Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

We EG VoL. CLV SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1923 ARGOSY-ALLSTORY 2S ee NUMBER 5 By JOHN SCHOOLCRAFT Author of ‘‘ The Bird of Passage,’’ “‘ Let the Wedding Wait,’’ ete. CHAPTER I. THE BATMAN, CUTT, the batman, topped his day by taking three half pints of bitter beer at the Red Lion, There was always a fire at the Red Lion built of good coals, not coke, and from one shadowed corner he could stand unobserved and watch Kate, the barmaid. Some day, when he had wound up his nerve, he would kiss Kate— just before closing time, as he had seen an Australian do it. Kate could have had any sergeant major LA in Woolwich, with the exception of the gar- rison sergeant major, who was a sandy little man with his eye on the widow of a con- fectioner in Herne Bay. Kate was big, dark-eyed, with full, curving red lips, and a dusky skin—the vivid type that crops up over all England, and must go back to the invading Danes of Alfred’s time. Night after night the batman would stand. in the shadow and watch the play of her rounded arms while his heart«picked up bit by bit until at closing time it was hammer- ing in his temples. Each time his foot crossed the threshold he wondered if this 641 : GComichooks:¢o