Adventure, February 20, 1922 — page 154: what you’re looking at

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

~~ of butter melting on its surface, such a broil is seductive. All might have gone well with the steak and the Conway entente cordiale had Sherry found a clean handkerchief. He had shaved, bathed, dressed, polished and brushed. Then came a ten-minute hiatus, followed by a hail for Jessie. Sherry had run aground. “T want a clean handkerchief and there isn’t a blamed one,” he said. “There are more than a dozen in your drawer,” she replied stoutly. “T’ve raked the thing from stem to gud- geon. They’re not there.” © “Get out of the way and let me look,” said Jessie, fork in hand. It kept her looking for five minutes, but she found them, rolled up inside of a flannel shirt he had shoved about impatiently. “Lord, what a place to keep ’em!” grunted Sherry. ‘“‘Vou threw that shirt in there yourself,”’ snapped Jessie stiffly. - “I hung it on a chair to air a little, as always, and you threw it in. Then you just pawed like a mule till you had it all mussed up and the kerchiefs rolled up inside. I thought the Navy taught neatness.”’ “Can the lecture,”’ said Sherry, all at once the petty officer rather than the husband of the prettiest girl in the block. “Something’s burning!” Jessie shrieked and fled. She snatched the saucepan of spuds off the gasplate, turned them with her fork, then set the pan in a deeper vessel of cold water to remove the scorched taste. | She turned to the steak and gasped. Her finger flipped the lever around that shut off the gas. Her lip began to quiver. That huge and luscious steak had dried to leather and burned black around the edges. “T could cry if it would do any good,” she told herself. ‘I will anyhow if Sherry is cross. I can’t help it.” Sherry did not scold. He merely became stiff and overly polite. He made quite an elaborate show of peeling the burned por- tions of the steak in order to salvage a bit for Jessie. Then he put on the air of a mar- tyr and ate a morsel himself. Under this infliction his wife lost her self-control and said things. Sherry re- torted, and she gave him a shot below the waterline. “You mussed things up and then called 152 se Sh Adventure me just at the most critical time,” she said. “T think you are the one to blame for the burned steak. Then Sherry got mad, ‘and the net result was a row, winding up with Jessie in tears and Sherry reaching for his uniform cap. *fSo this is what I have come home to, is it?” he remarked, rising. “T think you are horrid to treat me so,” answered Jessie, slumping. | The fat was in the fire; and Sherry walked out, very stiff in the back and correct in attire, slamming the door just enough to emphasize his last remark. An hour later he had signed his name to papers that bound him to serve his national uncle for four years more dating from discharge. — it! There goes ten bucks to Biull,” he reflected as he came out to the street. “‘Better pay than be whined at and cried at, though.”’ He wandered about the city until he felt sure that Jessie would be sound asleep, then let himself into their apartment. There was a big couch in the little living-room. He would bunk there, so he would not dis- turb Jessie and set her off sniffling again ‘ He slipped his shoes off, tiptoed in, found his pajamas and came back to the couch without turning on a light. He eased him- self down. “Ouch!” said the voice of Jessie as some- thing gave under him. “Good Lord!” said Sherry, bouncing up. _ “What are you here for?” . “‘To sleep, of course,” said a sleepy voice. “You sat on my legs and it hurt. There is a whole bed in the other room, waiting for - you.” Sheridan grabbed his pajamas and hur- ried out. He slipped into the bed and stretched luxuriously, not without some few qualms over Jessie on the hard couch. It was a poor thing compared to the bed. A FEW days passed with little ===} jangles jingling unaccountably. In fee! due course his discharge came and Jessie perked up. The very next day came an order to report on board the Qo for duty. Jessie went white. “Have you— Did you—” she said, and could not finish, her eyes big. : “Yep. The day the steak burned I signed * up for another hitch. I suppose I made a —— fool of myself, to put it in my lan- ~ guage.” | ‘+ t . > ro" , ; “s 4