Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 124, No. 3 — page 152: what you’re looking at

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

526 dragnet might bring in the girl, Ilsa, or he might tire of waiting and arraign Hill for- mally before a magistrate on a murder charge. A sudden inspiration had come to the ex-roundsman and chdracteristically he determined to put it at once to the test. ‘““So that was what Ford meant?” Mc- Carty commented. ‘‘ Come on, let’s order; I'll go over and have a little interview with him before he leaves the house. I’m think- ing he'll be more ready to talk, now that it’s al] come out, than he was yesterday.”’ They ate a quick breakfast and Mc- Carty left Dennis to proceed: to the fire- house with the understanding that the lat- ter was to call for him at his rooms at eight that night. In the cross-town car he studied the Bulletin once more, but not for the satisfaction of rereading his adver- tisement; the reproduction of a photograph on the second page had caught his eye and he recognized it at once. It was that of a broad- shouldered man of — about forty, undeniably handsome at a casual glance, although closer inspection re- vealed a slight but telltale fulness of the lips and heaviness of jowl, and the eyes with their almost feminine sweep of lashes did not seem to meet-the gaze quite square- ly. There were incipient pouches beneath them, too, and the smile which was intend- ed to be dashing held the suggestion of a leer. Under the picture was the name ‘‘ Fugene Christopher Creveling.”’ Where had he seen that living face be- fore? He had known it on sight for that of the man stretched upon the floor of the study two nights ago, and yet McCarty felt a peculiar, haunting sense of familiarity as of a living presence. Creveling’s picture had appeared in the newspapers frequently enough | in connection with various escapades in the old days, but it was not that. He could associate no sound of a voice in con- nection with the face in his memory, recall no details, but he knew that somewhere quite lately he had seen that ‘man alive. _ He was still pondering over it when he reached the St. Maur Apartments. “Mr. and Mrs. Ford ain’t here, suh. They done gone away: went last night, ” the saddle-colored switchboard-operator told him. ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, McCarty smiled. ‘No, they didn’t,” he said with easy assurance. ‘I know all about Mr. Ford’s trouble and I’m not here to bother him, He'll see me, all right. Just say Mr. Mc- Carty wants a word with him.” The boy hesitated, but the note of au- thority as well as confidence which rang in the ex-roundsman’s tones impressed him and reluctantly he obeyed. There was a moment of evident indecision at the other end of the wire and then he turned a re- - heved face to the visitor. “You can go right up, suh. I don’t know—TI had orders not to announce no- body, and Mr. Ford is a mighty positive gentleman!” ‘““T know him!” McCarty grinned as he thought of his reception on the previous day. ‘ He’s out of luck just now and his bark is worse than his bite.” The same servant admitted him as on the day before, but the smile was gone from his Asiatic countenance, and although the drawing-room presented as bravely lux- urious an air there was an’ atmosphere of forlorn bravado about it which permeated even McCarty’s matter-of-fact sensibilities. “Well, what can I do for you now?” A toneless, indescribably weary voice spoke just behind him and McCarty wheeled, an uncontrollable gasp escaping him as his eyes met those of Lonsdale Ford. Could this broken creature with his twisted, bit- ter, tragic smile be the same man who had so coolly and arrogantly ordered him from his presence on the previous day? ‘Mr. Ford! I—I hape you'll not think I’d have intruded on you now if I could have. helped it, sir, but we’re still working on the Creveling matter and I’ve got to obey orders.” ‘“Qh,. that’s all mght, my man. One thing more or less doesn’t. make any differ- ence now.” Ford motioned toward a chair and then sank into another opposite, as though his legs would no longer support him, yet he added with a touch of the old savageness in his tone: “I didn’t shoot Creveling, if it will do you any good to know it, but I wish I had, and then put a bullet through my own brain! He’s dead, but be was a damned cur! The papers GON GooOoks G Colin