The Argosy, April 1916 — page 86: what you’re looking at

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

fe 7 “Joseph Ivers Lawrence eir fo Viillion A TWO-PART STORY—PART ONE. CHAPTER I. A MYSTERIOUS CUSTOMER, M PENDER $§sstalked vigorously from the ice-box of the Eighth Avenue butcher-shop where he was employed. He was carrying a side of beef on his shoul- der as a man of inferior sturdiness might bear a sack of flour. He swung it around easily, in no haste to be rid of his burden, and laid it across the cutting bench. As he attacked it with saw and cleaver, to divide it into cuts of graded quality and price, his employer left the brine vat where he was salting down the corned beef of the future, dried his hands on his apron and stood for a while regarding the craftsman- ship of the younger man. “Fiver hear anything of that feller of the same name as you, that wrote to me from Massachusetts last spring?” the employer drawled, as he propped himself against a block and lighted a cigar. ‘Never had a word from ’im, Mr. Joyce,” answered Tom. ‘I never knowed much about my folks, anyhow, but I figured he might be some kind of uncle or cousin, as I told yer at the time. The people that brought me up said my father come from Massachusetts, an’ that he had some swell relations up there. Huh! I should worry ’*bout swell relations!” “T gave you a good send-off to ’im, any- how,” Joyce said genially. ‘‘I don’t want to lose you, Tom, but I wouldn’t keep you out of a good job or anything like that. I reckoned he might have something for you. I told him you was sober and industrious, and as good a meat cutter as could be.” He chuckled as he added with kindly irony, “I left out tellin’ him that you was one of the hardest fellers to lick from Eighth Avenue to the river.” “You could ’a’ told him that, for all I’d care,” said Tom indifferently. ‘I never ex- pect to hear from him. One o’ them swell guys, prob’ly, lookin’ up his relations ter see if they was worth mixin’ up with. Prob’ly got my name outer the city directory, and 76 had some one look me up and find out where I was workin’. When he found out I was a butcher it was all off.” ‘“‘He must ’a’ known that, if he found out where you was working,” argued the em- ployer. ‘He wrote to me right here, and he must ’a’ known there wa’n’t no Wall Street brokers nor Fifth Avenue jewelers on Eighth Avenue.” MICLOOOK C@