Argosy, Vol. 85, No. 3 — page 118: what you’re looking at

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

460 boobs. They come like they was little lambs what I was leadin’ to pasture. Gee! You’d ought to seen ’em. They got mixed up pretty close with one o’ them little bombs along the shore just about the time the Friedrich fired a shot and you let go the mine the other side of the yacht. This soaked guy went clean overboard. The other toppled into the cockpit an’ lay still with the muffler singein’ his hair and neck. And these two make-believe sailors just laid down to die anywhere the layin’ was good and handy.” Rudy had turned now and started back with us toward the row of shacks nestling in the hollow of the great crescent of soft coal. He bade the girl follow. Mean- while I was making an inventory of Rudy. All told, he looked good to me, and he sounded better. His broken English was not the sort a German learns in school, but the kind one picks up in a stay of a few years right around New York City, U. S. A. Apparently that same idea of the young officer had occurred to Hart- mann. | _ “ Say, Herr Offizier,” he spoke, in that utterly nonchalant manner which is the similitude of his entire attitude toward everything, ‘“ would you mind giving us some sort of steer as to what they’re go- ing to do to us for accidentally stumbling on this delightful little island of yours?” “T don’t know,” Herr Offizier Rudy replied quite seriously. ‘It would make a whole lot of difference for why you want to come to our delightful little island. You'll get plenty of chance to exblain that to dem Herrn Capitan. Whether he be- lieves you might be somethimg else again, see?” “ But—but—” Louie began. ‘“ Anyhow, I ain’t supposed to talk with you fellows. But, say—” his voice dropped—“ you don’t neither of you hap- pen to come from Newark, do you?”’ “Why, my father’s sausage factory is out on the meadows,” hastily responded Hartmann. . “You don’t happen to know anybody by name of Shiffen on Sixth Street, num- THE ARGOSY. ber a hundert and one? I got one sister, named Hilda, what boards there when I come away. Her and Mamie, here, ain’t never got along good — you know how girls is. So Mamie don’t know nothin’ about whether Hilda’s still there, or alive or dead yet.” Louie apologized for his utter ignorance of Newark beyond his father’s factories, Save as to the main streets by which mo- torists get through and out of that town. His regret sounded ‘pretty gemuine. “Tt must be devilish hard,” he mourned, ‘to be cut off from your rela- tives like this.” IT could have understood his regret if Loute weren’t half as sympathetic a big kid as he is. I was regretting a lot my- self, and was guessing whether it would be safe to assure our keeper that I knew his sister Hilda perfectly. The trouble would be that, if he asked any questions about Newark, I’d be caught bluffing. I don’t remember ever seeing even a picture post-card of New- ark. Anyhow, I didn’t have time to take the chance. In another moment we had been ushered into the august presence of Herr Lieutenant Baron von Hilberstein, a pink- cheeked, blue-eyed, golden-haired youth of a trifle over twenty, who stood up to greet us, looking as if he was afraid to death of us. It was not of us, however, that he was afraid. It was of his own almost fault- lessly though much too carefully pro- nounced English. ‘“‘T trust, gentlemen,” he said, when he had managed some form of general intro- duction, ‘“ you will understand our in- quisitiveness from the fact that the usefulness of our station here depends en- tirely upon our enemies’ tgnorance of its existence. “You will also appreciate that it is difficult for us to understand why you should have brought your yacht here from so pleasant a resort as San Juan; oh, yes, we have been the ones inquiring your po- sition every few hours under different comicloool C©