The Argosy, Vol. 83 No. 1 — page 166: what you’re looking at

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

156 him, reached out and tapped at his driver’s arm and pointed down the side street! An instant the recent chairman fancied that his fevered imagination was playing him tricks; a second glance, however, con- vinced him that he had seen aright. Both cabs were coming down that way and— “Got your orders?” he barked at the driver. “Steamship pier?” “Vep! Quick! We're chased!” said Darton as he dashed into the cab. After that, for two minutes or more, James Darton quite lost track of things. He knew that Sibyl was clutching him hard and stifling one small scream after another; he knew also that Thomas Morely had selected New York’s premier daredevil taxicab artist — the gentleman, he fancied, must have gained his training as getaway engineer of some particularly reckless crew of automobile bandits. Twice in one block they had skimmed s®@ narrowly by a truck that the wheels grated together without locking—ah, and that messenger boy had been snatched aside by the hand of Providence, had he not? And leoking backward Jimmy Darton discovered that two other taxicabs were making much the same sort of progress. They were chased, fast enough! Still pier sheds and funnels and masts — were just ahead, and that was the water- front. Rather befuddled as to location for the moment, it still seemed to Darton that the Rio boat sailed from this imme- diate section—and in that he was right, for their chauffeur was heading directly _across to the nearest of them and— “That’s where we’re going; I know the place now,” Jimmy said. “We can’t get through with the cab, because those two trucks are blocking the way, Sibyl, but you and I can make a run for it afoot, and once we’re aboard I think it’ll be all right. I don’t know just what’s coming behind us—avengers, probably, or maybe some one with a warrant on some cooked- up charge—but whatever it is, now that now! THE ARGOSY. I’ve got you, I can fight ’em off with bare fists till seven o’clock, when the boat sails.”’ “But, Jimmy, if—” “Are you ready, dear?” Darton asked desperately. “All right; he’s stopping Quick, out here!” Brain seething, he dragged her out of the taxi and through the doorway of the pier, utterly ignoring a uniformed person who requested them to halt. Laughing quite wildly, they ran on through the shadows, between boxes and bales, worm- ing their way through alleys of cases and barrels, for well ahead was a square of light and through it came a glimpse of the © steamer’s side and some yards of gang- plank! A mountain of cement bags halted them for seconds; they raced around the farther side at last and forward again—and halted once more as a giant hand-truck blocked their passage and their view. But now the hand-truck, too, had moved along and their way was clear, with the gang-plank and safety not more than twenty feet away; and here Jimmy Darton and his bride-to-be stopped short, because at the foot of the gang-plank, mopping their respective brows as they panted queries at an officer of the steamer—who shook his head firmly—stood two gentle- men. One of them, the first amazed glance told Jimmy Darton, was none other than Stockwall Westling himself, multi-million- aire maker of motion pictures; the other, rather shorter, was mostly bald and very worried of appearance, with the strained expression of the tired business man; and him, too, Jimmy Darton had recognized even before Sibyl’s cry of: “Father!” The Dane of Bostwick & Dane wagged his head and stared at her with fishy, ex- hausted eyes. “Why the—why didn’t you go down the foot—footwalk on the other side of the pier?” he gasped. “It’s quite clear over there.” He swayed toward his only . daughter. ‘“‘What are you—up to?” “Pardon me, sir, but —if you don’t CORMMICGLOOOKS (C@