Judge — August 1937 — page 14: what you’re looking at

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

PEDESTRIAN PERIOD R. Martin emerged from the flor. ist's with a bouquet of roses clasped in his chubby fist. He scanned the boulevard carefully and then, ob- serving that traffic appeared to be well under control and that the lights were with him, he stepped from the curb and set forth confidently for the other side of the street. It is doubtful if any man ever was more at peace with the world than Mr. Martin as he pointed his steps across the broad highway in front of the auto- mobiles that were waiting. His business had been excellent in the morning; his digestion better than normal. He had broken ninety at golf that afternoon. for the first time in a year, and he was taking some roses home to his wife. Indeed, such was his spirit that it seemed to him all the world must be his friend, and he glanced up to bestow a benignant smile upon the waiting drivers. But the smile died horridly in gesta- tion. As he lifted his glance Mr. Martin suddenly became aware that the eyes of every driver in the front row of cars were fixed upon him. Several of the cars had moved a little across the white stop-line, and were rocking menacingly back and forth in gear. Behind the first row were many others, waiting for the lights to change. And on all that broad boulevard there was no pedestrian but Mr. Martin. Appalled at his predicament, Mr. Martin paused and looked back mo- mentarily to see how far he had come. Then, seized with genuine fright at the homicidal expression in the faces staring at him, he tossed dignity to the winds, clapped his hand on his hat and made ready to sprint the remaining distance. Too late. The front line of cars, which had been rocking faster and faster in the past few seconds, leaped ahead with a grinding and ripping of gears, just as the unhappy pedestrian reached midstream. The packed cars in the rear, like water in a reservoir that feels re- lease of a breaking dam, began to press forward into the breach, and from the mass came a terrible roar of motors. SEVEN of the leaders were away at the touch of their accelerators. The eighth, in front of which Mr. Martin was warely caught, jumped toward him viciously and stopped with a screech just before it touched him. With a yelp Mr. Martin dove ahead, squarely into the roaring pack. Again there was a shriek of brakes, many brakes this time, and now the din of horns was added to the uproar. Mr. Martin cast a rabbit glance at the face of the nearest driver and promptly leaped in a new direction, for the fury of that countenance could not have been greater if Mr. Martin had just butchered the man’s entire family. C 12 In a new agony of terror he skipped backward and forward, now dodging a car that whirled his topcoat around his legs as it lunged past him, now halting another that advanced, even to the cloth of his trousers, with the ferocity of a wolf bringing its prey to earth. Somehow, miraculously, _ through clouds of exhaust smoke that choked his lungs and assailed his smarting eyeballs, he maneuvered clear of the pack at last, and was safe on the opposite sidewalk, standing beside his own parked sedan. Collapsing into the driver's seat he mopped his brow with a handkerchief and sat blinking and panting, waiting for his heart to stop hammering at his ribs. The roses were still in his hand, clutched in a convulsive grip. Mr. Martin's thoughts softened a little as he noticed them, and he laid the flowers tenderly on the seat beside him. Finally he heaved a great sigh and started his motor. Probably he should be thankful he had come through it all without get- ting hurt, he told himself. By the time he had driven a dozen blocks toward his house the incident was quite forgotten. Again he was filled with expansive good-will, and as he braked his car to a stop at a traffic light, he viewed the world once more with a fine sense of charity toward his fellow-men. Ae then an incomprehensible thing occurred. As a lone pedestrian stepped from the curb and began mak- ing his way nonchalantly across the street, Mr. Martin's chubby face lost every trace of its benevolent expression and took on a look that was almost ani- mal. Gone was the thought of his rising sales chart, his improved digestion, his golf score and his roses. He fixed the approaching pedestrian with a malevo- lent gaze and putting his car in gear, eased it across the white line, rocking it menacingly backward and forward. —Frep S. ToBEy IOLLY WOOD PREMIER re "Well, then, was Robert Taylor the one with this color hair?” Judge comicbooks.com