The Lookout Man by B. M. Bower (good books to read for adults .txt) 📗

wind could be heard in the eucalyptus trees that here and there lined the boulevard.

After the last street-car had clanged away from the deserted bunting-draped joy zone that now was stark and joyless, a belated seven-passenger car, painted a rich plum color and splendid in upholstering and silver trim, swept a long row of darkened windows with a brush of light as it swung out from a narrow alley and went purring down to where the asphalt shone black in the night.

Full throated laughter and a medley of shouted jibes and current witticisms went with it. The tonneau squirmed with uproarious youth. The revolving extra seats swung erratically, propelled by energetic hands, while some one barked the stereotyped invitation to the deserted scenic swing, and some one else shouted to the revolving occupants to keep their heads level, and all the others laughed foolishly.

The revolving ones rebelled, and in the scuffle some one lurched forward against the driver at a critical turn in the road, throwing him against the wheel. The big car swerved almost into the ditch, was brought back just in the nick of time and sped on, while Death, who had looked into that tonneau, turned away with a shrug.

The driver, bareheaded and with the wind blowing his thick mop of wavy hair straight back from his forehead, glanced back with swift disfavor at the scuffling bunch.

"Hey—you want to go in the ditch?" he expostulated, chewing vigorously upon gum that still tasted sweet and full-flavored. "You wanta cut out that rough stuff over this way!"

"All right, Jackie, old boy, anything to please!" chanted the offender, cuffing the cap off the fellow next him. "Some time," he added with vague relish. "S-o-m-e time! What?"

"Some time is right!" came the exuberant chorus. "Hey, Jack! You had some time, all right—you and that brown-eyed queen that danced like Mrs. Castle. Um-um! Floatin' round with your arms full of sunshine—oh, you thought you was puttin' something over on the rest of us—what?"

"Cut it out!" Jack retorted, flinging the words over his shoulder. "Don't talk to me. Road's flopping around like a snake with its head cut off—" He laughed apologetically, his eyes staring straight ahead over the lowered windshield.

"Aw, step on her, Jack! Show some class, boy—show some class! Good old boat! If you're too stewed to drive 'er, she knows the way home. Say, Jackie, if this old car could talk, wouldn't momma get an ear-full on Monday, hey? What if she—"

"Cut it out—or I'll throw you out!" came back over Jack's shirt-clad shoulder. He at least had the wit to use what little sense he had in driving the car, and he had plenty of reason to believe that he could carry out his threat, even if the boulevard did heave itself up at him like the writhings of a great snake. If his head was not fit for the job, his trained muscles would still drive with automatic precision. Only his vision was clouded; not the mechanical skill necessary to pilot his mother's big car safely into the garage.

Whim held the five in the rear seats absorbed in their own maudlin comicalities. The fellow beside Jack did not seem to take any interest in his surroundings, and the five gave the front seat no further attention. Jack drove circumspectly, leaning a little forward, his bare arms laid up across the wheel and grasping the top of it. Brown as bronze, those arms, as were his face and neck and chest down to where the open V of his sport shirt was held closed with the loose knot of a crimson tie that whipped his shoulder as he drove. A fine looking fellow he was, sitting there like the incarnation of strength and youth and fullblooded optimism. It was a pity that he was drunk—he would have been a perfect specimen of young manhood, else.

The young man on the front seat beside him turned suddenly on those behind. The lower half of his face was covered with a black muffler. He had a gun, and he "cut down" on the group with disconcerting realism.

"Hands up!" he intoned fearsomely. "I am the mysterious lone bandit of the boulevards. Your jewels are the price of your lives!" The six-shooter wavered, looking bleakly at one and then another.

After the first stunned interval, a shout of laughter went up from those behind. "Good! Good idea!" one approved. And another, having some familiarity with the mechanics of screen melodrama, shouted, "Camera!"

"Lone bandit nothing! We're all mysterious auto bandits out seeking whom we may devour!" cried a young man with a naturally attractive face and beautiful teeth, hastily folding his handkerchief cornerwise for a mask, and tying it behind his head—to the great discomfort of his neighbors, who complained bitterly at having their eyes jabbed out with his elbows.

The bandit play caught the crowd. For a few tumultuous minutes elbows were up, mufflers and handkerchiefs flapping. There emerged from the confusion six masked bandits, and three of them flourished six-shooters with a recklessness that would have given a Texas man cold chills down his spine. Jack, not daring to take his eyes off the heaving asphalt, or his hands off the wheel, retained his natural appearance until some generous soul behind him proceeded, in spite of his impatient "Cut it out, fellows!" to confiscate his flapping, red tie and bind it across his nose; which transformed Jack Corey into a speeding fiend, if looks meant anything. Thereafter they threw themselves back upon the suffering upholstery and commented gleefully upon their banditish qualifications.

That grew tame, of course. They thirsted for mock horrors, and two glaring moons rising swiftly over a hill gave the psychological fillip to their imaginations.

"Come on-let's hold 'em up!" cried the young man on the front seat. "Naw-I'll tell you! Slow down, Jack, and everybody keep your faces shut. When we're just past I'll shoot down at the ground by a hind wheel. Make 'em think they've got a blowout—get the idea?"

"Some idea!" promptly came approval, and the six subsided immediately.

The coming car neared swiftly, the driver shaving as close to the speed limit as he dared. Unsuspectingly he swerved to give plenty of space in passing, and as he did so a loud bang startled him. The brake squealed as he made an emergency stop. "Blowout, by thunder!" they heard him call to his companions, as he piled out and ran to the wheel he thought had suffered the accident.

Jack obligingly slowed down so that the six, leaning far out and craning back at their victims, got the full benefit of their joke. When he sped on they fell back into their seats and howled with glee.

It was funny. They laughed and slapped one another on the backs, and the more they laughed the funnier it seemed. They rocked with mirth, they bounced up and down on the cushions and whooped.

All but Jack. He kept his eyes on the still-heaving asphalt, and chewed gum and grinned while he drove, with the persistent sensation that he