Argosy All-Story Weekly, March 15, 1924 — page 114: what you’re looking at

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

BIG GAME. blow, the real knockout. ‘You can credit yourself with one win at least from John Forsythe.” ‘“ That wasn’t what [ meant, Marie.” ‘What did you mean, then?” she asked curiously. ‘‘ Sometimes I can’t make you out, Ralph. And you make me feel funny when you act like that. Come on now, cut it out and explain—I’m getting the willies.” 743 think we ought to give Forsythe’s money back?” he inquired. She pondered the question a few seconds and when she spoke her words had the snap ‘of decision. wf Walters opened his mouth several times, . but no words came. To aid him the girl put her arm around him in the same moth- erly protecting manner she had shown when guiding him through traffic. ~ “ Marie, will you marry me?” he blurted at last. The question or the suddenness of it dazed her. The color left her face. “ Marry you?” she asked in turn, her voice strained. Walters nodded. ‘Then, there on the lake front- with the Illinois Central trains fretting in the yards, the smoke of the engines disfiguring the air, she dropped her blond, head into his lap and great sobs shook and tore her ‘body. But her fingers clasped his. ‘‘T mean it, Marie,” Walters whispered awkwardly. ‘‘ Not because I think I ought to, but because I care for you. You were a good pal to me when John Forsythe put me down and out and you’ve been a good pal ever since. But, Marie, I’m sick of it all, the cafés, the waiters, the women, the men—everything. _ I want the green grass, the blue sky, the old maples over the walks—” Marie Riggers raised her face. The hard- ness was gone and in its place renunciation. ‘Then you go back to the country, Ra!ph,” she said painfully. “TI can’t, I’m too ’—she continued with evident effort— “dirty. Tl never be clean again. “ou can do it, but it’s different with a woman.’ ““Tf IT can, you can.’ ‘“ No, no, no,” she sobbed, her tears melt- ing her into a new tenderness. ‘‘ I want the grass and the sky. and—” She crumpled in his arms and raising her face, he saw a new light in her eyes. For a few minutes they sat silent, a strange world before them. “ Now that we’re going straight, do you ‘No, I don’t.. He turned us into the way we went, you directly and me indirectly, -and he should give us a new start.” Again that silence. “The first thing I want to do is to send a money order to Mrs. Smith,” said Walters, apparently dismissing the subject of For- sythe. “I ran away owing her fifteen dol- lars, you knew, and she’s a widow. I never thought of that before. I will pay Burch- ard also and he’ll withdraw that warrant I heard he got for me. And then Marie ”— careless of passers-by he drew her to him— “Jet’s go to Texas. I’ve got an uncle down there. He owns the general store in one of those funny little towns—he sent me a post card showing Main Street full of wagon . loads of cotton and he’ll give me a job. We'll get a little house—” “ With vines all over the front porch and a big flower bed by the front walk! Oh, Ralph, I’ve lain awake nights thinking of a place like that. .Ralph, I’ve never had a real home. I’ve had to make my living ever since I was thirteen years old. And youll work hard and J’ll save and some day you'll have enough money to go into business for yourself. We’ve, learned our lesson, haven’t we?” - Walters squeezed: her hand with a pressure that brought pain, but her quick tears were those of happiness. After more argument he persuaded her to take his arm and they went to the office of the county clerk. A little later an obliging justice of the peace made them husband and wife. | Then they hastened out to Paulina Street to claim their belongings. Their small amount of _ packing completed, Walters looked about the room to see that nothing had been left behind. Packages in -the waste paper basket caught his eye. “Why, Marie,” he exclaimed, ‘ youtve thrown away your cigarettes—here are two full packages.” “T. have. I’m through with them. Tl never smoke again.’ Impulsively ‘he put his arm around her. coOmiclbooks