Western Story Magazine, May 12, 1934 — page 63: what you’re looking at

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

Cowboy Samson 61 head on. arms and clung like a leech, yelling: “Get him! Get him!” NE of Bascom’s hamlike fists inserted itself under the chin that was digging into his ribs, opened, and then closed long fingers around the scrawny neck. The next second the man was claw- ing for freedom and yelling for help. Help was coming. The other two swarmed over the cowboy, not dar- ing to shoot except at close range, for fear of getting their comrade. Bascom wouldn’t stay put long enough. He set his boot heel on a toe, and there was a shriek of pain. As the leech at last tore himself loose, the cowboy grabbed off the mask. Schraber’s voice yelled: “T can identify that one, kid! Un- '>? cover the others! There was an instant stampede for the door. The unmasked man got away, but Bascom threw one of the others with his foot, and hooked a hand in the collar of the third. As he tore this mask away, he heard the sound of shooting at the bunk house. The guard there was evi- dently trying to hold the aroused men inside. “Get the other one, kid!” croaked Schraber, his voice crackling with excitement. He had torn off the gag at once, and was now looking for an opening to run in, but Bascom was moving much too fast for any chance of help. As the man he had tripped rolled across the floor, the cowboy snatched the gun of the fellow he had just unmasked. He tossed the weapon to Schraber and tossed the owner after it. The rancher chuckled dryly and said: “Seems to me I fired you for drinkin’ two years ago, Smitty.” This one dived under his © ~ ment. Smitty sat very quiet under his own gun muzzle. The last man had made a dimer ate break for the door. Bascom knew who he was by the way he moved. The cowboy got one finger in the belt of the flying form. It was hard on the finger, but it did the work. The next moment, un- masked and cursing like a madman, Lafe Hunt was struggling furiously in the grasp of the cowboy he had had fired only a few hours before. Bascom took him by the scruff of the neck and the belt, and faced him around toward Schraber. “Ever see this before?” he asked joyfully. Grim and astonished, the rancher stared. “What a lame-brain I turned out to be!” he said bitterly. “And I think,’ added Bascom, “that this hunk o’ coyote bait was plannin’ to lay the robbery onto me, is the reason he had you fire me to- day.” A voice spoke from the doorway. “T come back as quick as I could, but I can’t see’s I’m much needed.” Duke Jones came into the room, methodically poking before him the robber that Bascom had first un- masked. “The rest o’ the boys,’ Duke Jones said, “has got another guy out there they said was shooting holes in their door, and they’re askin’ him some kinda personal questions about it. Schraber,’ he said, eying the sullen-faced Lafe Hunt, “don’t you reckon that this about explains your mysterious cattle rustlin’?” The Old Man nodded slowly. He looked around the wrecked room. Not one piece of furniture in it, ex- cepting the safe, had escaped the hurricane. Then he looked at the wrecker, a smile in his deep eyes. “Some man!” was his only com- CONnNICLOOKSs COM