Argosy, Vol. 120, No. 1 — page 67: what you’re looking at

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

THE BUTT OF NEPTUNE’S JEST. have to be opened for further load in the morning, if more were coming. The very bow of the boat he avoided. He had glimpsed a black-garbed figure there which attracted him about as little as if it had shown horns and hoofs and a spear-tipped tail. Panama Liz was smoking a quieting ' cigarette before retiring, it seemed. - Dan had nothing to report, byt there was still the matter of his formal signing on the ship’s roll to attend to. He knocked at the 57 ships without any real help from lots of skippers. At the head of the lower stairs, the smile died suddenly. Once more a feminine form stood at a stair-bottom, poised as if halted from ascending, by the sound of his descent. But this one was arrayed in black. Dan had no need of the moonlight falling full upon it to enable him to recognize the up- - turned face of Panama Liz. door he had seen the captain enter. ~ “Come in.” The voice still held an encouraging steadiness. Dan entered the room. ‘The captain, still fully dressed, was sitting on the middle of his bed. Dan thought he had just raised his head from the task of unlacing his shoes. The man’s eyes stared heavily a moment at the intruder. Then— “ You!” burst thickly from the captain’s lips, the voice turning harsh and ugly as it dragged the single syllable.- “ ‘ What. in— hell — d’you wanta — come —thish time night, an— ‘** Oh—e’wan to hell—out—” It died away. It had been accompanied by the drunken man’s sagging lapse to a posture half lying across the bed, his still booted feet dangling to the floor, his head shoved onto his breast by the wall behind. Dan hesitated a moment. Then he shifted the wretched bulk to a proper position and unlaced and removed the boots. He got only mutterings, intelligible enough as ugly curses, for his pains. He blew out the lamp, went out, closed the door behind him. “Wish I could lock it on the inside,” he growled to himself. ‘‘ But—of all the men to act sober with a paralyzing drunk aboard! Some captain, Dan Corwin. And— “No, he'll never keep alive to see her wedding. Anyhow—don’t be thinking too far ahead. But say— — “TI forgot all about being scared on the bridge. I—I wonder—”’ In the next forty seconds, Dan made the two flights of stairs three steps at a jump! Then he stood on the bridge—walked the breadth of it—its length— He came down with a smile on his face. What of a little detail like a drunken skip- per? Lots of mates have to sail lots of "er 2. Sm". th. CHAPTER XII. RESPONSIBILITY. DAN stood stock still, his mind wavering on the verge of a hasty retreat and, if need be, resort to an undignified game of chase-the-fox around and around the chart and wheel-house. With a considerable sinking of the courage he had felt a moment before, he realized that this could avail him nothing in the long run. If Panama Liz wanted to see him, to speak to him—she would see him and speak to Him so surely as he remained aboard the City of Altoona. And she did not quite put him out of mind to stay. “Ah, Danny—”’ she called, as if she had just seen him, instead of having stood full half a minute waiting for him to speak first. ‘““T was just looking for you,’’ she added, much in the extremely intimate tone she had adopted at the dinner-table. Dan came down. At the table he had made some effort to be civil to her. There was no reason for any play-acting now. “ Well—what do you want?” he asked her sharply, as he got half-way down the steps. - “Just to talk to you,” she murmured sweetly. But he got the notion that some of her tone was meant for any possible eavesdropper. ‘“ Don’t you want to talk to me?” | ‘““ Not very seriously.” Dan suddenly resolved to settle things then and there with Panama Liz. “Id rather do any talking with you through an abogado de prose- custén, or whatever they call him, before un magistrado than anywhere else.” The woman laughed. ‘“ Your Spanish has improved a little faster than your sense; EO 1NOO CO