent broadcast over Selma that it Let- | ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. might thus share in Bert’s good fortune, the town began to hum with preparations. Spare rooms were put in order, and, in many instances, rooms that had never been spare rooms were immediately so designat- ed and reserved for eager guests. A sud-— den epidemic of solidly constructed furni- ture swept over Selma; and Mrs. Dan’! Seabury, whose delicate gilt-and-gold par- lor set had for so long been the source of . pride to herself and boundless admiration to her visitors, regretfully packed away the fragile pieces and ordered a Circassian wal- nut set from Pinebluff. Anticipating an era of great prosperity, Selma changed color like a chameleon that is brought from darkness to light. Josh Hartley, the hardware man, replenished his stock of paints three times in as many weeks. Even the Palace Hotel, the most sloven- ly, perhaps, of all of Selma’ s pathetically drooping structures, seemed to straighten and hold itself more erect in the sudden pride of its newly painted glory; and the reorganized Board of Selectmen, after an enthusiastic session during which each al- lusion to the name of Bing, Bang, Boom was greeted with applause, unanimously voted an appropriation for repairing the roadway, all the way from the railroad sta- tion to the Majestic Hotel. The days, filled as they were with prep- arations, passed quickly, and soon came the _ eve of Thanksgiving Day. David Hodge, returning to the railroad station from hi& supper, was met at the door by Amos, the usual excitement danc- ing in the youtls eyes and bubbly to his lips. “Well!” said David. ‘“ What now?” “That there Bing, Bang, Boom was here!”” Amos exploded. ‘“ He come in on the six twenty, from Pinebluff. He was. there all day, David.” “IT don’t see nothin’ onusual in that,”’ David declared, rubbing his hands _to- gether; for the November night was chill. ‘“‘ He’s been goin’ there ’bout three times a week.” ~ “But he brung yer somethin’,” said Amos. “It’s a big box, wrapped up, an’ ever’thin’. He couldn’t wait fer you to git (C(O) nn) (C 6)(0)O) KS (C(O) nn)