Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 25, 1924 — page 60: what you’re looking at

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

50 space before the huts. That will be the real thing, for there are plenty of rats from the gutters of Paris who have drifted to Rio. You'll find them all up there.” So that night Tina did not come to the Café La Scala. She sent word that she was sick. George would have to put some- body else at the cashier’s desk. And as the moon rose full and round over the sea, the girl muffled herself in a black cape and left the house. Soon she was gliding silently up the dark and narrow al- leyway where George had tought off the hill gang. There were few houses on the slope and the lights were dim and far apart. Cau- tiously the girl stole through the shadows and as she neared the top of the steep hill she bent down and assured herself that the knife she had thrust in her stocking was still there. The faint sound of guitars and a violin drifted down from the thieves’ colony on top of the hill. She could hear the noise of shrill laughter and hand clapping and occasionally there were whistling and catcalls. Evidently it was a party night at Apache Louie’s and the party had begun with a bang. As the ascent became more gentle, Tina decided that she had better leave the path, so she took the first dim trail that led be- tween the scattering of huts, and worked her way to the summit by a roundabout route. Only a few squatters, black, coffee- colored or pallid, lounged in the doorways of the cabins. They paid no attention to her, and Tina breathed easier. Guided by the light of a bonfire she gradually approached the cleared space where the party was in progress. The riff- raff of Rio was there. Black shadows clad like scarecrows in old rags and tattered straw hats were silhouetted against the fire- light. Their backs were turned. No one noticed Tina. Moonlight flooded the hill- top and its sprawling shacks of irregular outline. Here and there a royal palm rose against the luminous sky and below the wide bay, with its promontories and peaks, extended like a vast mirror. Breathless with the splendor of the scene, and the thrill of her escapade, Tina watched ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. the dance, a mad race of whirling couples, their rags flying in every direction. No doubt some one in that crew had stolen a cask of brandy, for everybody was more or less hilarious and the liquor was still flowing. Tin cans and cocoanut shells were circulating from hand to hand and from mouth to mouth. As Tina looked on with wide fascinated eyes, Louie, the apache, was crouching in the center of the cleared space, walking with cat-like steps round his partner, a tawny, panther-like quadroon girl, who imitated his movements. One might have thought it was a duel with knives; they circled round each other like cautious fighters watching for an opening. Suddenly they sprang at each others’ throats as if they were about to claw and bite, but instead of that they spun round and round like leaves in a whirlwind, and threw themselves apart and snatched each other up again in the fury of the dance. All at once the girl seemed to go limp and Louie seized her fiercely by one ankle and one wrist and whirled her round and round, so that she swung clear of the ground, her hair flying and her scanty skirts whipping the air. Then he had her in his arms and they were clinging closer than ever, whirling to the wild music of the fiddle. Again they flung apart and this time when they met, Apache Louie had his com- panion by the throat and was shaking her as if he had murder in his heart. As the music crashed to a frantic finish he .flung her far from him and she lay a panting heap on the ground. That was the apache dance! Shrieks of laughter, hand clapping and a clatter of tin cups full of brandy was the applause that the hill gang gave to Frenchy as he glanced arrogantly about him, sweating and panting, his lank hair clinging to his forehead, for it was dripping with the speed of the dance. He looked like a puny but exceedingly vicious pirate as he poised on his toes, his torn shirt open at the throat, his baggy trousers and the red sash that supported them, picked out by the flickering firelight. Somebody tossed him a rose. He thrust it back of his ear and advanced to the CORNICGLO© S (S@)