Argosy All-Story Weekly, November 13, 1920 — page 138: what you’re looking at

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

* clo believe he’s mad. 416 ‘Often when I was a-setting in the mud up to my neck dodging machine gun bullets, 1 used to say to myself: ‘ There’s Pharaoh Evans with a good, safe job, and a pretty girl getting ready to marry him. He’s a lucky duck!’ “* Huh!’ put in Pharaoh with a sce from his chair on the other side of the room. ‘In-deed! You don’t say so, Mr. Finney!’ ‘“ After which he got up and come over to the sofa, his face all scrouged up to show he was mad. ‘ What’s the matter with me setting down, too?’ says he to Daisy. ‘ Move along, can’t you?’ “Move along?’ she says, snickering. ‘Where to? being used, Unless you want me to set on Mr. Finney’s lap.’ And when she says that she almost choked herself laughing. “¢ Miss Spiffel,’ says Pharaoh, very stiff, ‘you're forgetting something, ain’t you?’ “¢ What?’ asks Daisy. “<« Well, that there ring on your finger I give you, for instance,’ says he. ‘ Don’t that mean nothing to you?’ ‘“*Oh, come now, Pharaoh,’ says Jake. ‘I ain’t trying to steal your girl. Don’t think that. Not but what it’s a temptation, though.’ ‘“ «Mr. Finney!’ shrieked — ‘Tf you ain’t just terrible! The first thing you know, you'll have Pharaoh a-shooting -us both out of jealousy.’ ‘“* Pooh!’ says Pharaoh. ‘ And getting hung for it? Not me! TI know a better way than that.’ He picked up his hat. ‘Good night, Miss Spiffel!’ he says. ‘I hope you'll enjoy yourself.’ Then he give Jake a knowing sort of squint, and stalked cut of the house. ““ My,’ says Daisy, looking rather pop- eyed as the door slammed behind him, ‘I It’s all your fault, Mr. Finney.’ “My fault,’ says Jake. ‘ Why, the idea, Miss Spiffel! Ht ain’t my fault you’re so nice, is it? He oughtn’t to have brought me here. I’d better be going myself.’ “But he didn’t; not for a half-hour or so. And when he did tear hisself away, he did it so lingering, Daisy ‘5 dad had to yell down-stairs twice at ‘em. “The next day at ncon, Jake says, when Can’t you see all the seat’s ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY, he knowed I wouldn’t be there, he stopped in at the shop. ‘ You done noble, Pharaoh,’ he says. ‘ At the rate we’re: going, it won’t be no time before the grand finale. Don’t you think you’d better commence to start to get that money out of the bank?’ “*“Not on your life!’ says Pharaoh. ‘Why, I ain’t even got my ring back yet. I'll wait and see what sort of headway you © make at Daisy’s this evening.’ “You watch me!’ says Jake, throwing back his shoulders. “So when Daisy come out the back door of the American House that evening to take her car, she was both pleased and surprised to bump right into Private Finney, who, ac- cording to schedule, happened to be in the vicinity. “ “Why, Miss Spiffel,’ says he, giving her his best salute, ‘ ain’t it nice meeting you this way by accident? Where do we go from here, eh?’. ““T’m going home,’ went to a movie.’ “Oh, there ain’t no place like home,’ says Jake hastily, remembering how he only had the five Pharaoh had give him, and the sixty-eight cents of his own, to pay his board and everything. So he dragged her to the trolley and give her a boost up the step before she could argue the matter. ““ You fond o’ candy, Miss Spiffel?’ he says, bringing out a package of cough drops he’d hooked from off my razor-stand. ‘““T love it,’ says she, grabbing the re- freshments as the car started. ‘TI love any- thing I can eat.” ‘““ Gee!’ says Jake. ‘ a gingerbread man!’ “She give a shriek of merriment that made his blood run cold. ‘Mr. Finney! You're getting worse and worse! You don’t says she; ‘ unless [ You ought to marry care what you say!’ “Oh, yes, I do,’ says he, thinking what Pharaoh had wished on hisself by talking too much. ‘If ever you hear me say any- thing f oughtn’t to, Miss Spiffel, you just call me down.’ ““ "Then you stop now,’ she says in what she thought was a whisper, ‘ making love to me this way!’ ‘“ Luckily they was the only ones in the car. If they hadn’t ’a’ been, I guess they’d 8 A EComicbooks (E)