Argosy All-Story Weekly, March 15, 1924 — page 59: what you’re looking at

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

YOUNG ‘‘ Nope,” says Jimmie. “TI had my little fling at cigarettes yesterday. I was just trying myself out. I wanted to see if I could go wild and free for a day and then put on the brakes. The brakes are all set. For me not a thing to-day but business: You notice the keen, determined look on my face, don’t you, Mr. Tom Hill?” He was smiling with his lips, but there was a kind of a sad look in his eyes. He looked older, too. I expect he had lived more in that yesterday than I had sus- picioned. Things was happenin’ to Jimmie, but I wasn’t much worried this bright morn- ing as to what the end would be. I had a notion that there was method i in Jimmie’s madness. “Will you drive into the city with me?” he asks. “J will go anywhere with you, Jimmie,” says I. “You are a pretty ‘good scout at ana, Mr. Tom Hill,” he says. “ Let’s go.’ My conscience give me a little dig when I thought that maybe I wasn’t playing quite square with Jimmie, but I give it a kick in the ribs and it lay down. For a fact, I was sort of spying on Jimmie, but I meant to stick along with him, so I wasn’t double- crossing him none. We had a nice ride into the city, and Jimmie put the car in a garage down town. -We walked several blocks and come to a place that was all big warehouses. You'd have thought there was enough stuff in them to-feed and shoe and clothe the world. One place was labeled “ Wholesale Gro- ceries,’” and Jimmie led me into that, He asked a man sitting at a desk where Mr. Morgan was, and the man sent him along an alley, and we come to a little cubbyhole of an office where a baldheaded man was sitting, and the baldheaded man was very pleasant to Jimmie and kind of beamed when Jimmie said he wished to buy a stock of groceries for a new store that he was starting in our town. Well, I rolled along after them two brisk people while they went in and out among the allevs of that warehouse. Jimmie looked things over and then we went back to the cubbyhole and IJ sat in the doorway, not wishing to take up all the left-over room REBELS, 687 there was, and Jimmie and beaming Baldy sat down and talked things over, and then a girl come in and wrote a list of things as long as my arm and the baldheaded man bowed us out, after telling Jimmie that he knew his business and could not fail in his venture. | “* Oh,” says Jimmie, “ my‘store is to be a cash store and I’m paying cash. You can draw on me to-day for the full amount. T will let you know when to ship.” ° “Very good, Mr. Fraser,” says Baldy. ‘““ Very good, indeed. Let us hear from you from time to time. We-shall be interested in knowing how you get along and our Mr. Kennerly will call on ‘you as he goes over that territory.” “‘ Good day,” says Jimmie, very dignified. We went out and went along the street and come to a place where they had show- cases in the windows. In we went. , “ Show me,” says Jimmie in his new, high manner, ‘‘ dustless, flyless showcases to out- fit a modern store.” I let Jimmie buy them showcases all by his lonesome. I went out on the sidewalk and lit a cigar and stared up the street with unseeing eyes, as they say. I was get- ting the correct slant on Jimmie, I thought. Yesterday he had been just plain and simple mad. He had been busting out at the pores because Sadie had flew the home nest and was having a good time all by herself at the beach, apparently giving not a back- ward thought to her hard working, washing machine buying but nonetheless loving hus- band. But now I seen that Jimmie was taking a high dive that: would land him in the swimming pool of success or break his neck. The question was would the people of our town take to a cash.store. Jimmie could undersell ’Lije all right on an even break and he could undersell him because ’Lije was an old robber on general principles. There was three other grocery stores up and down Main Street, but it would be ’Lije that Jimmie would have to buck chiefest. "Lije had been in business a long time. He carried customers, lots of them from the farm districts, for Jong speus when things wasn’t breakin’ very good for nobody. Could Jimmie make a go COmMicboo aE