Argosy, Vol. 147, No. 1 — page 44: what you’re looking at

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

Se ee 1 ‘Randolph Beatty could 1 thought of how old Pierre fe a . when. he awoke to discover his | 3 ‘man— alone. His last years em- P tnoved | in an agony of indecision. rted slowly toward the corner drug ee (the en, suddenly, he stopped. With fick firm step, he crossed the street di- d the Marshall gate. dy had come to a sudden decision. ie shall should have his warning = I. He should know with whom he to deal; know that a decent enough sand iP leved his daughter and wanted her ey wife. He, Randy, did not blame : or his opposition to the fortune hunt- ‘+: fe was perfectly willing to be investi- na him Se LT. {nd L he would tell him so! Without making any reference to ‘the ol i elopement, he would inform Pierre all who and what he was, and why ra Ponte d his daughter for his wife. Then, Gere aie to be unreasonable, let it Randy did not doubt that he would be nable after all that had happened. t least, that would be open war, then. o Rnd Pet be fighting in the dark. : : Proud at least know that the fellow ; daughter had eloped with was no skulk- nor ry yet any blackguard who was marry- Corinr » with the hope of extorting some rer father’s dollars afterward. oom such circumstances there was 2 e of reconciliation later. The other ‘t er s would have been none; the two Tt Vy ’ tc x » t nou olds would have been inexorably un- iltab >, This way— ge trying, anyhow. If he loved — only decent thing to do. If sr it was his duty to think of her piness. ed 1 the street, opened the gate, ne graveled walk and rang the id not know that, as he passed pa atch of light cast by the two pillars guarded the gate been observed by Co- ory aeri¢ ». where her Ve ter in; z. $ + > 2) « on ak aay c ‘ — _ eee WEEKLY. A moment later she heard the doorbeil ring, and felt a sharp stab of pain at her heart. Noiselessly she glided over the thick velvet pile of the upper-hall carpet and came half down the stairs—down to where they turned. She had taken the precaution of extinguishing the light behind her, so that there would be no shadow cast. Then, from where she stood, she saw Simpkins’s assistant, a tall young footman named Albert, answer the door, and heard the voice she loved best asking for her father. “ Oh, God!” she gasped, wondering what terrible thing had happened to upset his plans. Recent fiction she had read supplied material for her fears. Had Evans discov- ered her duplicity at the riding academy and installed a dictograph that had revealed Randy’s plot? Was her lover, even now, under surveillance with the chance of pos- sible arrest—‘ for trespassing,” say—as her father had threatened Robert Benham? She stood like something frozen, until, in her darkness, she saw Albert in the light bringing Randy to the door of the down- stairs library and ushering him in. She slipped down after Albert had shut the door. But the walls and doors of the Marshall house were thick, built to stand, and, with the tapestries and the thickness of the carpets, not so much as a confused murmuring reached her ears. So she crept away, like some hunted thing that has been trapped at last; crept back to her bedroom and threw herself face-downward on her bed, sobbing piti- fully; she, who until then, had been in an- ticipation, the happiest girl in the city. Had she heard what was happening she might have been spared something of her fears for the man she loved. But she had not forgotten her father’s threat to “ do an injury ” to him who should come next in the effort to win his daughter’s affections. What happened would have surprised her. When Pierre Marshall looked up from the reports he had been trying to read with- out his reading-glasses—said glasses have been unaccountably mislaid and not found, ~ although Albert and Simpkins had searched the house and were still searching when Randy rang—when he looked up and saw . (elo) Mm boo cS. (0) 7m