Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 68: what you’re looking at

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

_ before. always more than enough to eat. = © Pilin’ insult on top of injury,” she got out between clenched teeth. “ Look at her!” she said. ‘‘ And listen toher! I can’t stand much more, Buck. I'll have to do some- thing pretty soon, or I’ll have to scream. And the way those two fools are acting!” Christine was dressed all in black and in her suffering she looked almost beautiful. She was a madonna everywhere but her eyes, and in her eyes was murder. The whole house was full of the smell of fresh shellac. Uncle Dan Vickus, who was an old hand at this sort of thing, had made the coffin himself out of some seasoned cy- press, and it was out there in the sitting ~ room, either end resting on a chair. Outside, in the darkness, the negroes were chanting. It was queer. There was a note of jumpy excitement in their voices. A little black girl, ten or twelve years old, was carrying the chant in a thin, shrill, hysteri- cal voice, calling on God Almighty for blessings and forgiveness of our sins and for peace everlasting, and every now and again when she choked for breath, the choir of tie cutters, quarry laborers and section workmen and their women would moan _ * A-a-a-men!” People were slipping in and out of the house, and inside everybody seemed to be moving around, restless. It wasn’t like any wake I’ve ever attended. In a place like Vingo a wake is always a social event. Peo- ple come from miles around and sit and talk about things in natural voices. There isn’t a revelry, but the corpse doesn’t exactly spoil the party either. Once in a while some old mammy begins bawling at the top of her lungs, and everybody listens politely till it’s over, then they go on talking as New people come in and sympa- thize with the mourners, then they join the crowd and the talk goes on. There is Every one is supposed to bring something—a sweet potato pone, or some corn bread, or a boiled = leg of ham or some bacon to be fried for sandwiches. It was almost eleven o’clock, and all the ___ food was still stacked up in the kitchen, and -_- no one was touching it. The usual pleas- ant melancholy was lacking. Every one was uneasy and jumpy. There was a feel- - ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, ing in the air that something awful was go- ing to happen. Well, it did. ‘ After all she did to paw,” Christine was saying to me in that dull, dangerous voice, ‘you would think she would have a little pity on us. But look at that get-up! And the nerve of her bringing that fellow! I could kill her! And wouldn’t you think those two fools would have a little shame?” Well, there wasn’t much I could say. I drifted into the sitting room and took a look around. Alvina was sitting there as { had seen her last, rocking slowly back and forth in a chair that creaked. The fox terriers were curled up on the bare floor at her feet, looking up at her with their sharp little eyes and every now and then thumping the floor with their stub tails. I don’t think any one would have minded the rest of the things Alvina had done if she only hadn’t smoked cigarettes. She was smoking one cigarette after another. Alvina was the first cigarette smoking wom- an in Vingo, and there is a big distinction between a corncob pipe and a cigarette. Once in a while, absent-mindedly—I hope _—she blew a trail of smoke across the lid of the coffin. The air was heavy and quiet, and the smoke would roll along the lid and pour off along the edges as if it was water. I suppose it fascinated her. But I don’t know. She was queer and cruel. She might have been doing it on purpose. I think she got a lot of joy out of just hurting people. Well, she had certainly gone out of her way to hurt the Clayburn girls, As if wearing that bright red dress and smoking cigarettes weren’t enough, she had brought Anatole along. He had come out to hunt quail and she had persuaded him to stay over for the wake. And if Christine and Belinda had understood her reason for bringing him as I believed I did, they would have been more furious still. They thought she had brought him simply to flaunt him in their faces, but I don’t think that was it. Of course, she wanted him near her; but I think she was doing what a girl who is madly in love with a man will always do. She was trying to please him. She had traveled enough to know that wakes of this kind weren’t common and ‘she had Eomichbooks.co