Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 189, No. 4 — page 164: what you’re looking at

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

634 straightened up, and Jack saw in his hands an object that showed dimly white ‘against the velvet of the night. He stiffened for action. His quarry appeared to be restoring the appearance of the clay with one foot and whenthis had been accomplished to his satis- faction, he turned and made his way swiftly toward the highway leading to Hinsdale. His course took him directly past the spot where Jack lay. The detective did not wait, but sprang to his feet and, with drawn gun, rushed the other. The man hesitated a second, turned as if to flee—then, with a muttered curse, whipped out a pistol and fired point-blank at Tempest. The wind of.two shots fanned Jack’s cheek as his own weapon spoke. His op- ponent crumpled on the grass as lights sprang up in the Pyle mansion and the master’s voice bawled out: “ What’s the row about?” An hour later, when the victim had been lodged in hospital, where he made a state- ment to Jack and the local police before submitting to an operation for the removal of a bullet from his right lung, Tempest told his story to a very wide-awake group in the Pyle drawing-room. “Vou see, I believed young Anson,” he was saying. “ And so I scratched him off my list of suspects. Then, when I came a cropper on the Kelly business, I began to thmk. And I had a sudden hunch that Trent was the man. “T cabled to London and learned that there were no such persons as Lord Perri- ton and Sir Gilbert Dufflesford. That showed I was-on the right track. But my _ the duck! ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. | best bet was an off chance which I took and which turned out to be the berries.”’ ‘What was that?” asked Pyle, leaning forward. “TI figured that a bird who could put it over with forged credentials and all, as Trent did, would be an old hand. So I wired Scotland Yard and asked if anybody there could recall a crook who probably worked the butler game and who was given to whistling, ‘ The Long, Long Trail.’ ‘And I’m hanged if the answer didn’t come back that half a dozen of them knew His name was Joe Turk and he had done four stretches for butler stuff. Fle was supposed to be in Canada. You see, Trent was always whistling that tune and everything checked up fine. All I had to do then was watch him. “ According to his story, he got home just as you rushed off to see that airplane. He had been laying for a chance to turn something and here it opened up for him— on a silver platter, so to speak. He grabbed the stuff and stuck it in the clay pile, locked the door of the room you found him in. Then he pulled a little second-story work along the ledge under the windows and got into the room that way. ‘With the fire tongs, he gave himself a clip—enough to make it bleed and look nasty. But he was not unconscious any of the time. He made up the description of his attacker from a picture he had seen of Beano Kelly in the paper. Thought that would answer for a bum steer. And that’s about all there is to it.” They sat silent for a moment—Jack felt their unspoken tribute. to the phonograph, fumbled a moment, and presently the strains of “ The Long, Long Trail ” floated out upon the morning air. THE END U U U U MORE FOR YOUR MONEY than anywhere else is what you get in Arcosy-Attstory. Not only that, but in quality as well as quantity this magazine still stands unsurpassed in the field of fiction, in which it was the pioneer. ori wae (E(0) .OOKS =) a Then Pyle crossed (EO)