Argosy All-Story Weekly, January 21, 1922 — page 115: what you’re looking at

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

DOUBLES AND QUITS. he had languished in that death-trap. But he dared not let himself fear that she was dead, and his faith in her love touched the sublime. There were kind people in Witcham who would not have allowed her to starve, how- ever much they might blame him. He. thought of the little baby she had been ex- pecting, and wondered if it were safe. Poor Amy—she had been so alone through this long trial! He went up the steps to the gate of the terraced cottage. There were different cur- tains at the windows, from one of which a strange child’s face peered out at him. With a heavy heart he raised the knocker. The child came to the door—a little girl of about eleven. | “Does Mrs. Marshall live here?” Dick asked. He knew at once that she did not;: the furniture seen dimly behind the child was different—but he had to ask. Perhaps they would be able to tell him where Amy was. The little girl shook her head, her finger in her mouth. A woman sitting by the stove bathing a smaller child called out to her sharply to shut the door, but immediately she turned, and catching sight of Dick remembered her manners. “ Come in, sir, if you please. The draft’s very strong, and I don’t want this one to catch another cold. But if you’re selling anything—”’ ‘Thank you,” Dick said, hastily avail- ing himself of the invitation to enter. “I only wanted to find out the address of some one who used to live here.” The homely interior, familiar yet strange, struck him with a pang of homesickness. “A clerk at Tremlett’s, name of Mar- shall, lived here before us,” the woman vol- unteered as she wrapped her dripping infant in a warm strip of blanket. ‘“*I don’t know who had it before.” . . Dick cleared his throat. ‘“‘ It’s the Mar- shalls I’m inquiring about,” he said with an effort. ‘Can you tell me where they— where Mrs. Marshall has moved to?” ‘‘La! You must be a stranger, sir!” “TI am,” he replied. Never had anything seemed truer. 105 “Well, sir, it was rather a shocking story. I hope they weren’t particular friends of yours? Perhaps they owed you money. They owed so many people.” “No, I—I just want to find Mrs. Mar- shall. It’s a personal matter.” "© She isn’t Mrs, Marshall any more, sir,” the woman said with a sour little laugh. ‘She didn’t lose any time, either. Her husband was sent to prison for robbing his employer. Some say they don’t believe he did it, but it doesn’t do him any good now what anybody thinks. He died of the plague at Quentin.” “Did hee” Dick asked grimly. “ And his wife?” “Oh, he hadn’t been dead more’n two or three months before she married Mr. Tremlett—him that her husband robbed.” The visitor sank down onto a chair, his elbows resting on the kitchen table, his face hidden in his hands. “Oh, no!” he cried, his voice muffled yet betraying a sharp note of anguish. “T’m sorry, sir. Yes, it’s the truth, and I don’t wonder you’re shocked, It’s a liv- ing scandal, isn’t it? And they do say she’s changed a lot. I’ve only seen her myself driving about in her motor-car. Peter Tremlett's had his house all done up new. My husband is a painter, and he did some work there. He says nothing like it has ever been seen in Witcham.” The man was suddenly shaken by a coughing and shivering fit. He was like a bag of rattling bones. When he recovered he managed to get to his feet and thank the woman for her information. Then with a gesture of despair he made a dramatic exit. The woman ran to the window with the child in her arms to peer out after him. ‘Now, what do you suppose he wanted, Lily?” she demanded of the little girl. “‘ He Was a queer one, all right. It took him all of a heap when I told him Mrs. Marshall was married again.” The little girl had no answer to the rid- dle. “iI dunno,” she said. Dick went on down the street and pres- ently found himself in the brilliantly light- ed High. It was a Saturday evening, and all the shops were going full blast. . He comiclboooks C©