2-Gun Western, February 1954 — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

TIME FOR A HANGIN’ ss Seka TOUCHED spurs to his horse and rode past. As he did so, old Jump’s head swiveled, his glance clinging to the rancher’s boots. Jed looked too, and saw that splotch- es of bluish-gray mud clung to the leather. “Some lawman!” Jump snorted when Wymer was gone. “Way he hankers to keep clear of trouble makes a man wonder how he ever got money to go to ranchin’ an’ take it easy like he’s done. You see that blue clay on his boots? I’ve seen that stuff around here some’ers—can’t seem to recall just where...” “Right now,” Jed said, “we better stick to finding Lucy.” They picked up the sign of the three-shoed horse on a: narrow, little- used road that angled from the town toward the upper end of Jack Saw- dey’s range. The moon came up as they climbed higher and higher into the Rattlesnake Hills. Its light helped them follow the sign. The trail led to a Quarter Circle S line cabin, where the horse with the missing shoe stood slack-hipped in a tiny corral. Old Jump slid sound- lessly from his saddle, putting an intent regard upon the unlighted cabin. Jed stepped down, pulled his rifle from the boot and handed it to the oldster. “Stay out here,” he said ‘tightly, “and cover me.” He drew his sixgun and stalked forward. Stopping in the scant cover of a well-pump he called, “You in there! Come out with your hands empty—we've got a rifle on you!” There was no answer from the shack. The only sounds were the tired hoof-stamping of the horses -and the singing of crickets in the dry grass. Jed tramped on to the door of the shack and flung it open. A lot of moonlight reached through the shack’s windows. A glance told him that Lucy was not here. But someone else was. The first warning was the intake of a man’s breath, faint but purposeful, close be- side the doorway. Jerking around, Jed saw the glint of moonlight on the descending barrel of a gun. Then a slashing impact jolted him, the numbing pain of it running down his 13 lank frane, and he knew that he was falling. He heard a shot. But it was not from his own gun, and the sound of it ran swiftly into aching distance, beyond reach of his senses.... When he struggled back to con- sciousness he thought at first that he was in his own shack, lying on the bunk as he had done so often at night, listening to the rumble of thunder that had puzzled him of late. He had asked old Jump about that thunder, but Jump had made some remark about a man getting cabin fever and imagining things when he lived alone. It wasn’t night now, though. The sun streamed through the: windows of the line cabin. Jed lifted his throbbing head and saw that the ‘whole front of his shirt was stiff with dried blood. The sound he’d heard wasn’t thun- der. It was: the beat of approaching hoofs. Spurs jingled as the riders dismounted outside. Jed swung his feet from the bunk and saw that his gunbelt had been taken from him and now hung on the back of a chair. He struggled to get up, and failed; and then his eyes encountered the body of the man who lay on the floor. It was Lafe Stratton, the Quarter Circle S rider who must have gunbarreled Jed last night. Stratton had been shot in the side, and had been dead for hours, Jed was gaping at the dead man when the door was flung open and Black Jack strode in with drawn gun. “This does it, I reckon,” the ’breed said. “We tracked you down, an’— Why, you kill-crazy varmint! Got Lafe too, eh?” “Tf I did,” Jed mumbled, “he’s the first man I ever shot in my sleep. He bent a gunbarrel over my head. Take a look at my six, there— I’m betting it ain’t been fired.” . “You had some help here, then,” Sawdey said. “No matter. You'll hang for the killin’ of Eli Denn. We found him in the gully up at your place, back-shot. Tracks led from there to your shack.” Jed gripped the edge of the bunk to steady himself. He had pinned a lot of hope on Eli Denn for the clear- ‘ing of old Jump Tatum on that rus- COMMIGOOOKS (C@)