Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 7, 1922 — page 16: what you’re looking at

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

162 port through which the fog strayed in with hesitant, wavering streamers of gray. this. Save me man with the scar ived. I am not dead mad from this horror avern During the twelve years he had been at sea Rutledge had never been thrown in the path of its equal. He had come across a few queer ones, too, in his time—mysteries, bred upon the deep, that had lingered their puzzling span of moments upon the sur- face and then had disappeared below, un- solved. There had been that affair of the watchman at Hongkong — funny devils, Chinks, but this— “Damn!” he muttered, wriggling his large body into a more comfortable posi- tion. He had dismissed, at first, the idea that the message—blown to his feet by a stray wind through the fog as he had gone aft to read the log—might be some practical joke. He had felt that it was serious, real; that it meant precisely what it stated. Furthermore, on the way forward again, there had been the uncomfortable convic- tion that some one was following him—a figure, blurred in the mist when he had glanced over his shoulder; the strange, swift patter of stealthy feet; a slight brush- ing of fingers along the back of his shirt upon entering the passage amidships. He had wheeled about and stared blindly back into the fog, into that heavy, malig- nant mist that closed him in smothering vapors, shrouds of dead evils, only to see nothing. He had wanted to shout, to call out, “Who’s there?” but had resisted the im- pulse through fear of seeming foolish. He had also entertained the disquieting certi- tude that had he called out, there would have been no answer. Commencing with a faint hiss, developing into a shuddering sigh, and from that into a loud vibrating roar, the fog signal tore its warning through the blanketing mists. I am not dead. Why, Rutledge argued, should such a statement be found aboard a_ tramp ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. steamer, manned by a healthy and dis- tinctly alive crew in the solitudes of the Pacific Ocean? And who was the ‘“ man: with the scar?”’ He would take this singular paper with its mystery to the captain. The old man would know what to do about it. Perhaps he would laugh at it—and at Rutledge! Rutledge, like a good many men who are well built and above the average in size, was extremely sensitive in regard to being made to appear foolish. Furthermore, he was young—young even for his years, which numbered twenty-four; young in the manner of men who pass their lives aboard boats at sea and who retain in a marked fashion, even late in life, the cal- lowness of boyhood, the tender nerves of youth still fresh and raw, close beneath the surface of their wind-scarred skins, easily to be wounded, to be hurt. Hadn’t he better wait, he wondered, un- til there was something more tangible to go by? What a laugh there would be if it were a joke! He pictured, vividly and uncomfortably, the scene that would take place at supper— the old man at the head of the table, grim, severe, breaking suddenly into one of his unaccustomed bursts of harsh laughter; Harris, the second mate, his red cheeks puffed out, the tears helplessly streaming from his protrudent, china-blue eyes; Mac- Donald, the third mate, sitting there bray- ing like a jackass; then Sparks, the wire- less operator, an engaging young devil of blatant and occasionally distressing imma- turity, rolling in an ecstacy of infantile mirth alongside him on the settee. It would be a jolly party. “‘ Thank the Lord the engineers eat sepa- rate!” came into his mind. Worst of ail, Sparks would be sure to run a double-leader about it in the Woreless Press for the delectation of all on board. The sheet was an erratic affair, highly scandalous in nature, dealing more largely with affairs on board than with the duller doings of the world at large—affairs me- ticulously culled in frequent ear-flapping promenadings fore and aft on the part of its editor, who was a respecter neither of persons nor personages. comiclbooolx C©