Adventure Magazine, Mid-September 1917 — page 77: what you’re looking at

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

Wild and Woolly “Tt is the sixteenth,” Powell. Jonesy whistled and tried to remember who played Liveburg on the sixteenth. Ordinarily he could rattle off all itineraries in the league without an error. Now—his head hurt. He couldn’t make things line up. He strained his ears to catch sounds from the ball game and watched the tops- of trolley-poles as they passed the hospital. They were always strangely fascinating, but at this moment they were more than that. They lured. They taunted. “I’ve just got to find out something,” Jonesy murmured grimly after bearing the strain as long as it could be endured. Ten minutes after Miss Powell had left the room to answer a telephone call in the office Jonesy was sitting on the edge of the bed with his bathrobe over his shoulders. He put his arms into the sleeves, shoved his feet into some grass bedroom slippers and swayed drunkenly upon his feet. His head whirled terribly and he could barely hold up his weight. When the diz- ziness had passed Jonesy followed the wall to the door and in another moment was in the hall. There was no one in sight. Straight for the stairway back of the elevator he reeled, resting when he was out of sight at a turn and after a while reaching the attic. It was harder work to climb the ladder to the roof but he finally made it, sinking exhausted against the dome. Jonesy was at the game. From where he lay he could obtain an excellent view of Sportsman’s Park. He knew the teams by their uniforms and knew all players by the way they ran, threw or by other peculiarities. Jonesy saw the reason for the continuous rooting. Live- burg was eating up Oakland, simply chew- ing the visitors to pieces. It was impossible to see the score-board but he himself counted five men across the plate for the Liveburg team. McGinnis went to the bat. There was a man on first and one on third. There were two outs. One strike was called on McGinnis. Two balls the great batter let go by. Then—oh, such a_ beauty! McGinnis slugged a hard liner to the left of second. The man on third loped home. The man on first crossed second, then third and then tried to make it home. ‘The ball was thrown to the catcher; he dropped it and McGinnis was tearing toward third. replied Miss 79 Jonesy gasped a couple times, and then did just what he had been trying to keep from doing. He yelled. He yelled as long as the crowd yelled in the grandstand and bleachers. He was on his feet, his scarlet bathrobe whipping sensationally about in the wind and his bandaged head making him appear quaint and ghastly upon his high observatory. All at once his brain began to buzz. Everything grew dark. He was aware that he was being carried and later felt pillows under his head. Again blackness. When he came around this time his mind was clear but his head ached. An ice-cap rested over the bandages around his brow and over it was a towel, the end of which fell to the tip of his nose. Looking under the towel he saw the white skirt of a nurse. She was sitting in a chair at his elbow and had a finger on his pulse. Jonesy’s soul began to stir with throbbing paroxysms of sentiment. His fingers sneaked about her wrist and slipped down, a tenth of an inch at a time, until they closed gently about her hand. She made no ef- fort to free herself so he closed his eyes and patted the back of her hand contentedly, arguing with an impulse that wanted him to execute something yet more daring. Some time elapsed. The nurse removed the towel and he looked up into her face. “My Lord!’ gasped Jonesy. It was Miss Simpson. Miss Simpson, who seemed very hard to satisfy on the question of pulsations, pulled her chair closer and again closed her fingers about the patient’s wrist. He jerked away his hand and rolled over on his side with his back to her. He was mad all over. ‘““What they puttin’ that old curio in here with me for?” he muttered. ‘“‘What’s be- come of Miss Powell? Huh! I got ’em,” Jonesy whispered against the pillows. “It’s a frameup. Well, watch me show a- sortie.” He smiled upon Miss Simpson’s long nose and beneath its ample shadow saw an ivoried rift open in her face. “I know a friend of yours who tells me lots about you,” said Jonesy in a tone of congeniality. ‘You do?” exclaimed Miss Simpson, abruptly excited. ‘“‘Who is that? What did he—she say?” : “It’s a he all right and he’s one of your best friends,’”’? went on Jonesy. ‘“He’s—a COMmicbooks.con