Argosy All-Story Weekly — "The Purple Limited" — page 70: what you’re looking at

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

636. done her part exceedingly well. The row- boat was drawn up en the sand, and there was no sign of Mae and Bert. It was evi- dent that Mae had followed oa instruc- tions to the letter. There was nothing intricate abierut this extreme coup of- Skid’s, and why he had been obliged to lay awake for any length of time to conceive it, it would be difficult to say. All that he did when he reached the beach was io step out upon the sand, tie a rope which he took from his pocket to the other boat, fasten the line te his own skiff, and slide both boats to the water’s edge. After which he grinned at the trees im the approximate center of the island, climbed into his own conveyance and rewed hastily back toward the cottage. In a few moments, however, he untied the rope, set- ting Bert’s boat adrift, and shoving the line into his pocket, blithely proceeded on his villainous way. Bert would undoubtedly feel aggrieved. He had pulled his boat to a pomt a good ten feet from the water, and would feel justified in the belief that there had not been a tidal wave while he sat under a tree. But he would not knew whom to suspect or accuse. Mae might be expected to rave a good deal, and would most certainly know who was the tidal wave, but she would hardly dare come right out with it and accuse her co-conspirator. As Jim’s guest, it would place her in a rather difficult position, and | make her appear as a scheming adventuress who was an accessory before the fact. Mama Temple and Ann would believe. that it was a put-up job on the part of Bert, who had been acting peculiarly, to ' gay the least. Skid felt that if he could not make them believe that Bert had de- liberately set adrift the boat, he was losing his grip and should consult an alienist. And he would save Mae by persuading them that Bert was a scoundrel who had duped an innocent young girl from Dubuque. Then Ann -would shortly become Mrs. Skid Smith, wife of the prominent delica- tessen magnate—and what became ef Bert aad Jim was of small consequence and wor- ried Skid not at all. -ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. All in all, no harm ‘would be done, and Ann woukl thank Heaven daily fer a fond and homely husband whe was decidedly varap-proof. It was a lovely scheme, nearly up to Skid’s asinine standard: and he was at peace with the world when he drew his boat into the shadows and made his way to the porch by a circuitous route. “Where in the world have you bees?” growled Jim unpleasantly. “Me? Oh, I wanted to think,” Skid replied easily. ‘So I walked back through the timber and sat down on a log. I'm go business, and I was doing a little mental calculation. Do they keep pies in a deii- tatessen? I wonder how. you buy liver wurst, by the yard?” Mama Temple thought pies were a part of a properly conducted delicatessen; Ana and Jim thought they were not. And no one knew anything about liverwurst except that it was a thing to be avoided So Skid led the conversation inte other channels, apparently unconscious of the fact that as time passed both Ann and Jim were growing in nervousness and il] temper. Finally Jim sprang to his feet. ‘“‘ They’ve been gone two hours,”’ he said crossly. ‘I don’t like it; I don’t like x at all. Maybe something has happened to them.”’ ““My gracious!” said Skid. “Vd for- gotten all about them! Let’s take the other beat and look for them. Why, they might be drowned, mightn’t they?” “TY doubt it,” said Ann; and Mama Temple supplemented that with the obser- vation that it might be well if they were, and she, for one, was quite comfortable on the porch. So Ann and Jim and Skid set off alone to search the waters for the delinquents. First they rowed toward town, and then — | they rowed due west for quite a while, and finaliy they straightened out for the island. ‘They may have put in there,” suggest- ed Skid, “and their boat may have drifted off, leaving them marooned. But why frould they put in there? If it wasn’t so dark we could see clearer, couldn’t we? I wonder if they call those pickle barrels you S CO COMICLOO