Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 39: what you’re looking at

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

relieved as she turned away from the last one and remarked that she ought to be get- ting back. I guess the reason I have taken such an interest in you is that I myself was an odd bird when I hit this country,” he ex- plained. “ You may find it hard to believe, but I’m an Easterner, just as you are. Somehow, I didn’t seem able to fit into the ordered life of the country town where I was born. Tooslow for me. I had to have excitement and J got it in ways that were disapproved of. When folks began to refer to me as a black sheep, I figured it was time to light out, so I lit.” “Are you inferring that I am an odd bird?” One of her rare smiles lighted up Alice’s fair features. ‘You are mysterious, and that is odd. You are beautiful, and that is an attribute of most birds.”’ Her smile was wiped off like chalk marks on a blackboard. “I must ask you not to speak in that manner, Mr. Harper.” “ Then how about ¢/:is manner.” Harper did not look like a man-hunter now; a very tender expression was in his winning eyes. “TI love you, Alice, and I want you to marry me. That may seem sudden, but it is the truth. I want to shoulder your burden, whatever it may be. I want you to be happy. I am not a black sheep, really. I would be very good to you, Alice.” She looked at him in a sad and wistful manner. “ I—J appreciate your offer, Mr. Harper, but it—it is impossible. Please do not ever mention such a thing again.” Harper had expected some such reply. It fitted in with everything that she said and did. “Isn’t there anything I can do to help you?” he queried gently. “ Yes—let me manage my own life in my own way.” On their way back they called at the post office and Alice opened a bundle she had just received from a printer in Helena. She showed Harper a new circular which stated her business and appealed to the men to write letters to their friends and relatives, and she remarked that she meant to have them distributed along the whole line of con- struction. ™ - ~ Harper thought that she seemed 4 She laid whe else. we sonal letter on top of her packag per noted, without any intentio: on her, that the postmark read, * field, Ohio.”’ 7 The name impressed him. Willowfie That might have been the name of his owr native village, with its huge willow trees weeping over the fields and meadows in which he had played as a boy. * Probably that was where Alice came from. She had impressed him from the first as being a small town girl, and now, as he appraised her again, he felt sure that she was. Small town girls do not start typ- ing offices in rough Western railroad camps, of course, but on the other hand, big city girls do not, either. : At her office there was no business in sight, so Harper proposed that they should visit his. She might be able to give him some hints on how to keep it in order, he said. She consented with a reluctance that vanished when she noted the “‘ Man Want- ed” circulars that were pinned up in a long line on his wall. ‘“ What are those?” she queried. Alert for any sign that would throw light on the mystery of her appearance in Geyser, Harper noted her sudden interest, just as he had previously noted her interest in the graveyard. “ Just reward circulars,” he explained. “When a criminal escapes anywhere, the police send them out broadcast.” She was looking at the pictures and read- ing the descriptions underneath—methodi- cally, one by one, just as she had read the inscriptions in the cemetery. “If one of these men shows up in Gey- ser, you will arrest him, I presume?” “T sure wil].” “And pocket the reward?” “* That’s one of a sheriff’s perquisites.” “Do you catch many of these wanted men?” “I’m sorry to say that I don't.” “ But you keep a keen lookout for them?” “ Each and every one.” Harper thought that she was talking in a casual manner in order to conceal an interest that was considerably more than casual , comicbooks.cc