The Argosy, April 1912 — page 120: what you’re looking at

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

106 THE ARGOSY. there, everywhere. Would it reach its des- tination, serve the purpose for whose accom- plishment I would have moved heaven and earth, had I been able? That I could not tell. Mine was only to try; and that I might leave no stone un- turned I went on wiring, hit or miss, to every haunt of Jimmie Whelan’s that entered my mind: Jim, don’t come. Wri— Before the gag touched my lips, I knew it was all up. Jim had come. Resigned, I sat stock-still and let myself be muzzled with cloth and cord; I offered no resistance to the rope that went round my arms. Helpless as a trussed fowl, I was lifted and laid full length on top of the cluttered table. I heard Jim laugh softly. Then he came in sight, a mask over his face, going toward the safe in the corner. Down on his knees, examining the door, he gave an exclamation below his breath. The door swung open to his touch. Rising, a tight bundle of greenbacks in his two hands, he shook his head at me where I lay. “Careless little station-agent,” he said thickly behind the muffling mask. “ Leaving the safe unlocked—but, that’s real con- venient! ” It was true. I had forgotten to turn the knob when McClintock deposited the smelter’s money there that forenoon. Well, what difference did it make? Jim would have had the swag anyway without much more trouble than that. Dull-eyed, I looked at the little fortune he was holding. Half was to be mine. Sort of a payment for the loss of Margie. Just then, with the stupefying effect of Jim’s arrival on me, I didn’t mind losing her so much. It was the right way after all. I was a crook—with the dirty procceds of a crime in my hands, I couldn’t stay and take her now. The thing was fate. I had to remain crooked. Well, after my get- away, she’d soon forget all about me—sure, good ones and bad, they always did. Jim had the money; I wondered why he didn’t clear out? I could hear him rustling about on a shelf behind me. What the deuce was he up to? Again he came in sight, carrying an armful of old newspapers and a pair of shears. Kicking out the chair, he sat down, the papers on his knee, and began hacking into them with the shears. Looking up, he caught my bulging eyes on him above the gag. He laughed aloud. “E don’t mind telling you,” he said. “This is how Ill keep all pursuers off my track till I’m clean gone. McClintock, foreman at the smelter’s, in Dutch with the men higher up. I’ve got inside info’ they suspect maybe he ain’t on the level. Well, I’m going to make ’em think so stronger still. Savvy?” He waved the shears. ‘““Gee, but you’re thick. I’m making a dummy package to put back in the safe. A bundle of paper, clipped to size, with a genuine bill top and bottom. I lock the door on it. Is the safe blown? It is not. Then that’s the package McClintock put in, and took your receipt for this morning. There’s been no burglary here. Jou won't tell any tales, I know mighty well. McClintock—will be the goat! ” Once more he laughed, hacking again at the newspapers. Save for the creak of the rusty shears, the moan of the storm outside, there was silence in the little office com- plete as the tomb. Curse the gag in my mouth! And curse this twist to Jim Whalen’s scheme that was bound to make Margie’s father taken for the thief—even after Jim was gone, releasing me,-as I took it he meant to do, and I had double-crossed my partner in crime by tell- ing the truth, as I swore I would to save the girl a moment’s doubt of her father’s honesty —even then, it came to me in a flash, the old man would still be under suspicion. If, as Jim said, the officers at the smelter had some sneaking- idea that square old Angus McClintock wasn’t on the level, they’d Jaugh at the story I’d tell to clear him. For wouldn’t they find out I was en- gaged to his daughter? That would be my reason for “lying.” And there would be the dummy package found in the safe, proof enough to convict the old man out of hand. Something must be done now—quick— to save her. Of course, it was of Margie I was thinking. Her trust in the world’s goodness shattered, and with her father as the “goat,” as Jim put it—no, that musn’t be. The way, though, to prevent it? Oh, for the gag out of my mouth, the free use of my limbs only for a moment. Under me my twisting hands at that mo- ment touched the sounder of the toy wire running to the McClintock cabin a half- mile away! My breath caught in my throat. Here was a way. Perhaps I could bring comicaoolkks (CO