Argosy All-Story Weekly, May 3, 1924 — page 154: what you’re looking at

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

944 My law! May Gardner slashed and cut me! Don’t yo’ b’lieve she didn’t scorch an’ bruise me, an’ I was down on my knees at her feet beggin’ her mercy an’ pity, but my soul rang to sweeter music in the scorn an’ fire of her anger than eveh hit had echoed before. May Gardner jealous of me! May Gardner tearin’ to pieces the good looks an’ reputation of that up-the-bank Alice Ha- ven—account of me! “That woman dancin’ to my music!” May scorched me, her face twisting an’ her eyes squinting mad. ‘ You fiddlin’ for er to dance! That woman!” I expect some men is so sure an’ pop’lar that it don’t mean nothin’ to them when a woman’s jealous on their account. Prob’ly up-the-bankers, swell folks, neveh know what hit is to find out a lady likes them so much she hates anybody else that’s friendly. I come down on the riveh account of a woman’s laugh at my playing music, the best I could do, for her—when she’d been listening to jingling dollars in another man’s pocket. Funny, ain’t it, how things work out? I’ve been making more money in a day ’n that feller she jilted me for has eveh made in a week. I was at May’s feet. I kissed those pret- ty silk stockings, between the straps of her slippers. I cried, tears coming down my cheeks—but not on account of being sorry, no indeed! I was happy! I was so blamed happy I dassent to show her my face, for fear I would betray the joy I was enduring. An’ I took her hands in mine. I kissed them, grateful as a dog for the friendly pat of his mistress. I’d neveh in God’s world deserve any happiness that dancing girl had given me; the rewards of heaven couldn’t have tempted me away from what it dawned on me was coming to be mine—account of her being jealous of that up-the-bank woman! Course, d’rectly I was standing up. I was standing in the cabin of my shanty- boat, on the floor where Steppin’ May’d been practicing. An’ she was right theh, with my arms around her, an’ her face turned up to me. “May,” I said, “ yo’ don’t mean—yo’ don’t want me to ask yo’ to marry yo’, do you?” ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, “Don’t I?” she asked, awful sarcastic. ‘‘ What do I want, then?” I couldn’t believe it, even then, an’ her in my arms, all limp—to have for my own, to kiss those lips, to claim those eyes! Lawse! Lawse! Fiddling Luce come to this, down old Mississip’! Hit warn’t jes’ professional people. Hit warn’t jes’ me fiddlin’ for her practice step- pin’, come the time when she’d have some- body that ’d be able to play. Hit were me loving that lovely woman, with her arms around my neck, and my lips worshiping temple lips, looking into the gem-light windows of her soul. Yes, suh! How come hit that woman let on she loved me? How could she—that woman, like a statue alive? . I married her. We cut loose from Men- dova, trippin’ down. When night come, I couldn’t believe hit were so, that she wouldn’t, an’ I wouldn’t either, go out into that skiff alongside, to sleep under the tar- paulin—but this was our cabin, our room, and she’d sit on my lap. Sho! Sho! Yes, suh! Lots drap down old Mississip’, an’ the farther down they go, the more miserable they are. They’d better quit, fore they roll out at the Passes. But some —some that hear the music, some that see the flash and spread of the colors, some that listen to the birds and feel the soothing in the sting of the north wind, an’ smell the fragrance of the blossoms in the dank of the swamp brakes—they’d sure better keep on trippin’ down; yes, indeedy! I tell yo’, if a man can keep step to the song old Mississipp’ sings, he better not break with it. He'll march into the halls of plumb comfort, if he marks the time, yes, suh. That’s my experience. ’Tain’t everybody’s, but hit’s mine. An’ May, she says it’s her experience, too. We’ve been far together, New York an’ the Coast— Sho! No matter if we’s busy—ev’ry wunst in a while we stop off on old Mississipp’, buy a shanty-boat an’ trip down. That’s what we’re doing now. But we don’t neveh stop to Mendova any more. May won’t let me. “TI ain’t going to have that woman— any other woman—steppin’ to your music! ”’ Just like that, and then we both laugh. 9A COMIG DOO! S C©