The Argosy, April 1916 — page 192: what you’re looking at

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

182 “Taking a morning walk,” Avison. The road was becoming more familiar. He knew many of the names that he saw on the mail-boxes; he knew the dog that barked from the gateway of a farmhouse— a dog that had always barked at him. But yet he was perplexed and bewildered by the lingering sensation of unfamiliarity. After ten miles the automobile slowed down. ‘““T have to turn here,” said Johnston. “Which way are you going?” 3 “* Straight on, I guess; and thank you.” Avison hopped out of the slowly moving car, and started again down the dusty road. He began to wonder why Johnston had not recognized him; they had passed each other several times. Avison put his hands to his ‘face. He felt several days’ growth of hair. Of course, that was the reason. He needed a shave very badly on the day of his ascent, and in the five days at least that he was in the air a black growth had covered his cheeks and chin. And his face felt thinner; the bones protruded. Soon he passed a farmhouse—one where he had often stopped for a meal while quail-hunting. So he entered the gate; he was hungry for a warm breakfast again. He knew the dog that came to meet him, and patted its furry head. The old woman _ at the doorway did not recognize him. He told her what he wanted, and she led him to the kitchen. He washed in a basin at the back and looked at himself in the glass. No wonder the others had not known him! His face was much thinner; great, dark bags hung beneath his eyes. Who would have thought that the days in the air could have been such a physical strain? His white, hollow cheeks and wide, black eyes, in contrast to the black hair, shocked him. No wonder he remained un- known to Johnston and the woman. During the meal he asked but one ques- tion—and it was a peculiar one. ‘What’s the date?” he asked. The old woman looked up quickly. “Twenty-fourth,” she replied. Avison had gone up on the sixteenth. He had been two days unconscious! And still the brooding strangeness per- plexed and bewildered him. Again he was out on the road. He picked up another ride soon, and when he came to Smithford, he took off the grease- replied THE ARGOSY. stained clothes he had worn on the air journey. He laughed at himself in the suit he had just bought. In bad need of a hair-cut and shave, and in different clothes, he wondered if Agnes would know him. The small town was at the end of his walk. He could take the train from there to his home. He walked about the town. Although he was well known there and many people looked at him interestedly, none came up to speak to him. He laughed to himself over the fact that even an old friend did not know him. The train—the slow old train in which he © had so often ridden—pulled in an hour later. By now it was noon; the Avison place was scarcely a half-hour’s ride away. He remembered the worn-out plush on the seat of the cars, the conductor who punched his ticket. But always something was not quite the same. “The trip has affected my mind,” he said at last. He could almost scream at the harass- ment of it all. He could not ahalyze or _ place his finger on the difference, but it was there; it was everywhere! The change of circumstance brooded about him and haunted him and made him grip his hands. His eyes widened at the thought of it. Was he asleep? Or hurt? Or dead?—Dead! Anything was possi- ble to him now. What if he were dead? Then he laughed at himself for being a fool. The laugh was hysterical; the train newsie eyed him suspiciously. He pinched himself on the arm, and the hurt was real. But something had changed him—or changed the world in which he lived. The train stopped at last at Avison’s Own town, at the outskirts of which stood his own house. Agnes lived here, too. Half- frightened, Avison wondered whether Agnes would know him. ‘But it would be good sport if she didn’t!” So he dropped into a second-hand store and traded his trim cap for an old, bat- tered hat. This he pulled down over his eyes, and started down the quiet street. Some boys stared at him as he passed, but no one spoke in recognition. A dog that he knew slunk away from him. Even the town was different! Yes! The stores and the people dnd the fountains and the sparrows in the streets and the signs were all the same in every cConmicloooks C@