Argosy All-Story Weekly, July 11, 1925 — page 154: what you’re looking at

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

| AO qe MA 308 She had looked forward to the day. Early in the morning, while Robin boiled up nets, she patched and made ready his Sunday suit. Robin could dance, drunk or sober! Wasn’t he the lightest-footed of .them all? Every bowery night he made those peg-legged old roustabouts envious! Wouldn’t the women watch them, even to Casper Clause’s briny old wife, and Ernie Jaynes’s two pickle-faced sisters? Wouldn’t Nels Nielson ask her for a dance, and then another and another, and wouldn’t she refuse after the first, only to prove that she was the proudest woman in Cat- head village? * She *saw Nels Nielson at four o’clock. She had run down to the shanty for more gasoline to clean a last spot from Robin’s coat, and finding Robin not on the beach, had come up to the bowery to look for him. She did not find him there either. But working on the platform was Nels - Nielson. Six months it had been since she talked with him. What a pity she thought it when that Nels Nielson had never mar- ried, how slow and red-faced and big-hand- ed and ugly he looked beside her blue- eyed Robin! He seemed less pitiable this time. ‘There was a fresh, windy color in his skin, a hardness she had learned to recognize as one sign of sobriety. ~ He had come over from Ottowa Island early in the forenoon, she heard, to carry home a boatload of children who had spent the winter in the convent school at Cedar Bridge. They were expected down at noon. But at noon, and at two o’clock, and again at four, the children had not come. He telephoned; the truck had broken, it would _ get there by five. “‘Tt’s makin’ me late for the dance,’ he complained to the men on the floor. “‘They’s a little blow comin’, too. Five ‘o'clock! And me thinkin’ it was a _ holi- day! It ‘ll be dark afore I get to the island, can’t get back here afore ten!” “ Kids,” Casper Clause commented, “ is a mean crew to handle in the dark. Specially when they’s a bit of wind on.” Nels Nielson laughed. “Yl handle ’em all right. They’s only ten. I'll pen ’em all down under cover.” ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. “And try to come back?” “Sure!” Again he laughed. “ Think I’d_ miss the whole dance for a mess of kids and weather?” Minna slipped away. There was a gay carelessness in his voice. She walked hasti- ly around the pine arbor to avoid a meet- ing with Mrs. Clause. Some one followed her beyond the heaped up piles of boughs. She turned and stood face to face with Nels Nielson. His carelessness had gone. In its place was a curious, sad defiance, and Minna felt a hot rush of blood redden her own cheeks. She started back; then called her- self a coward and stopped. * Minna—” he said. “You can have the second dance, Nels,” she answered lightly. Her attempt at recklessness failed. He came a step nearer. For a long, quiet mo- ment they looked at each other. “Minna, are you unhappy?” he asked. She was caught unawares. Tears came into her eyes and she tried not to let them fall. He was different somehow, stronger than he ever had been. About his lips she saw a new, soft, gentle line. They were firmer lips than Robin’s. His eyes were a deeper blue. : ‘“* Minna—” he said again. And angry shame came over her. With a hard spurt of will she rushed past him and down the hill. Why should Nels Nielson break up her pride? Why should he guess she wasn’t happy? Dare to say that she wasn’t? Who was Nels Nielson to act so slightingly to- ward Robin? She slammed the kitchen door behind her, and upstairs flung herself down on the bed. An hour she lay there, thinking hard thoughts of the man she had just talked to, knowing all the time, bitterly, that every thought was a lie to herself. She dressed at last, conscious of her pale cheeks, wearily prepared supper and sat down to wait for Robin. He had not yet come when the meal was ready. Twilight fell, and neighbors lighted their lamps. She put on her shawl at last and crept with a queer foreboding down through the sand to the fish shanties. Recklessly, she crossed ee a ~ i ish i =