Adventure, July 1, 1928 — page 128: what you’re looking at

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

122 his .45 and shot off the lock. His stiff fingers pried up the lid. There lay the banknotes in piles bound with wide rub- ber bands. He shoved the money into the deep pockets of his angora chaps. Then he buried the empty metal box in the débris under the chute. Five minutes later he rode on again into the storm. He looked old and sadly troubled. The bitter cold was pinching the color from his face. He was a little sick from the liquor that he had drunk. Sick and lonesome. Through the lane and past the grave- yard, on to the wind swept benchland, headed south toward the badlands of the Missouri River, almost a hundred miles away. With the wind at his back, Buck Bell drifted. His heart was as heavy as the leaden sky. Ahead of him rolled a giant tumbleweed. On and on, across the bench, grotesque, almost alive, blown along by the north wind. Headed south. Tn the pockets of his black chaps was stowed more money than he had ever seen or even dreamed of. There was not a chance of the theft being fastened to him. It had been easy, almost too easy to seem true. With five thousand dollars a man could buy a good bunch of cattle down in New Mexico or Arizona. Buck was cow- man enough to make a herd pay. It would mean that he no longer need work for wages. For forty a month. . . Forty into five thousand. Buck was a good hand at figures. One hundred and twenty- five months. Ten years and more, even if a man didn’t spend a dime for poker or redeye or smokin’—or clothes. Socks and such. He had sold his bed for twenty dollars. That twenty was in his vest pocket now. He had kept it separated from the other money—the money he had stolen. “Sam Bass was born in Indiana; it was his na- tive home .. .” The song, high pitched, quavering, drifted along the wind from behind Buck, blurred a little in the flurry of hard snow that swirled across the ground like white sand. Buck halted as the singer came up WALT COBURN out of the storm. It was Dick Powell, the sheriff. OMETHING hot scalded Buck Bell’s heart as the rider came alongside. Had the sheriff some- how found him out? Buck almost hoped so. But Powell grinned as easy greeting. He was warmly clad in chaps, overshoes and a buffalo coat. The stock of a car- bine jutted from his saddle scabbard. “You look fer all the world like a bull that’s been whipped outa the herd, Bell. Here, see what this’ll do to you.” He passed over a quart of whisky. They drank together and rode on with the storm. “Trailin’ that gent that done the rob- bery, Dick?” The sheriff grunted into his fur collar. “Trailin’ hell! Whoever done it didn’t leave a sign. But mark my words, Bell, he'll give hisself away.” “How?” Buck Bell slapped his cold hands against the slicker to beat the blood into circulation. “Here, take these.” The sheriff pulled a pair of yarn mitts from his pocket. “I brung along an extra pair. The missus knit ’em.” Buck pulled on the red mittens, mum- bling his gratitude. “How?” The sheriff replied to his question. “Well, it’s thisaway, Bell. I know every man that was in town that night. I know where each man will be workin’ this winter. Horace gimme their names and what camps they'd be at. I wired fer the serial number of them sto- len banknotes. When that money begins goin’ into circulation, Pll nab my man. Er if ary man quits this range, I'll be follerin’ him. Tl have the other towns posted. He’s corralled.” The sheriff consulted a little book. “‘Here’s the list. Stuart and Contway at Big Warm. Howe and Smith at Little Warm. You and Cotton Eye at Rocky Point, down on the Missouri. And so on.” He shoved the book back into his poc- ket. Buck’s head was lowered as he comnlicloooks.com