Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

A STFRANGER IN TOWN. carven pillars on either side, and then once more he crossed a street. It was a street that ran roughly north and south, but mainly south so far as Eddie was concerned, since it started from the street he had been following for some time. On the corner of its beginning, opposite the foursquare building, Eddie took up his stand. And then he tilted back his head and let his gaze climb up toward the distant tower that crowned the structure’s equi- lateral top. Appreciation leaped into Harmon’s eyes. He could appraise the pile of masonry be- fore him far better than one less trained. He stood staring with back-tilted head, oblivious to the hurrying life about him, forgetful of all else save the serried rows of windows tier on tier above him, the ma- thematical symmetry of the clean-cut ascending dimensional lines. And then, just as Eddie was lost in pure professional enjoyment, utterly carefree, utterly relaxed because he was on his vaca: tion and could do absolutely as he pleased for the remainder of his three weeks, his hand was suddenly seized and something was thrust into his instinctively closing fin- gers; somebody’s voice barked raucously, ‘“Here’s what I owe you,” and somebody’s hand was brought into stinging contact with his face. Eddie came back to earth with a gasp. “He reeled. Ordinarily the blow would not have shaken him by its force. But he had been taken wholly off his guard, and he had been standing with a back-tilted head. He staggered, stumbled and brought up with a grunt against one of the lighting posts. [Its iron contact gave him back his physical balance at least. But his brain was dazed. Somebody—had slapped his face! Some- body had rushed up to him and grabbed his hand and said they owed him some- thine—and—hit him, and—and—dimly he caught sight of a figure darting off through the crowd. The whole thing had passed in an in- stant. Eddie glimpsed the vanishing figure—lanky, not unlike his own in both build and dress—and then he glanced at his hand, which seemed to have something in it—something he had held onto even dur- ~~, 643 ing his carom against the post, and as his fingers unclosed their grip upon It, his gray eyes widened, in a startled unbelief. Tt was a hundred dollar bill—a crumpled currency note. The unknown had slipped it into his palm and said he owed him some- thing. and hit him in the face. . He had hit him and run away—and whatever anybody owed him here or elsewhere, Harman was convinced that the sting of a set of bony fingers was not included in the debt. It takes time to describe, but Eddie ap- prehended the whole unbelievable situation in a flash. His cheek was hot where the vanishing man had struck it, and his resent- ment of the blow boiled up in a surge. He was @ stranger in town. He had been standing here admiring architectural beauty, minding his own business, and— some one—he didn’t know who—it didn’t matter really who had done it since the fact was established to his satisfaction—some one had run up to him and regardless of anything else, had deliberately slapped him. And no matter what that some one had thought he owed Harmon, Eddie was wholly convinced that e owed the other man a debt which should be speedily discharged. He did the only thing a red-blooded youth of twenty-six could have done in his position. He thrust the century note into a pocket, pulled his soft hat lower over his square-built forehead, and started at a reck- less dash in pursuit of the man who, by now, had disappeared. That was natural enough. Possibly no more than a half minute had passed since Eddie had been struck, but it is really sur- prising how far a man can travel in half a minute or how completely he can lose himself inside the span of thirty seconds, in a sidewalk crowd. Eddie, however, was giving small con- sideration to such details as he charged along. No matter how far the fellow might have gone, he was confident he could run him down, unless he had-turned into the doorway of some shop, which he hardly believed he had done. Nor was he con- sidering either the comfort or convenience of the others on the sidewalk as he jostled through them, ducking and twisting to es- cape collision, where the opportunity Gomichooks (E@ ak