Argosy, Vol. 118, No. 4 — page 42: what you’re looking at

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

512 “You'll stop over at our place as much as you can, won’t you? You and your mother will spend Thanksgiving day there. And—and your father,” she added hastily, “if he’s home.” That shrinking that had been growing upon the other girl, which was almost habi- tual with her mother, as though she feared a blow, became more pronounced. She forced a smile— ‘T guess so,’ we'll be glad to.” Atop a hill Jaqueline topped to dwell enthusiastically on the rolling panorama in which, bleak as.it was with the trees > she said. ‘‘ Of course— bare and cold, she found the rugged. beauty. “There,” she pointed ahead of them where the road dipped a quarter of a mile away—that’s the Rock. We're going to picnic there, Dot, before we go back to «school, whether it rains, hails, or snows. Rex wrote me the other day that he was over and fixed up the fireplace so every- thing would be shipshape for us.” Rex was her thirteen-year-old brother, the only other child. “And there’s a big trout down ‘in the pool below that he’s been saving for me— for us,” she ran on. Her eyes lighted as they resumed walking. ‘“ Say—let’s go down and see if we can get a look at him—Rex says he’s a trout among trout.” Dorothy negatived the proposal. “It would take half an hour to climb down to the pool and up again,” she ob- jected. “And,” she laughed faintly, for her heart wasn’t in it, “ you know how you’d be, Jack. You’d stay looking for that fish until it was too dark to see. Let’s go straight on,” she was almost auras: “T want to get home to—to—” She wanted to get home to learn whether her father was there, but she could not say it. Jacqueline understood the unspoken words. “All right, Dot,” she agreed. “ We won't stop. That is,” she amended, “ we won’t go down to the pool. We'll go over to the Rock a minute—just for a minute.” Dorothy didn’t argue—she couldn’t be constantly a wet blanket. » “Just for a minute, Jack. We'll have THE ARGOSY. lots of time in the week before we go back to school.” They reached the point where the Rock stands fifty yards off the road. Jacque- line leading the way, they went over the path to it through the trees. On two sides the Rock, an odd, square- topped formation, rises straight up to its height of twenty feet. On another it sinks sheer for seventy feet into the chasm where the ,stream now snarls and whips itself to foam. The fourth side is a broken slope allowing already foothold for one to clam- ber to the summit. Dropping their hand-bags at the base of the crag, Jacqueline started up it. “Come on, Dot,” she urged. “ We'll peek at where that trout is waiting.” She was half-way to the top, and Doro- thy followed. ‘Together they inspected the fireplace they had helped to build years ago, and which Jacqueline’s brother had repaired in preparation for their homecom- ing. ‘Then they looked down the seventy- foot face of the rock—Jacqueline standing fearlessly with one foot on the edge, Doro- thy keeping as far back as possible, and craning her neck to see the pool that held the prize Rex had promised them. “Be careful, Jack — please.” Dorothy shuffled backward another few = “ You might—fall.” Jacqueline stretched her arms out over the gorge and laughed with head thrown up, her body straight and tall. “Fall!” she was saying scornfully when a scrunching on the rock behind warned her toturn, | A whiskered face under a shapeless hat was regarding them from the place at which they had ascended. Even in the dim light Jacqueline could see the dirty eyes apprais- ing herself and Dorothy in turn. Only the head and shoulders of the man were show- ing, but that sufficed to present a complete picture of him. His grimy paws came into sight as he hauled himself deliberately up- ward. | While they stood motionless, Jacqueline still on the verge of the chasm, Dorothy reaching out a hand to her for courage, he greeted them. “ Howdy, girls?’ The dead cigar stub CoOnniclooo (C(O)