Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 105: what you’re looking at

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

FATE AND EVELYN. and taking care of myself all right for about six years without nobody to throw a fit if I had a couple of drinks or come in late or something like that, but if I walked down the street in broad daylight in this town, where they was all nice people, with a fel- low, why, everybody that saw me guessed maybe it was in my blood and I would probably never be able to behave myself. I would talk to Marie about it, and she would say, never mind, I would get used to it soon and then J would love it. Then there was a fellow who worked in the grocery store, and his name was Louie Shuster. He was a kind of a nice kid, and I used to talk to him a lot, because I would go into the grocery store and buy something for Mrs. Gavin, and I could stand there, while I was buying it from him and no- body could say anything. Louie had been born in Chicago, and. had lived there for a while, so he was not so much of a hick as some of them, only he kept telling me that being a hick was a lot of fun. I would talk to him and say to him, don’t you wish you was back in Chicago, and he would laugh at me and tell me he would not live in the city for nothing. He would say that as soon as I got used to it I would like it fine. I guess I would have gone away from the place and not stayed to find out if it was any fun if I got used to it, only I got liking Louie Shuster. I used to go to the store and talk to him every day, and finally one day I went to talk to him and he was not there, and then the fellow that owned the store told me Louie was no good and he had fired him. So I got mad, and I bawled him out, and the fellow told me to get out of the store and stay out, because he said he always knew a girl like me was no good and never would be, and Mrs. Gavin was a fool to take me in and give me a home and 4a. chance and everything. So I went back to Mrs. Gavin’s, and f was crying on account of Louie, and when I got there Marie was crying on account of Jim Farnsworth. Nobody had fired Jim Farnsworth or nothing like that, but he had asked Marie would she marry him, and she had said yes, and so she was crying. So I says to her, “‘ What are you crying 895 about?” I says. ‘‘ You’ll get married and settle down here where you like to be, and have a home and a lot of money and every- thing.” ‘Qh, no!” she says. ‘“ Me and Jim are going to New York. I would like to live here,” she says, “‘ but I got my career to think about.” When a girl in the profession ain’t got any money or ain’t got any fellow that’s got any money to back her up, and ain’t doing anything, she says to herself, “ My Gawd! Now I got to go look for a job!” And the minute she gets some money or gets a fellow that has got money, and then gets tired loafing around: doing nothing and wants to go get a job, she says to everybody that she has got a career. You would think a career was something like boils or weak feet or something like that, that a girl got when she got money! So Marie says to me, “ Yes, I got my career to think of.” And then she says: ‘“ As soon as I study singing with some mas- ters for a while, why Jim will make a lot of money, because as soon as.my voice is all right, in a couple of months he’ll buy a show and I will star in it for him and make him a lot of dough.” And I says, what about his business here and his farms and everything? “Oh,” she says. ‘‘ Oh, he is going to sell that all out right away before we leave.” Well,”’ FE says, “I guess that would be better, because if he did not sell it out him- self before he leaves, maybe if he buys the show and you star in it for him he would not have enough money left to come back here and watch while some sheriff or some- body sold it out for him. And maybe they would cheat him.” “Oh, is that so?” Marie says. And I says: “ Yes, that’s so! And that ain’t the half of it,” I says. “ Jim Farns- worth is a nice fellow,” I says. ‘ Only he ain’t got any sense, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself,” I says. ‘ A nice fel- low like him taking him to New York and making a bonfire out of his bank roll all for nothing,’’ I says. “Ts that so!” she says. And I says: ‘ Yes, that’s so, and you know it!” CcommiclooOokS. CO