Argosy, Vol. 111, No. 1 — page 16: what you’re looking at

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

6 THE ARGOSY. to be seeing things out of my past. That _ Shows the devil ain't losing no time with me. But the thing that comes back oftenest and hits me the hardest its the sight of your mother, lying with you in the hollow of her arm and looking up at me and whispering, ‘Dad,’ just before she wen't out.” The hand of the boy fell, and his wide eyes sought the face of Father Victor. The latter was standing. ‘“* ‘You told me I had no father—”’ An imperious arm stretched toward him. ‘* Give me the letter.”’ - He moved to obey, and then checked himself. ‘This is my father’s writing, is it not?” ' “No, no! It is a lie, Pierre!” ' But Pierre stood with the letter held be- hind his back, and the first doubt in his life stood up darkly in his eyes. Father Victor sank slowly back into his chair. All his gaunt frame was trembling. “ Read on,” he commanded. ' And Pierre, white of face, read on: “So I got a idea that I had to write to you, Pierre. There ain’t nothing I can make up to you, but knowing the truth may help ‘some. Poor kid, you ain't got no father in the eyes of the law, and neither did you have no mother, and there ain't no name that be- longs to you by rights.” Father Anthony veiled his eyes, but the bright, starved eyes of Jean Paul Victor stared on at the reader. His voice was lower now, and the lips moved slowly, as though numb with cold. “IT was a man in them days, and your mother was a woman that brought your heart into your throat and set it singing. She and me, we were too busy being just to raise up the son of Irene; so I brought you to Father Victor on a winter night and left you in his arms. That was after I’d done my best to raise you and you was just about old enough to chatter a bit. There wasn't nothing else to do. My wife, she went pretty near crazy when I brought you home. And she'd of killed you, Pierre, if I hadn’t took you away. “You see, I was married before I met Irene. So there ain’t no alibi for me I just acted the hound. But me being so close to hell now, I look back to that time, and somehow I see no wrong in it still. “And if I done wrong then, I’ve got my share of hell-fire for it. Here I lie, with my boys, Bill and Bert, sitting around in the cor- ner of the room waiting for me to go out. They ain’t men, Pierre. They’re wolves in the skins of men. They’re the right sons of their mother. When I go out they'll grab the coin I’ve saved up, and leave me to lie here and rot, maybe. “Lad, it’s a fearful thing to die without - having no one around that cares, and to know that even after I’ve gone out I’m going to lie here and have my dead eyes looking up at the ceiling. Pierre, part to tell you what you ought to know; part because I got a sort of crazy idea that maybe you could get down here to me before I go out. “You don’t owe me nothing but hard words, Pierre; but if you don’t try to come to me, the ghost of your mother will follow you all your life, lad, and you'll be seeing her blue eyes and the red-gold of her hair in the dark of the night as I see it now. Me, I’m a hard man, but it breaks my heart, that ghost of Irene. So here I'll. lie, waiting for you, Pierre, and lingering out the days with whisky, and fighting the wolf eyes of them there sons of mine. If I weaken—if they find they can look me square in the eye— they'll finish me quick, and make off with the coin. Pierre, come quick. “ MarTIN RYDER.” So I’m writing to you, © plain happy to care much what was right or wrong; so you just sort of happened along, Pierre. Me being so close to hell, I remem- ber that her eyes that was bluer than heaven looking up to me, and her hair, that was copper with gold lights in it, ran down across the white of her shoulder, and even past her side and around you, Pierre, till it seemed like “you was lying in a red river. She being about all in, she got hold of my hand and looked up to me with them blue eyes I been -talking about, and said ‘Dad,’ and went out. And I damned near followed her. “I buried Irene on the side of the moun- tain under a big, rough rock, and I didn’t carve nothing on the rock. Then I took you, Pierre, and I knew I wasn’t no sort of a man The hand of Pierre dropped slowly to his side, and the letter fluttered with a crisp rustling to the floor. CHAPTER III. THE LAUNCHING OF THE BOLT. HEN came a voice that startled the two priests, for it seemed that a fourth man had entered the room, so changed was it from the musical voice of Pierre. | “Father Victor, the roan is a strong horse. May I take him?” GOMIIGDOO SS (CO