Adventure Magazine Cover — page 82: what you’re looking at

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

re: was too well known that Indians, as well as white men disguised as Indians, were prey- ing on the stage lines, on freight and pack- trains, and on lonely horse ranchos. Old Idaho was busy mulling over some of these bits of gossip as he ate his breakfast. The story of the stolen mare now began to worry the old man. True, he had seen a mare, conspicuously marked as Hale had described. But suppose a man planned a coup against property, and suppose that man realized there were those who suspected him of being on the wrong side of the law; what better réle of innocence, then, to adopt when venturing into the Payette Valley than to come as one who had been plun- dered? How easily and quickly could he establish himself as an injured man by hav- ing an accomplice precede him with the alleged stolen property so marked as to be noted and remembered? Being a vegetable farmer, Old Idaho should not have feared even arobber. Perhaps the trim little figure of his granddaughter was the treasure he wished no lawless man to discover. Age weighs and deliberates long after Youth has leaped to a conclusion. The girl was immensely pleased to have met this stranger. Infrequently other men wandered down the valley and called at the cabin. Among these were some with the eyes of a mountain-wolf as they gazed on the girl. Old Idaho bruskly sent all such about their business. As yet none had dared, or cared, ~to disregard his orders. Yet it was a lonely life for a girl of twenty. Day after day the wonderful blue mountain tops hung in the heavens at dawn; shadow succeeding glare at evening, with a purple sea covering the plains. At dawn and dusk amountains appeared and grew immeasur- ably in height and flung out far reaching ridges, yet hid themselves at noontime. And there was the glory of the nights, when the rapid radiation brought coolness, even a chill, when the heavens were crowded with stars and each star burned like a planet. She accepted these wonders just as she accepted the Summer winds from the west, heavy with dust, and blowing with a steady persistency throughout the afternoon and dying mysteriously at sunset. Out of all these phenomena she made many stories and peopled the heavens and the haze with her day-dreams. But she was young and full-blooded and her spirit clamored for something which neither the marvels of the Adventure zenith, nor the beauties of earth could supply. She had a horse to ride, if she would promise not to go too far. She had guns to shoot, but was not- permitted to venture widely and depend upon them. And there was a time for a brief spell when she had had a dog to love. With the dog came her first touch of romance. The dog was a gift from a man in Idaho City. His hands were better kept than those of any other man she had ever seen. She met him on one of the rare occasions when her grandfather took her to the county seat. He was very picturesque, a bit melo- dramatic, in his black jacket, snowy shirt, his brown trousers tucked into irreproach- able French patent leather boots. His hair was glossy and his beard short and distin- guished looking. And he removed his black felt hat when addressing her with a mixture of impudence and meekness. He told her his name was Ferdinand Patterson, and that he had never met a woman to notice her until he met her. Then he gave her the dog and she had brought it home, with her mind filled with romantic nonsense. Soon after*he invited himself to the cabin and ate with them. She had been highly elated at this break in the sage-brush monotony. Then her grandfather walked aside with the man and talked to him briefly. He rode away without even saying good-by. The next day Old Idaho found the dog shot through the heart, and the old man buried it and said it had gone back to town. The gambler had taken back his gift. paww THUS with her sentimental back- ground but hastily sketched in with S482 emotions which she could not ana- iy ze, the girl was in love with love without knowing it. She was as frank and honest in her desire to discover and understand her strange impulses as she was unconscious of her masculine garb. Life to her was always on the edge of becoming a wonderful and beautiful adventure. As she watched Hale she vaguely began to understand that the adventure could not begin until there came a man who was not old like her granddaddy, nor wicked as she believed all gamblers to be, nor animals as were some of the bewhisk- ered creatures who happened upon the cabin. | She tilted her head and surveyed Shoshoni Hale with marked deliberation. Hale was GOMIIGoOO S (©