Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 121: what you’re looking at

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WITHOUT GLOVES. hatred had disappeared the moment King had found that Leonard had been selected by Blodgett to corroborate his testimony before the committee. All the way to Thunder Head, and later on the trans- continental flyer, King had assiduously de- voted himself to being agreeable to the de- spised greener. Time and time again Leonard had grinned to himself at the awk- ward overtures of Number Nine’s foreman, and the words of exaggerated praise with which King had detailed to Blodgett his feat of keeping the log road open during the blizzard. | Leonard knew that this sudden show of friendliness was but a clumsy mask of King’s real feeling toward him—a mask of expediency. For if, as Neely had said, King had been hired to steal MacAlister’s timber, upon the success of the undertaking depended King’s remuneration. Therefore, King exerted himself to estab- lish friendly relations with his ally, the new foreman of Number Eight, and it was de- spite this exertion that the sneer had crept into his voice. He was quick, however, to cover the lapse, hoping Leonard had not noticed: “Well, here’s how! An’ I was just kid- din’ Leonard. ~Facts is, it ain’t no one’s business but his own if a man don’t favor smokin’ an’ drinkin’. Some does, an’ some don’t—an’ there y’are. Come on, we'll go in to supper, an’ then we'll hunt us up a show somewheres. Use’ to be a pretty good theayter over near the end of the Wabasha Street bridge, plenty of gals an’ the like of that. You go to shows, don’t you, Leonard?” “Oh, sure, I go to shows, all right,” laughed the greener. “ Come on. Let’s eat.” As they were leaving the dining room, Mary MacAlister and MacCormack en- tered. Leonard swiftly averted his eyes, and his blood boiled as he noted the in- solent stare with which King’s appraising glance swept the trim figure of the girl in the white shirtwaist and blue serge skirt. In- voluntarily his fists clenched, as without a word, he followed the others to the office. An hour later, Leonard sat at a small table, in a long room filled with similar 591 tables, and drank vichy while King drank beer. Upon a stage at one end of the room a rather suggestive act was in progress be- tween a lightly clad and heavily painted amazon and a caricature of a Jew comedian. Other painted women moved: freely about among the tables selling bottled beer and drinking with the patrons. And all to the accompaniment of a brass-voiced piano in- cessantly and vociferously manipulated by a sallow-faced youth in a stained and ill- fitting dress suit. Straying from the stage, King’s glance fastened upon Leonard who had straight- ened in his chair, and was staring wide-eyed into the face of the girl who had paused at the next table to lean caressingly upon the shoulder of a cowpuncher who, with three or four companions, was taking in the town. The man’s arm was about the girl’s waist and he was repeating with maudlin insistence that he had brought a train load of beef from Chinook, Montana, to the stockyards at South St. Paul. Slopping beer from a bottle into a glass, he held it to the girl’s lips, and as she raised her head to drink, the boss of Num- be Nine saw her eyes meet Leonard’s fas- cinated gaze. Seconds passed as the two stared into each other’s eyes. ‘Then the girl’s arm slipped from the cowboy’s shoulder, and the hand that held the un- tasted beer faltered so that when she re- turned the glass half its contents spilled. In two steps the girl reached Leonard’s side, “You!” she cried. “ Mike Duffy! You—here!” “Yes, Lottie, I’m here,” answered Leonard. “ But how about you? What’s the matter with the big burg? What you doin’ here? I thought you’d throw’d in with Bull Larrigan.” The drop curtain terminated the cheap skit on the stage, and the piano swung into the strains of a sentimental ballad. The cowboys rose from the adjoining table and ~ made their way noisily toward the door, and the girl drew one of the vacated chairs to Leonard’s side and settled her elbows on the table. “ Buy a drink, Mike, and I'll tell you. They won’t stand for us girls setting around unless we’re selling drinks.” Eomicbooks 7 (©) "Ee