Adventure Magazine Cover, October 10, 1921 — page 18: what you’re looking at

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

8 Adventure He crossed the railroad track near the new station and traveled into the scant residential section, pitched helter-skelter on a little plain. His eye caught a flash of color crossing his path. It was a girl with arms full of | packages. She was trim, slim and neat, with a mass of golden-brown hair under a tan sombrero, and a pretty, piquant face peering from beneath the broad brim. Some daintiness in her carriage or some quality in her face aroused the young man’s interest. He stared. Apparently she didn’t know he was alive after her first glance. But fate sent an opportunity. The girl dropped a package. Before she could turn to pick it up he set spurs to his horse, made a gallant swoop toward the package, brought his left leg gracefully to the saddle-horn and swung out to his right, upside down, extending a long arm to the - ground. He fell off. It was sickening. It couldn’t have hap- pened again in a thousand times. He was born to the saddle and could do it with his eyes shut. Overconfidence proved his downfall. He slammed to the ground in a wide arc, plowed his face into the soft dirt and landed in an ungraceful sprawl while a peal of laughter assailed his reddening ears. He was wild at himself. He had made himself ridiculous, which is unforgivable to the mind of a young man in front of a pretty girl. It had to be atoned at any cost, even though it took months to do it. Self-respect demanded it. Sitting up, with one side of his face smeared with dirt, he glared at the laughing girl and spoke between set teeth. “P’m —goin — to—stay—here— if—it— takes—all—year!”’ was his amazing an- nouncement. Il THE loss of the foreman was a paralyzing blow to Grant Wilcox. BFS The episode shook the older hands on the ranch, but the bewildered owner felt the loss even more directly. His sole reliance was gone. He did not know which way to turn. Evidence proved that John Hastings had come upon some one making away with a few calves. He had opened fire. The other persons had apparently returned the fire with more success. That was all there was to it. Nobody knew who the murderers were. Nobody would know until some indiscreet person gossiped and gave a clue. The men on the Wilcox ranch understood the ways - of this mysterious country and didn’t at- tempt to follow a lost trail.. They waited. For a whole day the somber heir to the ranch drifted around~aimlessly, saying nothing but looking puzzled. When the body of the foreman arrived he ordered it into the front room of the hacienda, ar- ranged for a funeral the next evening, straightened his accounts, and then im- mured himself in his bedroom, a silent, lonely, grim soul. ‘““He’s wooden!” remarked “Big Noise” _Tupper in the bunk-house that evening. ‘“‘No heart, no feelin’, nothin’! Did you see him stand over Jawn and look down for five minutes and never bat an eye? He’s a dummy! That ain’t the sort o’ man to run this ranch!” . “Big Noise” had a wide mouth, a breezy personality and a sonorous voice. The other men always opposed him from habit. ‘“‘What’d yu expect him to do?” asked Old Man Shay, a gangling, wrinkle-faced oracle with stubby gray whiskers. ‘“‘Want him to cry?” “No; I don’t expect him to act like a wooden Injun, either!’’ “Mebbe not; mebbe not; still, there’s some good pi’nts about a man that keeps his mouth shut after all.” Tupper swung his giant body out of the bunk-house to keep from exploding. In an hour he came back. He stood at the door of the lamplit wooden shack and e beckoned mysteriously to the others. They looked curious and finally followed. They crossed the truck-garden like ghosts and slid around the front of the house, halting at a sign from Tupper when he stopped before a window. The shutters were pulled down and only a few tiny rays of light glimmered through the slats. Tupper pointed to a hole in the slats. The men screwed their eyes to the window. “Drunk!” exclaimed Old Man Shay. The charge was true. Grant Wilcox sat by a table in his bedroom, with a whisky bottle and a small glass by his side. His face was red and bloated. His eyes were blood- shot. There was no mistaking his condition. “And him the man that was goin’ to pull the ranch outta the hole!’ muttered Tupper, sadly. DOOLK ©