Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 5, 1921 — page 82: what you’re looking at

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

368 glittering in green, yellow, crimson fires on the jewels. He closed his eyes and thought ofthe Tangle; he opened them and found Sylvia Lester smiling up at him. She was quiet, timidly eager to be en- ‘ertaining, and yet held back by a charm- jng reserve, and above al! she danced with the grace of an enchanted creature. The evening wore on; there was more dancing: there was nothing left visible except youth, gaiety, and sometimes from the background the keen eyes of Mrs. Harding or the amused eyes of Mrs. William Lodge. “They found each other and sat together, held by a mutual respect, a mutual dread, which is often a great deal more binding than real friendship: moreover, it was nearly mid- night and the duties of the hostess lessenec| as every one found his or her pecultarly fit- ting niche. ‘They talked of nothing, clev- erly, until Mrs. Harding suddenly touched her guest’s arm. “What in the world,’ she said, happened to Jack?” ‘“ Because he’s dancing about like any other boy?” “Look at him now!” They could ovet- look the entire room from thetr chairs. ‘“ He’s either an astonishing actor or else he’s having a bully good time.”’ ‘At least,” murmured: Mrs. Lodge, “he is not an astonishing actor.” “He hasn’t that reputation.” said Mrs. Harding, and they smiled at each other, for Jack Lodge was occasionally accused of almost boorish frankness, and his yawns were the terror of every hostess in the town. “ But I thought he was planning another trip to Zanzibar, or some such place?” ‘Hush, my dear!” said Mrs. Lodge. “That is something we don’t mention to Jack. He thinks he's about to leave: every day is almost his Jast.” Mrs. Harding smiled. Wer own two sons had been of a different metal. but she had wide powers of sympathy. | “In time,” she murmured, ° they all come around.” And indeed, Jack Lodge felt that he had never before seen girls as they really are: he had never known that music and dancing can bring much the same thrill as African buffalo caught squarely in the sights; the * has ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. touch of a girl's hand may be very much like the pressure of the trigger on. the finger- tip, with a certain sense of explosiveness to be expected. Whatever he was when he went into the Tangle he was a new man now. The orchestra finished a piece; the danc- ing ceased, but there was a tumultuous en- coring, and eventually the orchestra struck into an old piece of ragtime; there was a murmur of applause and the dancers swung away once more. But Jack Lodge was troubled. Lt was an old tune with which he was vaguely familiar, and he danced with his head canted to one side, trying to remember what it was that the music recalled to him. And at length it came clearlv. The humming of the stringed in- struments grew harsher, the volume of the plano increased, dominated ‘the rest, and linally it became the rattle of a hurdy- rurdy, clattering this same tune not in the room, but in the street below. He looked down, and the face of the girl close to his shoulder was the face of Mary Dover. Then it rushed on him, the little office at the Chuck-a-Luck, and the thrumming of the hurdy-gurdy in the street. ‘What is it?” asked Sylvia Lester. ‘Nothing! Nothing!” He looked away from her. * You seemed positively —- fierce — just then!” she was saying. But he made no answer. With all his soul he prayed for the end of that dance and the cessation of that music, and to clear his vision from the ghost he locked at the nearest of the dancing couples. It was the blond hair of Ruth Angley that caught his cye, Ruth Angley, with her bright, happy cyves darting here and there, but at the very moment when he was blessing her silently (or banishing the illusion, the brilliant hair faded, tarnished, became a cloud, and then out of the cloud there grew a mass of lus- trous black, and beneath it two great, dark eyes, ancl grave lips; and the hand on the shoulder of Ruth Angley’s partner was formed with the most exquisite care, with (imples over the knuckles. Mary Dover! ‘| beg your pardon!” cried some one. He had shamefully wrecked a couple and, comichboaéks.c®