Adventure Magazine Cover — page 38: what you’re looking at

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

Author of ‘The. Devil a Man Would Be,” “Tactics,” as it ever gets to be at Sutton, Arizona, thus marking high-noon. : ) The heat was intense and the air above the desert quivered nervously. ‘Evidence that Sutton was inhabited by human beings was scarce. The only visible sign of human life was to be found in the shade of the big cottonwood-tree that grew alongside the Gray Wolf saloon. There Jack Hawkins, proprietor of the saloon, sat at a little table playing seven-up with his friend, Tom Peters, of the Circle-S ranch. With the exception of a grunted mono- syllable now and then, only the riffling and dealing of the cards broke the silence. The two players showed a woful lack of inter- est in their game, as if it bored them, or as if it were merely preliminary to cutting their throats as a protest against the ter- rific heat and the dull monotony of sand and cactus that stretched away to the horizon on every hand. Then suddenly Peters, about io play his jack of trumps upon his opponent’s eight of the same suit, held the card poised and cocked his head. His eyes squinted in- terestedly up the ribbon of road that wound its hot way nine miles across the desert to Hamden, the nearest point of contact with the line of the Pacific Railroad. “‘Who’s that fool ridin’ round this time of day?” he grumbled with an air of personal injury. “Where at, Tom?” asked Hawkins. “Comin’ down the road there,’ nodded the other. 2HHE sun was as near the zenith 28 elc. Hawkins turned in his chair and followed Peter’s gaze with his eyes. Down the road toward them jogged a lone horseman. A stranger he proved to be when he came closer, dusted from head to feet with the powdery sand his mount had kicked up. “That there animal he’s ridin’ looks a whole lot like Bill Simmons’ Dolly,” ob- served Peters. “Pd know that hamstrung off hind leg anywheres,” agreed Hawkins. Bill Simmons conducted a public livery- stable at Hamden and the inference was that the stranger had probably dropped off a Pacific train at Hamden and engaged the mare from Simmons for the ride over to Sutton. The horseman came on and finally reined in a dozen feet or more from the table where the two men sat. From one of his hip-pockets he pulled a silver cigaret-case and, taking out a cigaret and tapping one end lightly against the case, put it between his lips and lighted it. “My !” ejaculated Peters under his breath. ‘Store cigarets!”’ There was a world of contempt and derision in his voice, which was eminently fair in a land where cigaret-smokers rolled their own with one-handed deftness. “Tom, have a squint at them clothes an’ tell me if I’m seein’ things!’ said Hawkins in a hoarse whisper. ‘“The —— dude!” Hawkins too was justified in the scornful condemnation his tone indicated. According to the standards of dress set up in Sutton and its far-flung neighborhood, (E©) IOOKS (E@)