Pulp Fiction, 1938 · page 8 of 64
10 Story Book, August 1938 — page 8: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Page Analysis This is a page of story prose from a pulp magazine, containing the conclusion of a narrative about a circus sideshow and a supernatural encounter. The upper section describes how a girl discovers that an apparent "phantom lover" visiting her at a circus is actually a living man—identified as the "Living Skeleton" performer—who has been sneaking through the bars. The story resolves when the circus owner stops the illicit meetings by securing the enclosure. Below this narrative conclusion is a separate, italicized first-person monologue from an unnamed character (appears to be a woman of disreputable profession) lamenting her social status and mistreatment, referencing locations from Shanghai to San Francisco and invoking Islamic and religious imagery about fate and judgment.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
INTRIGUING STORIES, SPICED WITH PRETTY GIRLS! (Continued from page 4) however, the girl was nervous and jumpy, and soon after that midnight beating of the sideshow closing drum she slipped off to her room. And when the Madame could get away from business, which was rushing, she chased after her, arriving just in time to hear that scurring up the sidewall. She let out a shriek as she actually saw the phantom lover trickle like ectoplasm right through those close-set bars. With one elastic flip, like the snapping of a shrimp’s tail, his bare heels went through and he dropped out of sight in the alley. Now she knew this was no ghost, for she'd seen mud on the soles of those feet, and by putting two and two together fig- ured he must be one of those outlandish freaks from the sideshow. Katisha’s secret was out, and that lover who never came in by the front door was quickly identified by the circus owner himself as the Living Skeleton and Human Eel in his poverty- stricken little troupe. It was the Human Fel’s function, too, to beat the drum an- nouncing the end of the show at midnight, and in that way he signaled to Katisha whether he’d be right over or not. There was no money to get out of this wriggling string of a man who trickled in and out through the bars at the witching hour to enjoy those illicit moments of true love, so Madame put a stop to it by nail- ing chicken wire close over the bars and business went back to normal, without fear of either man or ghost. -. | am one of life's tragedies. A plaything of Fate, a slip of Chance. Perhaps under different environment | would have been respected and honored, but Kismet as the Mohammedans say. From Shanghai to Frisco, every dive has known me. My price is not high, that is why | am always available. | hate men, yet they insist upon taking me to their private parties. After | am all lit up they press me to their lips and soon they get all they can out of me. In the hands of the police | fare no better. At the station it is the same story. The treatment there is no better. Every possible name is attached to me. Me, a descend- ant of a great family tree. It seems that | am in everybody's mouth. Ah cruel fates, judge me not. Justice shall triumph. Yet | go on in spite of slander and mistreatment. | cry that it is un- fair, even though | am a cigarette. C@ Goook C@