Argosy, Vol. 117, No. 2 — page 111: what you’re looking at

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

YELLOW git a job so I kin git enough money fer film, an’ then go to it. / can make them pictures like they was alive, and it’s coming. Folks is going to ‘em like they goes to theaters now. Actresses like that there little Minnie Maddern will be bowing to the audience from the screen, an’ then the curtain will shoot up, an’ the play begin.” Hargraves looked at the flecked picture. Charlie’s dream seemed far away. “Think o’ the women that scrubs offices,” went on Charlie, “ savin’ their money and once a week goin’ to a show and then settin’ there, fergittin’ all their troubles and thinkin’ they’re the grand ladies on the screen.” Hargraves thought of Delia. “If that could be done,’ he answered, “a man should be perfectly happy. It would be a great thing.” His mother, he knew, had never seen the inside of a real theater. All of her happy memories were one—a trip to Tolchester Beach, Maryland. Cer- tainly they needed gilt, that sort. Even if it were tawdry and chipped in spots, they needed gilt. . “ Tt’s comin’,” echoed Charlie with some finality. ‘‘ There ain’t a bit of doubt about it. It’s comin’.” Elsie’s hemorrhage came on Sunday morning when Charlie was having his week- ly bath and Hargraves was deep in a Sun- day paper.:* He vas reading about the people of Mars, who were said to have horns and six legs. And there were pictures of them which somewhat resembled typhoid germs. Elsie, washing dishes on the back of the stove, suddenly began to cough with more than usual energy. Hargraves looked up. He saw her sway, and dropped his paper and reached her quickly. Then it came, He held her in his arms while she choked, spluttered, and nearly died from the coming of her warm, air-bubbled blood. Charlie, very dampgand clothed only in a gray-dirty towel, came hurrying in. They did not move Elsie, but piled quilts about her and slipped a small cushion be- neath her head. After a fewemoments she smiled wanly at Hargraves, and he smoothed her damp, cold forehead. After SOAP. 261 perhaps a half hour, she slept, her mouth open and her hand, outstretched, clutching spasmodically. Hargraves finished up the washing of the dishes very quietly and mopped up a pool of blood. Then he straightened the table cover and sat down to watch. Charlie had gone to see the doctor. It was very quiet in the little room. The cheap alarm clock ticked heavily, and now and then Elsie gasped, but otherwise the silence was so deep it throbbed. The fire leaped once and the mica doors all shone. A curled and fly-specked calendar over the table occupied Hargraves’s at- tentions for a moment, and then a moth- eaten worsted motto. The motto said: ‘“ The Lord Will Pro- vide,” and it was surrounded by pansies and some queer-looking growths that seemed remotely related to roses. Har- graves smiled at the motto. That particu- lar one, so much loved by his people, always made him smile. He did not believe it, at least if the Lord did provide, he pro- vided too much in some cases and not enough in others. He speculated on this and quite remade the world. It is very simple,to do when one is seventeen. When he looked at Elsie again her eyes were open. Kneeling beside her, he took her cold, damp hand in his and spoke. ‘“How are yuh?” he asked. ce Fine—” ‘“* Honest?” She nodded. Hargraves pushed back her hair and smiled again. If he were only making enough, Charlie could stay home and care for her. He wondered, after three days of shoveling coal, how soon he could expect a raise. He wondered how Elsie could be cared for. He did not see how they would dare leave her. She spoke as if she understood his thoughts. “IT want fer to go to the hospital fer a while,” she said. ‘“ Annie Mulany, she lives in the basement, she went last year, and they treated her grand. They don’t all cut yuh up, them doctors. If I could go to that there hospital where she went, I’d go. I think mebbe I oughta fer a while.” “ That’s a good idea.” Gomichbook (C@)