Argosy All-Story Weekly, 4 February 1922 — page 72: what you’re looking at

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

gesture, but it embraced the whole room before them, the drinking workmen, Logger - Shannon, white-aproned, behind the bar. William responded readily, as of old habit. “A girl like you has no business in a place like this—” “Sure, I know,” she returned; “I’ve heard that from three drummers now this week.” Nevertheless, her eyes beckoned as they beckoned to all men. She.moved, leaning against the casing of the door. The firm, full lines of her body ran into subtle curves speaking at once of strength and yielding softness beneath the loose drapery of her gingham dress. William stepped nearer to the girl, enchantment dragging at his senses. “It’s true,” he protested. ‘“ Why, a girl like you—you don’t know what you’re miss- ing in this hole.” 7 “No? Well, I’ve had plenty o’ chance to learn.” She flung back her head, her black hair blending as-in a master’s paint- ing into the shadows of the darkened room behind. There was something of defiance in her manner, almost a hint of possessive pride. _- “Tt’s mine, ain’t it? I belong here. I was born here. The Logger is my daddy, and my mother was a dance-hall girl—I can’t change that, can 1? I wouldn’t want to: all of this here is a part of me.” William was helpless before such reason- ing. “ But I don’t see—” he challenged. * With what you could have—” “ You wouldn’t,” she asserted. “ You’re a fool! Iain’t. I hold to what I’v< got.” Her eyes flashed. “ All that you've got, you fling to the birds. Talk to me about what I could have! We sell whisky, but I’m not fool enough to drink the stuff, and if I caught the Logger at it, he’d hear from me. You pay two-bits for whisky, God- Wnows-what for leave to drink the stuff. Men make me sick.” Her contempt, contradicted by her eyes, maddened him. Falling silent, she seemed Jost in some curious meditation of her own. William waited, passion mounting in his heated brain. He laid a tentative hand upon her shoulder. She did not move away. “ Maybe I’m a fool,” he said, encour- ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. aged. “But I know a good-looking girl when I see one.” The girl smiled at him again, turning her head slowly. “IT think,” she said, “ you’d better run away.” “Why?” he demanded, want me to stay a while?” “Oh, I don’t mind,” she answered care- lessly. “ But there’s some here might not like it much.” “What difference does that make?” he “Don’t you asked boldly. “Some!’’ She smiled again. ‘ There’s Dave, for instance.” William felt very reckless. ‘‘ Well, I don’t give a damn for Dave, whoever he is, if you smile at me.” He accompanied the boast with a caress- ing pressure of the girl’s firm arm. She did not resent the familiarity, but a dark bedevilment leaped into her eyes. ‘“* Dave!” she called softly. At the sound of her voice the huge, blond Hopewell Davies shoved out from the crowd. “You, Belle, what’s now?” he growled. The girl laughed. ‘“ This here feller, Dave, he says he don’t give a damn for you.” William stepped back, mightily aston- ished, more than a little dismayed at the threatening attitude of the great Cornish- man, more than all fiercely angry at the action of the girl. “°F ’ll gi’ a damn, time Ah’m through— messin’ abaht wi’ Belle!”’ Davies slouched forward. Whatever else may be said of William, he was not a coward in any sense. Perhaps, too, Logger Shannon’s whisky, said to be capable of making a rabbit spit in a wildcat’s face, had something to do with his access of courage now. William turned to meet the giant’s at- tack halfway. His lips were pale with anger, not with fear. Davies rushed, mean- ing to destroy this presumptuous youth with a single blow. William sidestepped, aimed a vicious blow as the Cornishman swung past, merely grazing the point of a tightened jaw. Mid- way in the drive Davies, unbalanced for an Eomicbooks Ss -- a