Adventure Magazine Cover — page 56: what you’re looking at

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

various piles of débris. icular which disclosed anything & ~ might not—probably not. __ farther up in the mountains than old man shorter way out, but there was none. the end he decided that the man he had = cary % 54 Adventure — - room and began an investigation of the a perfect view of her profile. There was a There was no.one thing in part of value in the way of information, but every- ons lay in the disordered confusion of use. : Staite who had lived there first had gone ‘out with the full expectation of returning. ee 2 - There could be but one conclusion—this had been the home of Lonesome Jim. It was a discovery, but it was nothing more. The lost mine might be close and it The cabin was Bently had figured, but it was quite pos- _ sible that Hasbrouck had found it and thor- oughly prospected the immediate vicinity. _. After all his trouble it seemed that Dal had discovered nothing of any value. Lone- use the cabin was a mystery, but in all probability he would turn out to be some other lonesome prospector who had de- cided to use the cabin for a while. It might, indeed, be Hasbrouck himself who was to be the new occupant, because So= it would give him more time to hunt the mine. Ifso it was detrimental to Showalter, for while the man was treasure hunting he _ was keeping out of the cussedness in which Dal hoped to catch him. Dal wasted some time trying to find a In followed had not been trying to cover his tracks, but had simply taken the only -_——* route to the cabin. =P It was dark when Dal finally got off to the slate-covered ridge. It was now too late to do anything at the sheep camp so : he turned old Spot i the direction of Silver Zone. He tied the horse at a considerable distance from the cabin and crept in cau- tiously afoot until he was within twenty feet of the window in the kitchen. He raised himself until he could get a good view of part of the interior. A woman stood at the table talking to some in- visible person in one corner of the room. __. She was in the uniform of a trained nurse, so her presence, which had somewhat mys- tified Dal, was oe Sees She was there to look after Sawy Then Vincie stepped 3 in front of the win- = : : ae hie and stood in a position where Dal had 2 went to show that the pros- — some Jim was dead and gone, and the cabin ___. disclosed no new facts concerning him. The identity of the man who now expected to- look on her face which struck Dal to the heart—a look of grief which comes only for one reason. It was easy to read from her face that-Samuel Bently was at last dead. A wave of sympathy for the lonely girl © rushed over Dal and he started impetuously for the door to offer his services, but at that moment he became aware that he was not alone watching the cabin. In the grease-. woods and among the other tumbled down shacks were furtive moving figures. Before Dal could make a decision someone _ snapped out-an order, and a volley of bullets crashed into the cabin walls. Immediately there was a wild yell from a dozen throats, and the mob surged toward the cabin. Dal caught a brief glimpse of a man inside the cabin who showed himself just long enough to send a bullet out of the window. It was Pet Bradley. Dal quickly determind upon his own course of action. The mob had gone by without seeing him, so he could reach the shelter of one of the deserted shacks and start a bombardment of the mob from the rear that was pretty likely to demoralize it for a time at least, and he knew that there was a man inside who could be depended upon to give an account of himself. Without bothering to look behind him Dal arose, and as he did so collided with a man. Instinctively he clinched, and im- mediately recognized his mistake. Athlete that he was he found himself in the grip of a more powerful man. Hasbrouck had been playing safe by stay- ing behind his gang until he saw how things were going. But it did not interfere with his using his tremendous physical strength when the necessity unexpectedly arose. Dal felt himself in an unbreakable hold. He was. lifted clear of the ground for a’ moment, then crashed heavily to the earth. An instant later the butt of Hasbrouck’s revolver descended upon the unhealed wound on his head, and for Showalter = thing ceased to be. CHAPTER XIV A LAND OFe DESOLATION _ TD“ opened his eyes and blinked into the leering face of the sun just emerg- ing from the rim of the desert. His first realization was that he was terribly numb cS comicboo _ 7 . i yw < - s = a a el ae al ja . eS . ~o an Vea > Se ~~ ee aed (Coy, o> a