Argosy: The Short Story Magazine — page 23: what you’re looking at

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

- 4. 7 - - ~ 2) . * i : , a ah 7 = ss) Sra . ‘ oes “San FS —s : ' - Ps ie Th ee ee ae ors it, i a ECA + eee on .s a “ a: 5o¢ ss, © . ' « via? HAUNTED SUMMER 23 her long since. Only me. How wonderfully terrible. Maybe — | she was trying to communicate with me! a I looked up at some of my aunts, moving around the kitchen while we were having supper that night, and thought how little _ t they understood. ; I knew I could have shared the terrible secret with my grand- ee mother, but I didn’t have time that night. It was Friday. She went to church. ‘cea I was very surprised that I had no dreams. Life was let down, a little ordinary, almost as usual, except for the secret. I kept expecting extraordinary things to happen. But nothing did. By the next morning—that was Saturday—I wasn’t even sure about the power. I went through the morning full of delicious foreboding, knowing that I was going to have to test it again. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged my old self up the stairs if I’d suspected such a thing was there. Wild horses coulda have kept my new powered self away. I couldn’t go in the morning because Saturday morning ¥ was busy, and it was only with a great deal of planning that I could shirk being put to work on chores. I went down beyond the railway bridge to the stream for most of the morning with | Francy, and hid until the afternoon when everyone would be dozing, or so languid with heat they couldn't be bothered with me. To tell the truth, I was afraid someone else would have the a power, and I didn’t want to share my secret with just anybody. oe In the still of the afternoon, I climbed the stairs again, *‘rolnd past my great-grandmother, | up ‘the attic steps, feeling that the black eyes were already staring at me. But when I reached the “3 top, keeping a watch to run in case she meved towards me, the partition door was closed. I dared going there to see, but ] wasn’t brave enough to dare action. I couldn’t reach forward and open the door. ) aaa I went slowly down the steps again, disappointed, looking behind me for fear of her long arm, all the way to the front — verandah. = Sunday morning was easy. Nobody got up until late, and the house was very quiet when I slipped out of bed. I waked up at the stillest part of the morning, planning and stirring my courage up in case the door was shut. sh I didn’t get it stirred up enough until about nine o’clock,. Everybody who was up was in the big kitchen having breakfast. The morning seemed washed and the sound of all the bickering ° in the kitchen and the chores being done and the chickens _ sy comicbooks.con ue ~ (=e = i