The Argosy for May — page 36: what you’re looking at

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

AT HIS persed before I had even time to draw my trusty blade.”’ At this moment, while the audience was listening to the narrative with bated breath, inarticulate, apoplectic sounds drew all eyes to Mr. Thorley, who was seen to be purple in the face from sup- pressed laughter. “My word! Oh, Lord! - Oh, save me!” he howled, rocking backward and forward and holding his sides. ‘What is the matter?” shouted every one at the same time. “ Are you ill, father?” cried Ethel. ‘“No—no!” he gasped, partially re- covering; ‘but Singleton! Oh, Single- ton, you will be the death of me! Didn't you draw that keen blade from its scab- bard at all, you rogue? ”’ ‘Why, no,” answered Singleton. “I found that the danger was over before it had well begun, and [ really never thought to look at the blade afterward.” MERCY. 223 Thorley had a slight relapse, but managed to gasp to the butler who was in attendance: “Go fetch me that heavy stick from the hall-stand.” The butler brought in the now-famous Malacca cane, and all eyes were turned upon it with reverence; but ‘Thorley seized it and, still shaking with laughter, pressed the button with his fat thumb, took off the upper part of the stick, and disclosed to the view of the astonished audience, in the lower section, the mouth of a glass tube from which he decanted into his wine-glass a fluid which resem- bled good brandy. As Singleton and the rest began to recover their wits and grasp the situa- tion, Thorley raised his glass and said: ‘I propose a toast to the hero who, armed with his trusty brandy - flask, fought and captured three desperadoes, single-handed.”’ AT HIS MERCY. By JOHNSTON McCULLEY, Author of “ Land of Lost Hope,” ‘‘ Shipmates With Horror,” etc. How a great city became practically dead, and the strange con- ditions encountered by those who braved the perils of the place. ECHAPTER= 1 THE INVISIBLE WALL. T ten minutes. after the hour of noon, on a bright day in April, the South Coast Limited was speeding toward the city of Merton at a rate of sixty miles an hour. Jerry Calkins, the veteran engineer, grasped the throttle firmly, and his eyes watched closely the twin lines of steel ahead. The train was due at Merton in three minutes, and was seven miles from the Union Station. Calkins was a man who detested being behind time. Suddenly the locomotive whistle shrieked. “Well, we’re at the junction tower,” commented his fireman. ‘‘ We'll not be more than five minutes late at that. And after all the bad luck we’ve had—” “Shut up, you fool!’ Calkins cried above the roar of the train. “ Five min- utes amounts to something when we're driving the crack train of the road! Do you take this for an annulled freight? We'll get called by the old man as much as though that five minutes was five hours! ‘This is the last time I’m going to try— What the deuce!” The fireman gave a cry of alarm. Jerry Calkins answered it with a cry of wonder. ‘Then he swung on the throttle quickly, and stood on the floor of the cab, shaking like a nervous wreck, great drops of perspiration standing out on his face and arms. : ‘“What—what was it?” the fireman gasped. For the limited, running at a mile a minute, had suddenly stopped, as though it had crashed against a stone wall! “T—I thought we'd jumped track!” Jerry gasped. ‘ W-what—’”’ “We're still on the track!” the fire- man cried. “ What did it?” the MICLOOOLES (C@