Argosy All-Story Weekly, June 13, 1925 — page 128: what you’re looking at

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

600 Louis scowled; and Mumphy noted the scowl. ‘“ Where did you sav he was now?” asked Mumphy. “| didn’t say, ‘cause I don’t know,”’ re- plied the proprietor. ‘“‘ He come here, out of the woods, with the Stalvarts, in the spring of the year—last year. But he wasn’t here long. Lem Stalvart sold out an’ went away, and Jeff an’ Jules went with im. But I don’t know what for nor where to.” Mumphy’s face showed his bitter disap- pointment. “ Far away?” he asked in a broken voice. ‘+ “Damn fy know,” returned the pro- prietor. Mumphy went up to his bedroom and closed the door and said some very hard things about the world in general and Jules d’Ance and Jeff Stalvart and himself in par- ticular. * He was thus occupied when there sounded a cautious rapping on the door. After a moment’s hesitation he invited the rapper to come in. The door opened and the big fellow, Louis, still with his fur cap on his head, entered quickly yet smoothly. With the same effort, it seemed even with the same movement, with which he crossed the threshold, he clesed the door behind him. He stepped close to Mumphy, who sat on the edge of the bed, and stooped over him. “Wot d’ye want wid zis ’ere Jules?” he whispered. ‘“ What’s Mumphy. For seconds their glances held and probed—veiled, searching, illuminating glances. Each disclosed something of the truth, each read something of the truth. “Yankee?” queried the bushwhacker. “TY am,” admitted Mumphy. “ You're smart.”” And he smiled. “Come wid me,” said the other, “I know some t’ing you lak to ’ear, maybe. Foller me outside—an’ we go to Griffou’s place an’ talk plenty—an’ drink some, too.” “Done,” replied Mumphy, brightening to a simultaneous internal agitation of hope and thirst. that to you” returned ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. Louis Gerou slipped from the room as swiftly and smoothily as he had slipped into it. trie CHAPTER XIX. A PAIR OF BLUE EYES. ND what of Dora Stalvart, née Har- low, who, having eloped with a rich man’s only son for the relationship of daughter-in-law rather than for that of wife, had packed her little bag and left her husband flat and snoring upon proving beyond a doubt, after several months of feverish matrimony, the wisdom of her original idea and mental attitude? Winter came early to Porcupine Brook that year. Plentiful harvests had been garnered on Lem Stalvart’s big farm; and herds and flocks had been Imcreased by purchase after the housing of the turnips. Lem could afford to farm right. The care of the live stock, including the milking, kept the boss and Tom Skellog busy; and Jules, who derived a degree of comfort from the snow-muffled quiet of the woods, undertook to get out next year’s fuel single- handed. Jules went alone every morning into a high grove of old-growth birches and maples, with an axe on his shoulder and his lunch in his pocket, and there wrought alone all day; and Lem and the Skellogs worked about the barns and house al] day; but at night, after supper, Lem and Jules left the kitchen to the Skellogs and played chess and talked, and played chess again, in their own sitting-room. In the sitting-room were Jules’s beloved books, and new complete sets of several standard authors recently purchased by Lem, and a fire on an open hearth, and a collection of the shabbiest and most comfortable chairs in the world. There many terrific battles were fought between the red pieces and the white, and more terrific battles (in the deep heart of Jules) when Lem talked of what he would do and how he would feel if he had a son like Jules instead of none at all: but nothing of the conflict of either the mock battles or the real showed in Jules’s calm face and still, dark eyes. | cConnicloool. CO