Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 6, 1923 — page 65: what you’re looking at

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

SO THIS IS kill the wrong one. And to be swell about it, like Iron Reedy was! Always dressed like he was going to a party. Keeping in the background, pulling the strings. ‘But it’s dead wrong,’ Reedy was re- suming. ‘‘ America was never planned that way. Too much power for any one man to swing. It’s like I had ten thousand arms and iegs and eyes. And I’m only one of the small fry, at that. System will pass away. If it don’t, then we’ll go blah, like Russia. But it ‘ll last my time; and as I say, I can’t break the habit now. But get this right; I never did use my power to get a fellow bumped off! If he needed it, I at- tended to it personally, and took my chances.” They slowed down, came to a halt ona rocky point whence for miles up and down the coast their eyes had a clean sweep. Reedy inhaled deeply. Presently he un- buttoned his coat, and removed a long, stiff envelope. “Open it,” he commanded. The boy did so. Within were ten one- thousand dollar unregistered Liberty Bonds. “ They’re yours,” Reedy said simply. “Tf you bring ’em back to town, they’ll take ’em off you. Maybe they will up here; but at least they’ll last longer.” “But I don’t want them! I tell you, I don’t have to be paid!”’ protested the Slap- - per. Reedy fixed him with a cold eve. “ Thought I told you I was all clean? I don’t have to buy you—nor any other man! This is yours with no strings on it. You'll never see me again—unless you’re dumb enough to return to the city. You need a stake. It takes a long time to dig ten grands’ worth of clams. But with these bonds, you'll be as good as anybody but Hendrie. And he tells me he can use vou in a little game of his own?” The Slapper nodded, still dazed. “Play up to him. You and Letty, too. I’ve always been interested in kids. Can call about five hundred by name, and they think me and Santa Claus was born twins. They call me Bill!” He chuckled, and sighed. ‘‘ Hope to hell their folks never wise ’em up to what I really am,” he said. WEDLOCK! 847 “Not but what I might have been worse, and got away with it.” He left, that evening, for Portland. “The minister’s wife,” he said to the Slapper, during their final talk. “ Hell of a life! She was raised in a little Western city. Went to lectures and concerts and things. Now she’s buried here, with a good man who can earn most five hundred fish in a lucky year. Seems she’s been crazy ior a radio outfit. I’ve ordered one for her. A whale. She can tune in on the Paris caba- rets, if she wants to. Or, if she gets fed up on her old man’s sermons, she can get Rome and hear the Pope preach in St. Peter’s. Be a life saver for her. Amuse her pals, too. I talked with the blacksmith here about rigging it up. Some bird, that smith! If I had him in the big burg I could make him rich in six months. He could work any combination box there is. Regular mechanic, home bred.” A little later he spoke of Mrs. Tucker. ‘““ She won’t take a nickel for my board. Cheap at two hundred! I’m a new man inside. But Letty tells me she loves maga- zines; the ones with stories in ’em. So I told the minister to book her up for every one there was except the pious ones. You’d be surprised! They'll have to stow them in the barn.” They all watched him as he relled down the turnpike. At the big dune he slowed down and leaned back. ‘Had the time of my sinful life!” he called back. ‘“‘ Never expected to enjoy myself this way, and never shall again. Good-by!” And that was the last of Iron Reedy. Five days later, opening his newspaper, the Slapper’s eyes beheld a leaded caption smeared across the first page: WILLIAM (“IRON”) REEDY KILLED. Servant Finds Bullet-Riddled Body Outside Door of His Park Avenue Apartment at Dawn. It was strange, the Slapper mused, how everybody seemed to want to see him go right. There were the Tuckers, and Letty. Technically he was merely a boarder. But COMmiclooe (©