Adventure Magazine Cover — page 71: what you’re looking at

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

fighting the greatest battle with himself he had ever been called upon to make. In spite of his terrible physical weakness sleep was an impossibility. Among the articles in‘ the pack was just one of which Pet Bradley had been ignorant—a burlap- covered gallon canteen. Dal had smuggled it into the pack with considerable difficulty, but with it filled with water the road to freedom lay open before him across the pathless floor of the desert. , He knew the girls would have no difficulty hitching the team up in the morning and driving on to Annamucca. It would prove to be a long, wearisome road but they would be scarcely more weary than if he were along to drive. As the country was flat as a floor there was no twisting of the road; it ran straight as a chalk-line and there was no chance for them to get lost. But there, so close at hand, was the girl he loved. Infinitely removed from him it was true by barriers of education, culture, _ refinement, and, since the discovery of the lost mine, wealth. Under certain condi- tions all these might have been bridged, but the fact that he was under arrest for murder—with certain conviction awaiting him—could not. Why, he asked himself, should he be troubled about what she would think when she awoke and found him missing. She would not require him to lose his life to keep from breaking his word; he knew that. If she knew all the circumstances he was positive that she would even help him to escape, would even go as far as old Thad Thompson himself. There seemed no reason why he should go on and put himself in Bradley’s clutches again. Yet he knew there was a reason, so in- tangible that he could scarcely grasp it in words, though he felt it keenly. He did not believe for a minute that Vincie loved him; vanity was never his curse. Still, he knew that in a way she idealized him. He stood for something finer in her mind than did other men-of her acquaintance despite his lack of social polish. In a word, “‘big- ness’”—a complete, utter thoughtlessness of self. And he knew that that feeling of hers would be forever destroyed if she awoke and found that he had sneaked away in ~ the night. Her feelings must inevitably triumph over her reason, which would in- sist that he had done perfectly right. - Silver Zone - early. A coyote howled in the desert, a mourn- oe Z ful, cynical wail—a perfect echo of Dal’s dreary thoughts—a grim commentary upon — e. a the futility of life. harshly. blankets and counted stars until morning. fon IT WAS a long hard drive to Anna- He laughed once, mucca and the days were short. 3 The electric lights of the little rail- road town in the midst of the desert were beckoning and twinkling a friendly welcome before Dal piloted the hack in front of the largest hotel. They had been three miles out in the desert when they first caught sight of the lights and Dal at once sensed the heart hunger with which Vincie wel- — comed them after two years of soul-trying — exile on the desert. After he had put his team in a livery stable and eaten supper Dal wandered around the town apathetically. In the saloons he found the talk still buzzing about the arrival of Hasbrouck’s men under guard. Wild stories. were being told. of the sanguinary battle that was supposed to have taken place out on Goose Creek, and at Silver Zone. In the excitement Dal found his own presence went unnoted, though ordinarily strangers were objects of some curiosity. In one saloon he found the two camp-— movers who had -brought in the outlaws. They looked at him strangely but other- 2 = wise made no sign of recognition. Quite obviously they had received instructions __ from Bradley to let him alone and say nothing. In the morning Dal was on the streets Vincie would be leaving that day, arid he was hungry for a final sight of her. But it was not until eleven o’clock that he saw her, and then he would have evaded her had she not caught sight of him and — called.’ as a-schoolboy. She was not the girl he had known, this lovely creature in black silk taffeta, black silk stockings, soft black | shoes, and a trim, dark little hat. He had known at Silver Zone that she was good looking, but he had never dreamed — that she could become as radiant as he saw her now. “Am I. not extravagant?” she greeted with a blush that was half-apologetic, and _ = half-anxious or his approval. Abruptly he returned to his ¥ * i. < - A 7 Fs . “a $ ; & F re 3 ? Ste (Cig its — Se ey iat tb % S tat Cats FF ,, ASS) bp Nek a i hea ad Pan Sie ial) a lle NN Se i Ag aT eh : twig Arete : ve q Ca Ne Ths * Say : eli halite J t , “ rate BS etal | « aw.) “ah tty wits oTy Pri ide Soe iY ac eA iA x He stood before her awkward and bashful © o Sg : comichnoolss Gal