Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 12, 1927 — page 24: what you’re looking at

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

18 ARGOSY-ALLST@RY WREKLY. an’ she sho was jes a-drippin’ wid diamonds. Yassuh! Talked kinda high an’ squeaky, too, lak a real lady. ‘ Looka heah, black man,’ she says to me, ‘ brush dat dust outa mah way so mah feet—’ ” “Go away from me, George,” Stewart groaned, “before I commit mayhem on your person.” Gloomily he walked along the main street, and turned in at the Y. M. C. A. In the locker room he stripped, stepped under a shower, and poised on the edge of the pool. Half a dozen men splashed around in the clear, greenish water. “Oh, Hull!” Sergeant Breitman called from across the pool. “ Just the man I wanted to see.” Stewart teetered on the springboard, made a shallow dive into the cold water, and came up, blowing and pink, beside Breitman. “ That’s the stuff to liven you up,” he said. ‘You didn’t look so chipper just now. Had a bad night?” “No. I don’t touch the stuff.” “You don’t look as if you did. You don’t develop that build on white mule. I missed you yesterday. I wanted to talk to you about the regimental bouts coming off next month. Did you see the notice on the bulletin board?” Stewart nodded without much interest. He was wondering just how far off Martha Lane was on her way north. “ Captain Jim thinks you ought to repre- sent the company in the heavyweight divi- sion,” Breitman went on. ‘‘ He was watch- ing you sparrin’ around with Jennings here in the gym the other day, and he got the idea you might make the grade. None of the rest of us are box fighters.” “ Nor me, either,” Stewart scoffed. “ I’m only a ham alongside a really good man. I can hit, and that’s about all.” “Well, you won’t run up against any Carpentiers in the other outfits as far as that goes. We ought to be represented for the credit of the company, and no one else shapes up as well as you do. Try it out.” ““ How about training?” Breitman grinned. ‘If you want any more road work than Celluloid Jim hands us every day, buddy, you’re a hog for pun- ishment. After doing our stuff for these several months you're not exactly a human wreck, You can work out every day after drill with Jennings or some one of those other big bozos. The old man will be dis- appointed if we don’t dig some one up.” “All right, if that’s the case,” Stewart agreed. ‘‘ Don’t blame me, though.” “Good! I'll put your name down.”’ “‘ Get a ringside seat,” Stewart advised, “and get ready to catch me in your lap when I come through the ropes. I’m go- ing into it because I don’t want to turn Celluloid Jim down, but something tells me Ill spend most of that evening falling through the air.” Breitman whistled. “You sure are optimistic to-day! Some dame must ’a’ give you the air bad!” Stewart waved his hand and took a head- er into the pool that brought him neatly across and climbed out. The rest of the day he spent in solitary misery, propped in a corner of the reading room, and walked the four miles back to camp for lack of something else to do. It had grown suddenly chilly, and the Sibley stove, the curse of the soldier’s ex- istence, was going full blast in the tent, scat- tering sparks in all directions, alternately raising the temperature to oven heat, and lowering it close to freezing. Stewart stepped into the midst of a dis- cussion of the merits of the new additions to the company. “We drew one loot, and ten men,” Har- rison announced. “TI ran into the loot on the company street awhile ago, and I almost passed him without giving him the high sign, but he reminded me of it quick enough. I think he was out to collect salutes from the help, and send them home to the missus.” “Seems to think well of hisself,” com- mented Finneran. ‘“ What’s he look like in the rough?” “Well,” Harrison frowned thoughtfully, “as far as I can make out, he belongs to the species, little known to science, known as a whifflesnitcher.” ‘“Whatsa da wifflesnitch?”’ Georgeopou- los asked respectfully of this man of travel and research.