The Argosy, Vol. 84 No. 1 — page 20: what you’re looking at

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

10 Dr. Bowen gazed at Polly’s expensive office clock. It was quarter past five, and growing dark. Polly, apparently, was not - coming home for dinner, and the. hasty one was doomed to disappointment un- less— Dr. Bowen started slightly at the en- trance of the trim maid, who pressed the wall-push and lighted the office. ‘““No word ef the.doctor?” he queried. “No, doctor. He’ll hardly be home now, I think. That’s what I came to tell you, sir. Mrs. Whinnys, though, will be back for dinner.” ‘“Do you happen to know who takes Dr. Whinnys’s cases when he isn’t about?” “Dr. Pelling, around the corner, sir, but he went to the hospital himself yes- terday.” : ‘James Bowen, M.D., hesitated a final instant and then rose. “A call has just come from a family named Catterson,” said he. ‘It seems to be urgent, so perhaps I’d better take it myself, and very likely I'll come back here afterward to report to Dr. Whinnys. Tell him that, please.” ‘‘ Very well, doctor.” “ And which way do I walk for Clinton Avenue, by the way?” “ You'll hardly want to walk, sir,” the maid smiled. “I think you’d better go over that way and take the Flatbush Ave- nue car and get a transfer to Vanderbilt Avenue. Or you might go in the other direction and take the Brighton Elevated at Newkirk Avenue and get off at Van- derbilt.” Dr. Jim Bowen tried to commit it to memory. “ Tl stick to Flatbush Avenue, I guess,” he muttered vaguely. ‘It seems more familiar. I saw that name coming down here.” In the woods he was noted for his sense of location—which was well, for it enabled him to follow the direction of the maid’s pointing finger after he had left the home of Polly Whinnys. Blocks of detached houses his long legs put behind and further blocks; he was THE ARGOSY. just beginning to doubt his own accuracy when the familiar “ B. R. T.” clanged by at the far end of the square, on a long, low rakish car of solid steel with ‘“ Flat- bush Avenue” over its middle door. Well, the traction corporation had col- lected another nickel from him, which reduced his capital to the four one-dollar bills in his beautiful wallet. Dr. Jim read through his elaborate transfer and settled down to watch Brooklyn as revealed by twilight along Flatbush Avenue. It seemed to be a big town; he wondered just why, in all his days, he had never made more than four or five trips to Brooklyn, but he did not wonder for long. His heavy thoughts dragged back to his own plight and the call just ahead of him. Custom and friendship combined would deprive him even of the fee he was about to earn! Not so much as the wretched car-fare he was spending would be his reward for attending the suffering member of the Catterson family. In the matter of plain money profit, Brooklyn so far measured up to the Hallas standard in every respect. Yet in all probability he would lose nothing; the little professional courtesy would put Polly Whinmys under some small obligation; and there might be need for that, Dr. Bowen reflected bitterly. People change oddly with the passing years. It was more than possible that the wild, good-natured Polly Whinnys of twenty- three had turned into the pompous Dr. Whinnys of thirty-five or thirty-six. Per- haps it was as well that Catterson had called—and the conductor was doing some calling, too, by the way, and mentioning Vanderbilt Avenue. Dr. Bowen hurried to the door and waited on the little island of concrete pavement for the coming of his next vehicle. It arrived in time, bringing with it an obliging and loquacious conductor, who studied over the address Dr. Bowen men- tioned as one studies a tremendous prob- lem, talked it over with himself, and COMIC OOOKS (E©)