Argosy All-Story Weekly, June 13, 1925 — page 115: what you’re looking at

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

HONEST FOOL. | 087 truth is Im in a bad fix Jules and I reckon you will have a laugh to hear me say so. I guess you got out of jail easy enough. They would as lieve have the devil in jail nor you TI guess—Monday and his gang. Well Jules maybe Im as big a fool as you told me I was quite frequent. Maybe Im all the things you ever called me. Im in a bad hole anyhow. The money I brot with me is all gone and I got a job but that aint the worst. I could kick myself Jules. And if I could undrink all the bad booze I drunk in that country the Old Man is so stuck on Id do it if it killed me. If he hadnt dragged me away from Ste. Jeanne I wouldnt be were I am now thats a sinsh. I guess you know what I mean Jules. Im taking my medicine all right all right and it tastes like hell and onions. Say a good word for me to the Old Man if ever you can think of one Jules. Yours respectfully, Jules STALVART. Jules read this artiess production many times, at first with disgust and scorn, but presently with less definite emotions. The more he considered it, the less bitterly did his gorge rise at it and the more tender became his heart. With Jeff so far away, and this letter in one’s hand, it was not diffi- cult to forget anger and feel only pity. Pity bred kindred emotions. Gratitude, for in- stance. He began to feel grateful to Jeff for the very thing that had all but split his heart with rage at the time of its discov- ery—that graceless, cruel, false, ignoble de- sertion of Marcel for the girl Dora. His gratitude was all for the sake of Marcel. He shivered at the thought that a man fall- en so low, capable of such madness as this, might have done otherwise—might have passed the Harlow house and gone on up- stream to the bushy farm and taken Marcel away with him. Now he realized the enor- mity of such a thought. He realized now that Marcel was fortunate in that matter, however bitter her grief might be. He knew now that it would have been too late for Marcel even to have saved him from his own weakness and folly—that any time since their arrival on Porcupine Brook had been too late. After mature consideration, Jules offered the letter to Lem. ‘“Who’s it from?” asked the boss sus- piciously. Jules told him; and the boss replied, with an oath, that he neither wanted to see it nor hear anything about it. Jules fixed him with a dangerous eye, stood squarely in front of him and opened the letter. ‘“ You shall ’ear it, nevertheless,’’ he said. “Tf you try to go away, I shall detain you by force. If you put your fingers in your ears, I shall shake zem out.” Then he read the letter aloud. Lem’s face was expressionless. “It is evident zat your modest Dora is not all your fancy painted,” said Jules, fold- ing the letter. “ True, Jeff does not men- tion ’er by name—but it is not necessary.” ‘He made his bed an’ he can lay in it,” said Lem. “Spent his money, has he?— the money he stole from me! Well, it’s the last of mine he’ll ever get a chance to spend.” ‘ You are wrong, my friend. I ’ave never been a fazzer myself, but I know zat you are wrong. Jeff is your own son, ’owever big a fool ’e may be—and partly for zat very reason. In the meantime, I shall do what I can to ’elp the unfortunate weakling: and some day you will be very grateful to me for doing so.” “ You'll help him? How d’ye mean, help him?” “To write ’im a letter not too severe, and to send ’im a modest sum of money.” “Send him money I paid you? Not on yer life, Jules Perdu!” ‘It is my money, unless my work is such zat I do not earn it. In zat case—if zat is your opinion of my labor—I will find employment elsewhere. It is for you to say, Mr, Stalvart.” ‘You go plumb to hell, for all of me!” “TI ’ope zat I shall not find it necessary to go so far for honest employment,” re- turned Jules, gravely. Jules wrote to Jeff that night, advising him to come home at the earliest opportu- nity, no matter under what circumstances. ‘You must hasten to the formidable task of proving to your good and sorely enraged father, if possible, that you are not entirely devoid of that spirit which is supposed to elevate man above the soulless and degrad- ed level of wild beasts,” he wrote, reflecting that this was not too severe, considering the thickness of Jeff’s skin. cComicbooks CO