Adventure, August 3, 1919 — page 23: what you’re looking at

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

| ' sag i eT « ell es 3 ee So eee “Keepin’ Fulton full of Dutch courage,” - toown your ranch, Got froze out like you. ~ Woke up too late. Swore he’d kill Finch. - Didn’t make good. Got sick, went broke SUT? years. Worked up his c and drifted away. I forgot all about it. He ‘didn’t. Came back here after five e with licker. Tried to git himself up to the killin’-point. Got too noisy, and I threw him out. “Then you reminded me who he was. You told me who’d owned your ranch before you. You mentioned Tom Fulton. Then I knew him. After you left, 1 went after him. I sort of have it in for Finch myself. Fulton told me all his troubles. Got sympathy. Also licker. Buckets of it. Got more courage every day« -Waited for Finch. Finch arrived today. Funeral tomorrow.” ee Carlton felt his hair curling. This broad-shouldered, black-haired giant in front of him had arranged a killing as casually as he would prepare a fishing excursion. He even furnished the bait! ‘The engineer found himself dizzy. The old boss read his thoughts. “For the public good,” he grunted. “Finch was a pest. Always in trouble. Always snivelin’. Always cheatin’. I’ve been waitin’ for some one to put him out. Now I’m glad he’s gone.” So was Carlton, in a way, but his soul had not yet risen to such heights of altruis- tic manslaughter,.and the chills were running down his spine. He was brave enough, but » this was different. He changed the subject abruptly. “Then maybe Fulton poisoned those horses,” he surmised. is “Mebbe. He went away mysterious several times. He promised to do some- thin’ desp’rate. That’s about his size— pizenin’ dumb animals. Mebbe, if I wanted. proof, I could git it, but—what’s the use? I don’t care a hoot either way.” There was a wealth of scorn in Dolan’s a in commenti pod bss tool, and the e engineer realized how masterfully the IV IT WAS terse and to the point, but drunkard had been managed. While Carl- ton was away ney his valley, a little drama is rt in this rough pine-board colony, with John Barleycorn as a. prime = at * - re * i ‘actor and himself as beneficiary—and Do- used lan as stage-manager. Carlton realized that the big boss had mainly told him the truth. He had supplied the shooting because he despised Finch naturally, be- cause of the general public good, because he wanted to see a fight and partially because of Carlton. Then another thought crossed the engineer’s mind. “By the way,” he asked, “how about Jim Black? What is he going to do?” Dolan’s reply was prompt, “Nothin’. Why should he? Finch is dead. The deal’s off. This shootin’ leaves Black up in the air. Nothin’ in it for him, is there? He’s got nothin’ against you personal, has he?” “It sounds reasonable,’ conceded the engineer. Here in the dusk, with the last faint traces of red in the western sky, it seemed that a great burden was lifted off his shoul- ders, even though he did not exactly ap- prove of the method. He felt that his life seemed clear from now on and he could live forever with his bride in the valley of his heart’s delight, with the old copper mountain giving them benediction to the end. With his heart swelling, the engineer turned away from the wrinkled face of the | sordid, crafty, loyal old thug who had befriended him. He absently looked out- side to where groups of men stood about the actors in the pitiful tragedy. And then his dreams vanished. The crowd in front of Finch had thinned slightly, and the glimmer of a lantern ° showed his head heing raised on Jim Black’s knee while another man was sponging his hair, where a dark stream was flowing from above the ear. Finch’s face was almost demoniac as the lantern cast its lights and shadows upon the sharp features, and from his mouth there issued a volley of profanity that seemed to flicker the light with its blasts. Nearer, another group was putting Tom Fulton on a shutter, lifting him with rough tenderness. Beyond the groups of men, lights from Looey’s place and the other saloons down the street gave vague illumination to the roadway, while the music of a tinny piano jangled from one of them, playing a “coon song” as if nothing had ‘happened. But above all came that high-pitched jabber of Ebenezer Finch, very much alive. It was Dot soft and regretful now; it was