Adventure, February 20, 1922 — page 166: what you’re looking at

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

«164 results to both their pride and their bank- rolls, by bringing in a new bucker which . they had discovered while breaking colts that Spring, and which they had deceitfully kept hidden at the horse-camp all Summer, _._where the animal’s education was carefully aes attended to without any one getting a line *. on their devilish plan. : And this knowing brute, having origin- ated in his own wicked head a combination of sunfish, and swap and double reverse _ pitching which was a peach, piled the Square and Compass rider all in a heap, likewise breaking an arm and a couple a of ribs, thus rendering him totally unable to take any further part in the proceed- - Ings. Es To make matters worse, the HSE Outlaw of the Square and Compass failed to pitch in his usual form, and the Boot rider, 3 who had managed to stay on by the skin of his teeth, insultingly stood on his head in the saddle after the bronc quieted down, and in that position asked his crest- oe ae 8 Fen | - ___ Skate was the best that they had in the bunch. “ This double catastrophe having left the ie Square and Compass without cash enough to wad a shotgun, a delegation hunted up ___ Buck and besought him, for the honor of the _.. brand and the sake of their pockets, to come to the rescue. 2 But that youth, being otherwise engaged, took the delegates to one side, and having forcibly and profanely consigned them to the nethermost depths for bothering him, E. returned a flat refusal. The cause of this was a young lady apparently named Kitten -—-—at least that is what he called her—who ee had asked him not to do anything danger- ous because she couldn’t bear to think of his . getting hurt. And her wishes being more - Important than anything else in the world he basely deserted his comrades to their fate. __ So the envoys, muttering dark threats of _~ reprisal, returned to their fellows and mixed -- much medicine. | As a result of this, they pooled their re- - ,maining funds and entrusting them to one _ Of their number, dispatched him to where a poker game was being played on a saddle- blanket spread on the ground. - ~ Here the adventurer, first taking the _ precaution to ask if it was a gentlemen’s game and being informed that it was not roe 7 MATL be Lal] ‘ a | a) i * We, 4 ne ln ~ : =) ?- * ° Adventure fallen adversaries if that bench-legged ~ and that if he had any cash to lose to get in quick, managed, it being by. now nearly dark, to slip certain cards from the discard under the edge of the blanket when no one was looking. With the aid of these, properly inserted into his hand at the right moment, he won a big jack-pot, after which he played close to his chest until the game broke up, and returned with much needed supplies. During the day it was quite apparent that young Mr. Ewing and the daughter of his tribal enemy were on very good terms indeed. There being an armed truce between the opposing forces which neither party was as yet ready to break, many of the men from the Broken Bow were in for the celebration, and the sight of their employer’s daughter in such company caused much comment, es- pecially as she had ridden in with Craw- ford. But Miss Newton had explained this very satisfactorily, to one person at least. : “Kitten,” said her escort—you will ob- — serve that he had lost some of kis fear of girls—‘‘you look like a little ghost this morning. What is the matter?” “It’s Mr. Crawford, papa’s foreman, you know. Lately he’s tried to be attentive to me, and it scares me. It isn’t what hesays, it’s the way he looks at me, as if he owned ~ me. And he’s cruel, I know, I can see it in his face. _ “Tt isn’t anything that I can go to papa about, and I’m afraid of him, too, I’m afraid of those awful eyes; did you ever no- tice them? Not that papa is bad to me, be- cause he isn’t; he just isn’t anything, al- though he tells me that if I want anything to let him know, and if I want to go back to San Francisco that I can. “But I don’t want to, not now,” and she smiled. “But I haven’t another living rela- tive, or any one but just you, and that’s the reason that I don’t want you to get hurt, one reason, anyway. “‘And there’s something else. You know that you don’t want to go to the Broken Bow, and so when Mr. Crawford asked if he might ride in with me I couldn’t very well refuse. And when he asked me for the first dance I couldn’t refuse that, either, after coming in with him. So you mustn’t be angry, and I'll give you most all the other dances, and you bring your friends, nice ones, and I'll give them the rest.” comicbooks:com