Pulp Fiction, 1934 · page 94 of 148
Western Story Magazine, May 12, 1934 — page 94: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# A Game of Draw This is a story prose page from a pulp magazine, featuring the opening of "A Game of Draw" by Lloyd Eric Reeve. The narrative introduces a weary stranger arriving in a small town after eight hours of riding and four years of waiting. He checks his horse at the livery stable, where a gaunt proprietor questions him. The stranger cryptically states he's come from Texas to "meet a man"—explicitly "not a friend." An illustration on the right shows the stranger speaking with the livery owner in a doorway. The prose concludes with atmospheric description of the stranger walking through town with an ominous, ghost-like presence.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
A GAME OF DRAW By LLOYD ERIC REEVE Author of “The Calgary Kid,” etc. USTY and weary with eight hours of steady riding, weary with four years of patient waiting, the lean young stranger rode slowly out of the blackening prairie, into the barren trail town. Along the single narrow thorough- fare he rode, past bleak false-fronted structures, through the dim yellow blooms of street lamps, and came finally to a drifting halt, before the settled bulk of the town livery stable. A gaunt man with a hatchet face, holding a smoky lantern shoulder- high, shuffled from murky depths and squinted up at the impassive mask of. the stranger. “Howdy,” he said. “Leaving your horse?” “Howdy,” said the _ stranger, swinging stiffly to ground. “Leav- ing my horse. Grain him an’ rub him. I might be riding again to- night.” “Come far?” wondered the lank proprietor. “All the way from Texas.” “Going far?” “No,” the stranger said, “this is the end.” The gaunt man stared. “Thought you said you might be leaving yet to-night.” “Might,” said the stranger. “And still—this is the end.” “Maybe you got business here?” “I’m here’—the other smiled— “to meet a man.” “Friend, eh?” “No,” said the stranger, “not a friend.” pif a X . 25 == —— oe — . j id > ; 4}! x > ‘ ( iF : < > wo 72 Bry pettieteny at \ } ; EA ve figisigess ' | att hr “4 ms fen iste I) = ay een ee . eas ri | i iyi) ‘oD sea yin it ’ i} “ ‘ } rT) bra , ase pe } is; : . : { ‘ ‘ o - rt HLTH WF 7 - ‘, , ‘ uid s ie ry dlhpe we a t; “ ead , ) - Hit] " t jf { ) H ‘ j 5 * j 1 élene ‘ {34 i . a; % 4 | Py hee » 4 fe }"fresy i ' ‘ | roid ' i { f Wer 4 RATER eee Bl un ma) “Oh.” The lank man _ looked flustered. ‘No offense, partner. I didn’t go to pry.” “That’s all right,” said the stran- ger. His body revolved sharply, swinging forward, and he moved on down the wooden sidewalk. ALKING with his head reared slightly, he kept his sinewy arms motionless at his sides. His boots thumped de- liberately with the funeral beat of a mufiled drum, and as he passed through alternate pools of light, he seemed to appear and vanish like a stalking presence not yet fully materialized. Gomicbooks.co im