Argosy, Vol. 117, No. 3 — page 36: what you’re looking at

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

546 sought him out. He was much pleased with Bagg’s proposal to drink more. Bagg assured him he could get any quantity of it—over in Chinatown. “T don’t like much to mix up with that yellow-and-white gang of grafters over there,” announced Heavy; ‘“ but I ask you —what’s a man goin’ to do? He’s got to drink, ain’t he?” This was so self-evident a fact that Bagg the Chink didn’t deem it worthy of a reply. He led Heavy to a vile den in Pell Street. They had many drinks. Heavy absorbed every drop that was set before him. Bagg the Chink got rid of his drinks in another way. He was quite sober. It wasn’t long before Heavy Windover was enticed—though he didn’t know he was being enticed—into a room in Doyers Street; there, as he believed, to get more drink. He got more drink. He had a con- fused, jumbled idea that Bagg the Chink sat opposite him, and that now and then a withered Chinese floated about the room like a dry leaf blown on autumn winds. He shut one eye tightly, and discerned a bed in a far corner. He didn’t know ex- actly where he was—and didn’t care much. Then he gently faded out of events, with a great fanfare of trumpeting snores. wHe lay on the bed, to which Bagg the Chink and Ming Yuen had dragged him. His right arm hung, limp, over the edge of the bed. Now and then the huge fingers brushed the floor as the sleeper stirred. Soon he ceased to stir at all. His snoring ceased, and he breathed only lightly—just enough to keep body and soul together. There was something else besides the liquor in the man. No drunken man ever lay so quietly—on the very brink of suspended animation. Bagg the Chink stared at the sleeper. ~ He was smitten with pity—fear; some- thing he couldn’t fathom. He had no af- fection for the man on the bed, but some- thing deep down fevolted against his con- spiring with the withered yellow alien to work harm against a brother white man. Bagg couldn’t have explained this in so many words—but that is what it was; it couldn’t be anything else. He watched Ming Yuen draw a chair to the bedside. THE ARGOSY. He watched him lift the huge arm of Heavy Windover and lay the forearm across his pantalooned legs. He saw that the palm of the burglar’s— hand was upward, and that the fingers curled slightly. He saw Ming Yuen take a small instrument from some _ hidden pocket in his strange clothing. He saw a vial full of greenish fluid on the floor be- side the chair of Ming Yuen, A wad of bsorbent cotton and a small roll of gauze bandage were there, too. Bagg the Chink shuddered—but he made no _ protest. Things had gone too far now. Ming Yuen accomplished: his purpose quickly. As the blade sank into the flesh of the wrist, there was only a slight tremor of the body to signify that the nervous sys- tem had been touched. The operation was not of the sort to arouse the deadened brain. So deftly did the Chinese work that the arteries in the wrist were not touched. The flow of blood was quickly stanched, a heavy bandage applied—and the wounded arm restored to a comfortable position. “You get one thousand dolla’,” said Ming Yuen to Bagg the Chink, as he left him alone with the sleeping burglar. “ Me get nothing. Me work for flend.” Broad daylight, a sickly gray through the custy windows, had come when Heavy Windover awakened. He was very sick. He discovered the bandage at once. His whole arm ached. ‘““How’d I get this?” he asked Bagg the Chink, whom he aroused from sleep in a chair at the table. “How'd you get it?” repeated Bagg. He had learned his lesson well. ‘ Don’t you remember havin’ a fight up here—and that big fellow drivin’ at you with a knife?” “No. ~ Tell me about it—and make it short.” ‘There was a guy up here drinkin’, and you and him got into,a jam. He pulled a ‘shiv’ on you, but you knocked him over before he could hurt you much. He nicked you on the wrist.” “ Did I get him?” “You only beat him up and throwed him down-stairs—that’s all!” “Am I cut bad?” ** No—not bad.” (E00) _DOOK (C@)