Argosy, Vol. 118, No. 2 — page 69: what you’re looking at

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

THE DEVIL’S — a feeling almost like gratitude toward the man who had succored him. 3 Then in his mouth a taste made itself felt and in his nostrils there was a smell. He could not at once place that combined odor and taste, but he knew it had never come from his water tank, and his eyes sought, questioning, the faces of the others. He read satisfaction, the look that vic- tors have for a beaten enemy, and then he was conscious that a feeling of rest and peace was dimming his quick alarm, taking away the edge of his pain, and even touch- ing a little the clarity of his vision. Was he going to sleep? That taste was still on his tongue and, just as the dimming face of Bat Marble laughed at his impotence, he found a name. -Chloral hydrate—a big dose. Hugh Spaulding’s second return from ob- livion was at first wholly pleasant. Too heavy with numbing sleep to move, his brain first became active, and one after an- other impressions registered themselves until he had a fairly accurate understand- ing of his condition. His face was lying against sunlight- bathed sand, for one thing; and he knew by his position that he was no longer tied. Water splashed gently somewhere at his back. It was calm, therefore, and beauti- ful. If it had not been for a reek of stale whisky in the air he would have been quite content to go to sleep again. That an- noyed him so much that he would have been willing to get up and lie down in an- other place if he could have moved his leaden body—but he could not stir even a finger. A broken bottle lay near. ' Some one moved him. Strong hands turned him over on his back, and the face of Sheriff Hardy appeared before his half- closed eyes. The sheriff’s thumbs pressed back his lids urgently. “Dead. drunk,” announced Hardy. “T don’t believe it!” rang fiercely in Spaulding’s ears; and that part of his being which was alive responded to the presence of Irene. She knelt beside him; he saw her hazily, and then she sat down and pil- lowed his head in her lap. “ Get up, girl!” That was Devil Down- ‘is caught with the goods? DAUGHTER. 219 ey speaking. ‘‘ Don’t you know this pup He’s got. drunk and wrecked his sloop, and the officers have caught him with half a dozen cases of whisky in the cabin! When he gets sober it’s going to be in jail! Ain’t that so, sheriff?” ‘““ He'll get more than jail if I can fix it!” growled Hardy. ‘And don’t think you ain’t going to get caught sooner or later, Downey! I ain’t got any evidence on you now, but I’d bet five dollars you had a hand in beating Spaulding up!” , “Come on home, Irene!”’ urged Down- ey. “‘‘ Can’t you see he’s done for? What do you want of a bum like him?” ‘He is drunk,” said Irene Downey slow- ‘TI can smell it!” “You better mind your father, and be- have yourself,” advised the sheriff. ‘““My stepfather,” she corrected, ‘“ and neither God nor man has given you any right to interfere in my affairs, Mr. Sher- iff!” “This fool is a bum!” cried Downey. “ You’re wasting time!” When she had agreed that he was drunk Spaulding’s mind had quivered to exquisite torture; and then, as he fought with all the power of his will to rouse himself, he won- dered whether it were not better that she should continue to think so. But he strug- gled on toward control of himself, and he had succeeded in opening his lids wider ly. when she answered the latest urge of Devil — Downey. ‘“He’s drunk, and he’s going to jail, and he’s made a fool of himself, no doubt,” she said slowly, ‘“ but nobody on earth is going to prevent me from sticking to him. I’m going to stick through hell and high water, Mr. Sheriff, so do your worst!” Then Hugh Spaulding found utterance, thick though his words were, and he spoke slowly from his resting-place in. her arms. ‘‘Look—under Downey’s—potato bins, sheriff! A hundred gallons—I’ll straighten out the rest—later on!” Spaulding realized vaguely that the oth- ers went away in a riot of cursing protest, but he cared nothing for that. What he cared for was that the arms of Irene cradled him and that her lips sought his, COMIC OOOKS (C@)