The Argosy, December 1905 — page 158: what you’re looking at

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

136 ther from the conductor, declaring as_ his belief that the car numbered 30-71- 11 had never been in the train at all! “Gosh, I don’t know but you're right!” admitted the dazed Sousa, as they returned up the hill. CHAPTER XVII. “WE HOWARDS HANG TOGETHER.” THE automobile party came home that evening in rather a shaken state. The exhilaration of running smoothly down -a well-kept road had made them all forget the danger at the bottom. When the machine dashed out of the woods and across the tracks so close to the huge forefront of the freight loco- motive that its breath seemed fairly to scorch them, the enjoyment that had attended the afternoon’s ride was sponged out at once. Bell Howard was not a girl of the screaming kind, and Mrs. Rodgers, her female companion. was too scared to ery out. The auto shot across in front of the slowing engine, and the chauffeur could scarcely stop the machine before Belle’s door. “Oh, I hope you are not so terribly scared,” stammered Dr. Lester, scram- bling out with his lame arm and helping Belle to alight. “ That wouldn’t happen once in a hundred years, you know.’ “Tt will be quite that length of time before it happens again to me, doctor,” she declared, and ran to her room, there to gain control of her nerves before see- ing her father. That narrow escape of the automo- bile shook her more than had the wreck of the Fly-by-Night. She sat by her window, which over- looked the rear premises of the Howard place and the railroad beyond, wonder- ing how that train had come to stop so fortunately. Inowing that it must have been the fast freight which went through at about the same hour every evening, she was also aware it had never stopped at that crossing before. Between the back fence and the rail- road line were several open lots toward which the rapidly growing suburb of THE ARGOSY. Coldspring was reaching eager fingers of gray brick houses. As her glance wandered over this still waste land she observed a figure rapidly approaching from the direction of the block signal tower, the rear elevation of which, with its blank and windowless wall, was di- rectly opposite her window. “Why, that’s Sade!” she suddenly said aloud, as the figure drew nearer in the gathering dusk. “ It’s ’Tilda’s girl.” "Tilda Armet, who had been a How- ard, and had gone back to the Howards with her brood of children when her husband died, was cook and general fac- totum for Captain Payne’s small house- hold; but only upon the agreement that the aforesaid brood should keep away from the premises. Wilder “loons” never grew than the Armet young ones, and Sade, the freckled, bare legged girl who now swarmed over the back fence of the premises with the abandon of a boy, was the youngest of the tribe, and came the most frequently to see her mother, vastly to the old captain’s disapproval. “When you git so derned fidgety ye can’t *bide without seein’ them young uns, ’Tilda,” he had said, “‘ you jes’ pack up an’ git, an’ come back when you reckon you kin stay content. But I swear I won’t have none of ’em around here, no more *n I would Jase Howard’s spawn.” Therefore, to head off the explosion Belle knew would occur if her father caught sight of Sade, she threw aside her wraps and hurried down-stairs to the kitchen just as Miss Barelegs sidled into the doorway. . “Tilda,” Belle said seriously, “ you know what father will say if he finds Sade here to-night. Now, don’t let us have words about it. I don’t feel as though I could stand it just now.” “She ain’t goin’ to stay more ’n a minute, Miss Belle,’ declared *Tilda Armet. “She jes’ come down on a errand for her uncle. She’s goin’ right back hum, Miss Belle.” “On an errand for her Uncle Jase? ” asked Miss Howard sharply, and eying the lanky girl with disapproval. “ Did it take her over to the signal tower? I just saw her coming from there.” \OOK COL, (C@