Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 1 (1925-07).djvu/49

"You was printing my death in the paper?"

"Just heard about it fifteen minutes before I closed the forms. Only had time to squeeze in a paragraph to say that 'As we go to press we learn with deep regret . . .' Hadn't run off more'n a dozen copies, and I've thrown 'em away. . . . You showed up in the nick o' time, Luke. What started that yarn?"

The editor, it appeared, had his information from a most reliable source, the truthful lips of the Reverend Joshua Stebbins. To the Reverend Joshua went Lucas.

"Well! Well!" exclaimed the clergyman. "This is indeed a most gratifying surprize!"

"I'm cheating you out of a funeral fee," Luke reminded him.

"My dear man!" beamed the sky pilot, raising a hand in protest. "Such a thought never entered my mind."

The pastor had learned of Luke's reported demise from Simon Cook, the village teamster. And the Reverend Mr. Stebbins gave full credence to the story, for Cook had it direct from Dr. Ferguson.

So to Ferguson's office. Here the appearance of the living ghost occasioned no astonishment.

"What can I do for you, gentlemen?" inquired the doctor, when Luke and Ed were seated. "And which one shall I do it for?"

"We're both well and strong," replied the lawyer. "Do we look it?"

"You do."

Ferguson lifted his eyebrows interrogatively.

"But I am a dead man, doctor, by your own statement," announced Lucas.

"Is this a joke?" the physician asked. "I may be dense, but I fail to get the point."

Luke A. Lucas, he of the mighty brain and the intellectual dome, spoke slowly and accusingly.

"You told Simon Cook that I was dead. The story has gone all over town. It even got into the Argus. I could sue you for slander."

"Man alive!" exclaimed the doctor, not realizing the peculiar fitness of his expletive. "I never said any such thing! Not to Simon Cook or anyone else!"

His denial was uttered with convincing emphasis. Lucas, more than ever bewildered, accepted it.

"I knew," said he, "that it wasn't like you to make up a story out of whole cloth. But we're such good friends that I figured maybe you were having a little fun at my expense. . . . I'm sorry, Doc, to have come to you with this, but Parson Stebbins said Cook got it direct from you. . . . Guess I owe you a box of cigars. . . . And now I'll be getting after Cook. We'll see what the stupid ass has to say for himself."

Luke and Ed arose and moved toward the door. . . .

The doctor's gaze at that moment wandered to a smooth, white object reposing on his desk and remained fixed there for fully ten seconds. Then he burst out in uproarious laughter.

He lifted the thing and displayed it to his callers.

"Here!" he said; "this explains your story. It's one I ordered recently. It arrived yesterday. I had just unpacked it when Simon came in with a bruised finger. He picked it up and looked it over—never had seen one before, I imagine. He asked me what it was—he's addicted, you know, to the foolish question habit.

"'Oh,' I said, offhand, 'that's Luke Lucas's skull.'

"And the doggone fool must have thought I meant it."