Argosy All-Story Weekly — "The Purple Limited" — page 52: what you’re looking at

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

618 mons rescuers. If she couldn't make her- self seen or heard she could throw some- thing out. Scribble a note, maybe. While she thus belatedly reasoned, the girl ran to the nearest heavy curtains and pulled them aside. The window was there all right, but what was wrong? Why wes there that strange, unbroken darkness be- yond? Why was there no lighted windows around? No lights of the city? Close to the dirt-encrusted pane, Julre pressed her face; but she could see noth- ing but a thwarting obscurity. Standing on tiptoe she reached for the window-fast- ener. It had rusted into place, and before she managed to turn it, her fingers were sore and bruised. This was not all. The window was stuck fast in the frame. Tug and strain as she did on the curved holders screwed to the frame, she could not raise the window even a trifle. Had it been glued or nailed it could not have been more be- yond her strength. She could not move it and that was an end of the matter. Was it? Under action, we change. The helpless sit-and-sorrow submission holds us supine. Movement, even misdirected, hold possibili- ties of benefit. Julie’s blood had warmed. She had undone the fastener, was she to be stopped by a pane of glass? Why shouldn’t she break it? There would be a noise and damage, well-— | ‘“ They had no right to lock me in!” Who “ they ” were or what might be the outcome of her contemplated deed, Julie did not now stop to bother about. It had taken some time for her to. rouse herself, but now she had started she felt like going on. Indeed, there was a certain amount of pleasure to be got from smashing that window. The door she could not break. This— ‘‘ Any one can break a pane of glass.” Julie wrapped her handkerchief round her knuckles and gave the window a sharp blow. It was a sidelong, glancing effort. A girl’s ineffective punch and—she shut her eyes. Very naturally there was no crash, not even a crack in the glass. Which was just as well. A falling wedge of plate-glass can do a considerable amount of damage. A razor-blade is less dangerous. Y ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. — Some i¢a of the risk she was running of injuring herself mast have occurred to the girl. She dropped the clenched hand raised for another try and looked around. Wasn't there something hard she could break the window with? . . Over in a corner behind an old baize- covered card-table she saw a long stick. It proved to be a billiard-cue. The balanced, loaded end couldn’t have been bettered 4s a battering-ram for window-smashing. Be- sides she could stand back out of all harm. One tap, and the deed was done. And after all, the noise was not so very great. The glass broke in big pieces and most of them feH clear of the narrow window-sill and stood edgewise on the thick carpet, propped against the wall. Refhoving a big, jagged triangle that still held in the wa dow-frame, Julie looked out. She could bear the roar and hum of the traffic below; she could feel the fresh air blowing past her face, but she could see nothing. Noth ing that is of human life and activity. All the rest was a maze of wires, heavy, wooden framework and boards.’ Excepting for a long, narrow opening far far above the top of the window, she was literally boxed in. The three windows of the big room wet blinded by a huge electric sign. Here and there through tiny cracks in the boards, glinted sparks and spears of light. The brightly illumimated sign had a humorous appeal, and now and again a passer-by in the throng below would look up and grin. Behind the sign, leaning through the broken window, her spread fingers half bur- ied in the fine dust collected on the sill, stood Julie. Fear and despair were again creeping over her. Presently she screamed. Shrill, piercing it was, yet to those below, as far beyond their power of hearing a5 & baby’s sigh. CHAPTER XIII. LANDED AND—STRANDED. N the half-open doorway of a hut made of ingeniously interlaced branches bedded in sun-baked mud, crouched a child of logical and disordered circumstance. Et- bows on knees, chin cupped in the hollows COMICL©OKS.COM