The Argosy, Vol. 75, No. 4 — page 115: what you’re looking at

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

MESQUITE RANCH, Midge had flung himself, all his big weight of bone and muscle, across the room in two steps. He stood with his back to her on the far side, fighting with the almost overwhelming long- ing that possessed him to take her in his arms and hold her against the world. “Do the Barringtons know about this?’ he asked after he had gained some control of himself, ‘Yes, I was there. So mother sent the telegram out to me. J opened it in the drawing-room. Of course they saw something was wrong. Mr. Bar- rington asked if it was from Ted. I didn’t answer, but I handed it to him. I’ve never seen a man in such a rage —except you just now, Midge. He went perfectly white. Mrs. Barring- ton noticed of course. So he had to tell her what it was.” ‘* She—did she—” ‘Midge, she had no chance to think of anything but her husband. He spun around on his heel and walked out of the room as if he had no intention of ever speaking to either of us again. It really frightened her. She went after him, and I did not see her again before I left an hour later.” Stratton, wrung by the love that had taken hold on him, came back to Bess. He took her in his arms. Without a word to acknowledge it, each of them knew the other’s love. “ Bess, if this is—if it comes out that Ted did have something to do with Bullen’s death—if it’s no use for | you to sacrifice yourself for his moth- er’s sake, can’t you give up— the money?” he asked hoarsely. “Mrs. Barrington, sir.” The announcement came from be- yond the screen which separated Midge’s inner office where he exam- ined his patients from the outer pri- vate office. It meant that Mrs. Bar- rington waited outside in his general reception-room. Bess seized her jingling gold trin- kets so that they could not rattle. She slipped from his arms and toward the G fe 617 door by which his patients could leave without going into the reception-room. ‘* Bess, you haven’t answered me,” he whispered, catching hold of the tassel on the sash that wound about her waist and hips. She stopped because of the danger to her gown. He plamly meant to hang on till he had an: answer. “It would make mother wretched,” she answered. ‘Good Heavens, we do nothing but think of somebody’s mother! We've got our own lives to—”’ “I’m coming in, Midge. I see you at once.” Bess closed the door behind her just as Mrs. Barrington came around the screen. “ My dear boy, I can’t be frightened any more, so you needn't glare at me,” she protested when Stratton faced her, scowling. ‘ Hugo—Hugo’s gone. He was perfectly lovely to me, as he always is; but [ could see that he was in a perfect rage with Ted. He’s done such an awful thing! So utterly un- grateful and so rude—to Hugo and to Bess. I’m going to see him, and you must come with me.” The interview found Stratton pledged to accompany Mrs. Barring- ton West in order to bring Ted to a realizing sense of his misdemeanor, Her heart was set upon the marriage. She excused Ted a bit with saying that Bess was cold and had prebably offended him in her letters, so that he had imagined some one else who hap- pened to be more cordial was really the object of his affections. But she could not get over her son’s callous rejection of the wonderful prospect which Hugo Barrington’s generosity had opened up to him. It looked to her as if the lives of two remarkably handsome and fortunate young people could flow along a way so perfectly smoothed and so luxuri- ously decorated that nothing short of sunstroke could have put the wild no- tion into her son’s head to reject the promised joy. must Gomichbooks (E@)