Adventure Magazine Cover — page 164: what you’re looking at

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

150 got here! Why, the day I arrived they began asking me about it. I kept still and made it worse; then it was too late to deny it all!” “Of course, you’d want to deny it!” she observed coolly. “T’d just like to get hold of the fellow who started it!” Miss White smiled sweetly. “What would you do if you found him, Elmer? Chase him into a cabin and leave him until you ran to get help?” The ranger winced. “That’s it, Flo; rub it in! I suppose you’ve had a fine time telling folks they’re all wrong, and I’m just an o’n’ry piker!” She halted, looked angrily up at him. “You know me better than that, Elmer Randolph! If you’ve developed a reputa- tion it is of no interest to me. My board- ing-house is just beyond, and you may leave me here. I'll never tell about you! Folks will find out the same way I did!” Elmer experienced a quick feeling of re- lief that his day of reckoning was thus removed further into the future. His jauntiness of bearing reasserted itself. “May I call around some evening, Flo?” She shook her head. 3 “No, I think not. I’m sorry, Elmer, but you realize I’m not like the other folks hereabout. I really know you!” Whereupon she left him, and it is indica- tive of how great a value he placed upon his new position in the world to record that he was far more relieved at knowing that his secret was safe than he was chagrined . at being thus summarily dismissed. Vax) THE feud between the rival lum- MCS ber mills was fast riding to a climax. So long as their differences and the -manifold expressions of their bad blood did not affect the Service, Ranger Randolph maintained himself aloof from their quar- rel. But when the manager of the Short Line Lumber Company complained to him that logs from the government tract were coming to his mill with steel spikes buried in them, he was forced to take a hand. He investigated the matter and held a long conference with Old Brant, the mana- ger of the other mill. Across a wide desk- top he told that gentleman that while he had been unable to obtain any direct indica- tory evidence as yet, he was not going to Adventure rest well until he had found out a few things. Then somebody was going up on the carpet before the big chief. .The Black Creek manager protested the intimation that he knew anything of the spiking of the logs. A week passed with no further develop- ment. Four strangers arrived in town; on several evenings. Randolph saw them at the Lone Star bar. One of them, who ap- peared to be the leader of the group and who advertised himself as Red Cullum, approached the ranger on the subject of patents, explaining that he and his friends — were searching for homesteads. Then late one afternoon fire was reported on the government tract. Six distinct blazes started simultaneously, and on the breast of a rising wind rapidly consolidated and swept into the heart of a rich valley. Ranger Randolph, exercising the power — of his office, impressed a crew to fight the fire. It was a grim battle. Numb with the fatigue of countless hours, they threw a fire-trail across the path of the flames and fought it to a standstill on the line. But before the conflagration was under control the timber-stand designated for the, Short Line Timber outfit, together with their logging equipment, was very effec- tively wiped out. When it was over the weary ranger re- turned to town and slept the clock around. He awoke to find a telegram from the dis- trict ranger bearing the advice that he was coming to make a personal investigation of the affair. .. As it-would be several days before his superior arrived Randolph rode back to the site of the fire to make preliminary survey. All forenoon he spent in the vicinity of the fires’ origin, going from point to point where the initial blazes had been re- ported. There was no gainsaying the fact that the fires appeared to have been laid with an eye to the prevailing wind. It was improbable that a series of blazes so cun- ningly aimed could have been natural. A triangle drawn upon a map of the timber, using the line of the six fires for its base, would lay its apex in the very heart of the Short Line Timber Company’s operations. , Randolph could deduce but one conclu- sion from his investigation—the fires had been of incendiary origin. This recalled to his mind the feud between the Black Creek Mill and the unfortunate Short Line outfit. (é 200! ou