Adventure Magazine Cover, April 3, 1918 — page 132: what you’re looking at

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

130 a shore ’nough lady, even if she did show me that new way o’ lightin’.a cigaret. An’ she likes me ’cause I don’t get fresh, huh? I’d like to see myself. Bet she’d smack my face good if I did.” He turned in at Ragsdale’s. The store- keeper was alone in the place and greeted him with a portentous wink. “T ain’t got no sofys nor goose-hair pillers nor stuffed-up chairs to offer yuh,” Soapy observed, “but yuh can sit on the counter if yo’re a good boy. Johnny stared seals at the storekeeper. “Yuh seem to know a lot,” he drawled. Ragsdale put his head on one side and looked Johnny up and down. Then he scratched his ear. “Nobody ever called you good-lookin’, did they, Johnny?” asked Soapy anxiously. “What’n ——,” Johnny began indig- nantly. “Well, I was wonderin’, explained his friend. ‘Yuh know, Johnny, my eyes are good. I can always see where I’m lookin’, an’ I never seen nothin’ beautiful about yuh, *ceptin’ the way yuh handle a rifle. But she ain’t seen yuh handle a rifle.” He paused in evident perplexity and scratched the other ear. “It’s that butter yuh don’t sell,” re- marked Johnny. ‘“She’s gone to yore head. I don’t wonder neither. The smell’s thick enough to cut. Why dontcha open an- other window?” “Tt ain’t the butter,’ denied Soapy. “Tt’s yore looks, an’ you ain’t got none, so that ain’t possible. She’s magic, that’s what she is, magic. No offense meant, an’ I know it ain’t none o’ my business, but ’m a married man an’ maybe I can use the in- formation. Howdja do it? Be a good feller an’ tell.” “How’d I do what?” “Howdja get to go see Mis’ Wallace?” ‘“‘What’s unusual in that?” ‘Nothin’, only yore the first gent ever went to her home to see her. An’ walkin’ up with her, too. That’s why I say it’s magic.” “Don’t nobody ever go see her?” ‘““Plenty’d like to, but she won’t have ’em. Not that she’s standoffish. No sirree, it’s ‘Good mornin’’ with her an’ ‘H’are yuh, ma’am?’ an’ she smiles an’ bows pleasant as yuh please an’ twice as pretty. An’ that’s all. She’ll take yore money or pay bets at the wheel with a word for all the boys. bP] Adventure But it’s always ‘Not tonight, I’m sorry,’ or ‘Some other time,’ when a gent only wants to walk home with her. An’ she does it all without hurtin’ a feller’s feelin’s. So this here is yore lucky day, Johnny. I'll bet if you was to go down to the Broken Dollar yuh’d break the bank.” The only man she had ever allowed to call. And she had asked him to call again. What was her purpose? ‘There was one. She was not the woman to break her custom for a mere whim. Johnny wore his best poker face, but his eye was sardonic. “For a storekeeper, Soapy, yo’re one wise Abraham,” said Johnny Ramsay, and changed the subject with a request for rifle cartridges, caliber 40-65. But Soapy Ragsdale did not stock the odd calibers. Johnny departed for the Golden Rule. Again he was out of luck— 40-65’s were apparently a dead card in Paradise Bend. Johny reflected that there were other towns and other stores and took heart of hope. That evening Johnny went to see Dorothy Burr. Her greeting was casual—elaborate- ly so. There was a five-pound box of candy on the table. “Have some,” invited Dorothy. Johnny thought he wouldn’t eat any candy, thank you just the same. A tooth had been troubling him. He feared to ex- cite the little brute. Dorothy smiled oddly. ‘You weren’t here when I got back,” she remarked, the smile becoming a trifle fixed. “Why no, I wasn’t,” confessed Johnny. “T was some’ers else.”’ ““Isn’t Lotta a dear?”’ The tone was in- genuous, but the smile was now quite fixed. ‘Mis’ Wallace? Shore. she’s all that. Just as folksy as yuh please. Nothin’ stuck-up about her.” “T heard she took you home with her.” “‘T guess she thought I was lonesome.” “All the same, it was rather a conspicu- ous thing to do, I think. She never has any one to call.” “So I heard.” Dryly. Dorothy stared at Johnny open-mouthed. “Well,” she burst out, “of all the smug, conceited men you’re the smuggest and conceitedest!”’ Then she laughed. But the laughter did not ring true. COnniclooo S (C@