Adventure Magazine Cover — page 66: what you’re looking at

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

630 lobe of the ear a puckered white scar cut the cheek horizontally. As he faced the engineer he uttered a slight exclamation and his arm dropped half way to his side, but with an oath he steadied the muzzle back on the breast of the blue jumper. ‘“‘No monkey business with me!” he said roughly. The eyes of Old Faithful were glued on the unsightly scar. ‘‘A brave sight, this, for the eyes of the man that begot you, James Toft!” he said. “When Black Murphy split your face with the ax in Daly’s, I would to God he had struck six inches higher!” The other laughed uneasily. “T wasn’t reckoning on meeting you, an’ that’s the naked truth,’ hesaid. ‘I haven’t been keepin’ tab on the comp’ny’s circulars this while back, an’ didn’t know my daddy’d got promotion. Where’s Denis?” “Denis Hagarty died in this cab two hours ago,” the old man said sternly. “Well, don’t you be a fool an’ do the same thing!” the son replied meaningly. For full five minutes father and son looked into each other’s eyes, while the fireman stared helplessly from one to the other. Then from back of the tender came the sound of a pistol-shot and a cry of agony. “You murderous dogs!”’ said the engineer fiercely. ‘‘What was that?” “Reckon somebody’s got hurt,” the other responded. ‘You keep still.” The brutal laugh which accompanied the words, the insolent note of command, pricked the old man’s courage like a spur. The half-veiled face, with its sneering lip and unsightly brand of evil painted clear against the night by the light streaming from the half-opened door of the furnace, filed him with a loathing unspeakable. With a swift indrawing of breath and a gritting of teeth he ducked down and side- ways and leaped in on his son. A bullet starred the plating between the gauges, but before the graceless. villain could draw trigger again a knotted fist went fairly home among the black bristles on his chin, and James Toft dropped in a heap, striking his head against the tender and knocking out what little sense his father’s blow had left in him. “The bell-rope—quick!” Dick snarled, and, snatching the spare hank from the fire- ma: he bent over the prostrate form. In Adventure another minute the arms and legs of the unconscious train-robber were held in a close-embracing hempen spiral. With swift, untrembling fingers the engi- neer stripped off his jumper and, plucking the mask from the white face at his feet, bound it about his own eyes. The broad- brimmed hat and heavy guns lay in the gangway where his son had fallen, and he picked them up. His eyes shone strangely through the holes in the black crape, and the fireman trembled. ‘What are you going to do?” he asked in a voice scarcely audible above the drum- ming of the imprisoned steam. ‘““My duty,” replied Old Faithful. ‘‘Bide you here.” He said no more, but dropped down the side of his engine and crunched his way back along the ballast. As he came abreast of the tender, two masked men leaped from the express-car and came toward him. Looking past them he could see the conductor standing by the forward sleeper, hands above his head. A thread of smoke hung in the door of the express-car. Little more than an arm’s- length away one of the men addressed him. “Why in don’t you obey orders, Jim?” he demanded sharply. ‘‘What are you here for?” “This!” said Dick curtly. He laid the muzzles of his guns against the breasts before him and pulled the trig- gers. Both men went down, one man limp and silent, the other with a horrid writhe and yell. ‘True to his upbringing, he tried a shot as he fell, and ripped a fur- row in Dick’s beard, but before he could fire again the engineer’s cowhide boot took him square on the jaw, and when he touched ground he was practically a dead man. From the interior of the express-car came the shattering sound of an explosion. Half a dozen boards cracked and broke outwards and a whirl of pungent smoke bellied out into the frosty air. Dick tore the mask from his face and yelled at the conductor. “Come here, you blamed fool!”’ he cried. ‘Are you going to stand there all night?’’ Bewildered, the other advanced. His hands were still in the air, but he dropped them as he recognized the engineer. “Vou?” he gasped, looking helplessly from the sturdy, menacing figure to the sprawling forms on the ballast. GOMmIGDOoOKSEEO 5}