The Argosy, Christmas 1912 — page 144: what you’re looking at

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

130 “We're waitin’, bo. Are you goin’ to slip us the answer, or ain’t you? Where is Perkins hid?” “T don’t know,” Lewis truthfully replied. | ‘* All right,” commented Pete. “ You won't tell. I guess you forget the favor we done you here. We got you away from them fly-cops. If we hadn’t took you out o’ their hands, you know: what was goin’ to happen to you, don’t you? Yes—you’d have landed in the chair. That's what—the chair. And now you take this straight. Either you tip us off to where you’ve planted this guy or his body, or—we take you back to the police on the run. Get it?” Lewis’s heart gave a bound. In the custody of the law was now where he would ten times rather be, if he had his choice, than at the mercy of these ras- cals. And here he had that choice vir- tually offered him. Drawing himself up, the reporter folded his arms. In the manner of a ten-twenty-thirty hero of melodrama, he declaimed: _ “Very well. Do your worst—take me back to the police!” His captors surveyed him in silence for a moment or two. Then the fat man slowly nodded. “You called the turn, friend,” said he. “I guess slow-thinkin’ ain’t one o’ your failin’s. You win out—we can’t take you back to the bulls. Stickin’ that pair of ‘em up on the street to get you away has put us in wrong with the coppers, too. They’d make it warm for us if they ever spot- ted Brady and me again—just the way you figgered. But that’s all right. Maybe you'll listen to another argu- ment now.” And, looking across at his partner, he pulled a cheap watch from his vest ‘pocket with one hand. Brady, in re- sponse to the fat man’s glance, had pulled his gun with alacrity and trained its muzzle on the reporter’s chest. Rubbing his thumb over the crystal of the timepiece, Pete sat looking down at it. THE ARGOSY. “Now,” and he suddenly glanced up at Lewis, “ you tell us where you’ve hid Perkins. Don’t hesitate too long about it, either, cause you've only got sixty seconds before my pal, here, cuts loose. One minute for you to give us the answer—and that same minute’s already begun!” Lewis’s eyes were held fascinated by the fat man’s steady gaze. He could feel his scalp lifting. -His heart was no longer beating. What—what, in reason’s name, was he going to do? He knew no more than his two captors where Perkins at that moment happened to be. Yet he must tell them the man’s whereabouts —accomplish the impossible, and that within the space of one swift-slipping minute, or—be shot in his tracks. “And I told Brennant ” — the thought leaped into his brain to mock him at that inopportune instant— “there wasn’t going to be any come- back to this. Oh, Lord!” CHAPTER VII. A WHISTLE IN THE STREET. As sure as he.had ever been of any- thing in his life, Lewis was sure that these rogues meant business. They would shoot him down without the least compunction, unless he yielded to their demand. They had given him only a minute, a minute that might already be half, three-quarters gone— “All right—I’ll tell! ” He blurted out the words, his tongue, thick with apprehension, stumbling in its office. Beads of cold moisture that had stood out on his brow during the tense pause, now started trickling down his cheeks. His knees trembled under him, as Brady lowered the point of his weapon, and the fat man, glancing once more at the watch in his hand, returned it to his pocket with a curt nod. “ And it’s a good thing for you ’— Pete’s remark provided Lewis just then CoOMmicbook C©