Argosy, Vol. 112, No. 2 — page 43: what you’re looking at

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

A ROMANCE IN REDEMPTION, am here with you. Everything is all right. We found you.” “ But you—you!” “We came through with the hospital train for the Czechs yesterday. been a week on the way.” The reaction came in a twinkling. ‘“ Where am I, Madelaine?” he cried, his voice the appeal of a little boy, afraid in the dark. “You're train.” “ But we’re moving!” “The train is headed back toward Vladi- vostok. The line has been mended where the Reds broke through. We have so many wounded we are going back to the hospital on Golden Horn Island. Don’t try to talk, laddie. Sleep and I will stay with you.” But Jim Herring, man of the world, yel- low journalist, iconoclastic war correspon- dent, was sobbing. The girl pressed his good hand tightly as she sat at his side while the train hurtled on eastward. So on and on all the rest of that day they rode and into the sapphire depths of evening with the wonderful blood- red Siberian sunset behind them. Pbree times on that journey the man tried to tell the girl his experiences since he had left her in Vladivostok to go far in-country. Each time she bade him lie quiet. “T understand, softly. ‘“‘ You need not. me.” “ Others have told you?” “Captain Graves returned and told us in Dr. Tolstoi’s Red Cross laddie,” she answered Others have told We have - 209 all about your experience with the dyings Japanese and the railroad scandal docu ments. Billy Evans came out with the ac- count of your work in Baikal Valley. And Captain Smolchak, who cooperated with us vesterday, told us all about the money.” Jim’s thoughts were chaotic for the mo- ment. Then he remembered. | “Yes, the money!” he cried. ‘“ The money I promised Briggs to deliver in America!” “We have it. You have done your work well and will be rewarded. Josef, your Czech, is in the car up forward. We found him shot through the legs by one of his own men, trying to get through our lines. But he had the money. He had got it safely out of the Red Guard lines, each bill folded neatly inside each copy of those Bolsheviki propaganda newspapers. And he told us how you refused to desert him the night you were captured. It has all turned out well, and you have made my heart glad. You— have—found—yourself. I knew you would do it!” And the Red Cross nurse’s eyes were shining. “Oh, Madelaine!” he cried antele With his one good arm he sought to draw her to him, ‘* Not now, laddie,”’ she whispered. “ The intervention is nearing its close. We will soon be free—for happiness. But the story —would be—oh, so sweet—in the telling!” The man went to sleep sobbing with the happiness of the boy’s heart, which, after all, is the heart of the man-universal. And the train clicked on through the star- lit, snowbound darkness. SUNRISE EEPENING shadows, blackness of the night, Still, quiet hours; then, suddenly Faint streaks of gray across the sky, A gull’s wing brushing it; the morning stars Singing together. A violet ribbon Tying soft bands of rose; pale-yellow bars. A moment’s hush—deéep crooning of the sea—. And then a silken sheet let down from heaven With burst of riotous color, fold on fold; Amber and azure, silver, cardinal— A jeweled canopy, pearl, emerald, sapphire, amethyst. At last, through arch triumphant blazed with gold, *Mid blare of noiseless trumpets, rides the sun! 3 Arcosy Mary E. Pike, EOMiIcboo (G “oe (E(0) 1