Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 6, 1923 — page 75: what you’re looking at

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

= here. fastidiously dressed in smartly cut clothes. He still wore his overcoat. Tortoise-rimmed glasses perched on the bridge of his beak- like nose. A long silk cord ran to his ear and down to a buttonhole. His glistening bale head shone like a billiard ball. He was smooth-shaven, and his features were strongly marked. The sudden coming of the girl made him squint. Again Nancy had a baffled sense that the face opposite was vaguely familiar, But she wasted no time on blurred memory. = May I ask,” she demanded sarcastical- ly, “who you are?” He watched her carefully. In the look recognition flooded his face. She knew that he had been more successful in his identi- fication of her. “I see that I need not warn you that yOUE skulking, suspicious presence here places you in a highly equivocal light. Ws doubtless are aware also that I, in the pur- suance of justice, cannot It old inviolate whatever you may say.” He nodded brusquely. “ I know—let me introduced myself. I am an old client of _ Mr. Kent here on business of a most pri- vate nature.” “ Evidently.” He flinched before the scorn in her voice. - “Vour name?” she went on. The tortoise-rimmed glasses fell from hig nose with the sharp spasm which contorted his face. “Amos Shoreham,” he anomie’ prag- matically.— “President of the a "National Bank,”’ Nancy thought, “ and—more extra- ordinary than all—the executor whom the dead Cavendish had named in his last will which now lay hardly dry in Mr. Cunning-_ ham’s safe, even as its testator lay hardly cold inthe oie upstairs.” : | “Vou doubtless realize the unpleasant- ness of your position, Mr. Shoreham,” she observed aloud. “ Indeed, I do,”’ exploded the man irasci- bly. hours—* —_ Nancy looked at her wrist =e is now one thirty, Only an hour and 4 ‘half has elapsed since you elected to wait _ didn’t you hasten out after him, when he ~ “me when my mind is full of Sa whide took Mr. Kent from this room?” : . stated with my worst ear toward the corri-— a = “¥ have been penned in here for = to test the truth of Mr. Shoreham’s ay We might as. well oe at the ee deat — He had Be the truth. set = be very éeact= in our statements— = es Mr. Shoreham.” = = Well, it seems a oe And a = a mighty important engagement. Now that _ you've found me, may I go?” “Not at aie “Why not?” he snapped frucolently- “You have no intimation of what has” eccurred?”’ = - “No. Kent went out in a fae a a= he heard some one calling, and he } has ‘not = = come back yet.” == “Tf your time is so highly precious, ay had been gone overlong? If your impa-_ tience is as great as you say, why hasn’t it - manifested itself in some way other ‘than your waiting here?” : “"Thunderation, miss! Didn’t I tell you that Kent is putting through something _ ighty important, that he broke off in the — midst of it, and I can’t go until = has finished the business?” : == “ And you had no curiosity?” = “ Of course not,” he blustered. “ Why should some commotion in the hall interest — affairs?” = “Did you hear the nature af the cry 7 te No. 5¥- = “ How did it happen that you could not translate the words which Mr. Kent so ob- _ viously did? You were both closeted here | together with an equal opportunity to hear.” The pompous bank president flushed. “ That isnot so. I am slightly deaf. T was” dor. I made nothing out of the noise.” “Then you know nothing of a has tle of fish, too, waiting = Tike a ses rat trying to make up my mind whether I should go or stay. Where is Kent, anes : way? His conduct is infamous.” ‘Mr. Kent is retained.” “ Detained?” thundered the man. Se Nancy looked down quickly. Ter ruse had worked. She had purposely dropped — her voice on the first syllable of ‘ retained’ = = Se ae Ss