Adventure Magazine, Mid-September 1917 — page 29: what you’re looking at

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

Longhorns “All by my lonesome?”’ ‘You an’ some other feller.” “Then gimme Telescope.”’ ‘“‘He’s up on Cow Creek. Yuh can’t——” “Yeah, I know, but Telescope he knows about this little deal an’ he won’t have to be told nothin’. Somebody else will. An’ you was sayin’ how yuh didn’t want any- body else to get on to what was happenin’.” “We-ell, all right. J’ll send Buff Warren up there to take his place tonight. Now looky here, Chuck, don’t yuh see how easy she all is? There’s the cows, like pullets in a chicken-house, all ready an’ waitin’ to be glommed onto. Why, she’s the easiest place in the world to get at, an’ no trouble at all to get to Marysville.” “That’s where they’re goin’ to sell ’em, huh?” “‘That’s where I’m gamblin’ they’re goin’ to sell ’em,’’ Mr. Saltoun made the asser- tion with dignity. ‘fAll right, you know.”’ “Say, you got somethin’ up yore sleeve. What is it? Don’t say ‘Nothin’ at me that- away. If yo’re so smart tell me what you think—if yo’re able.”’ ‘‘Me?e Oh, I’m able, an’ don’t yuh forget it. Cutnose ain’t figurin’ en deliverin’ his cattle in Marysville or nowhere near it. F. O. B. Farewell an’ vicinity is the hoss I’m bettin’ on. Hoss? Hoss? Didja hear me say hoss? It makes me think o’ some- thin’. S’pose now she was hosses an’ not cows that Canter’s li’! ol’ heart is a-cravin’ for?” “‘S’pose now yo’re crazy! Why, say, yuh make me plumb! weary. Hosses? ‘Cows! Yuh hear me! Cows!’’ ‘“‘What’ll yuh gimme if she is hosses, an’ I catch Cutnose?”’ “T’ll give you all the hosses.”’ temptuously. “Yuh mean to say that if Cutnose an’ his friends run off a herd, an’ I dump him an’ the deal, yuh’ll gimme the horse-band.” ‘Shore.”” Not with quite so much confi- dence. “All right, Pll go yuh. Here’s where you lose.’’ “T ain’t lost yet. In the mean time, you an’ Telescope drift five or six hundred head down on Buffler Flats. When yuh got that many there come to me.” “Do I get any chance to ride the range an’ watch Cutnose? I want to win that horse-band.”’ ‘“Yuh’ll have plenty o’ chance for all o’ Con- 27 that. Telescope rides in. I want yuh to fix the buckboard harness tomorrow, anyway. Them mules run away again yesterday. I guess that’s all.” Chuck rose and departed, whistling. “TY dunno if she.is hosses,’’ he said aloud, halting on his way to the bunkhouse to execute a pas seul. “But I’m gamblin’ she Is, cause Old Salt’s so shore she ain’t. I never knowed him to figure anythin’ out right yet.” CHAPTER VIII THE WORDS OF A TALE-BEARER HUCK MORGAN, straddling the “4 home-made stitching horse, and work- ing two needles, finished repairing the first trace, and removed his foot from the treadle. 4 them mules,” he muttered, wig- gling his stiffened fingers. “They must think I like to mend harness.” He looked at the shortened shadow of the bunkhouse. “Ten o’clock. Me for asmoke.” . As he inhaled the first puff came Jimmy the cook with a dishpan of potatoes and sat down on the bench beside the kitchen-door. “‘C’mon an’ sit closer, sweetness,” in- . vited Chuck, indicating the bench at the bunkhouse door. ‘Then I can talk to yuh without straining my voice.” “‘Nemmind ’bout strainin’ yore voice,’ said the cook, with a glare of suspicion. “Vuh might think you’d have to go me one better for that smokin’ tobacker I put in yore coffee this mornin’.”’ “?Tsall right,” grinned Chuck. ‘‘We’re even for that bath I give yuh yest’day. Besides, I ain’t got no more makin’s, an’ I want another smoke.” “Oh, o’ course,” Jimmy observed with weary scorn. ‘Play tricks on me day in, day out, but when yuh want a smoke come to me first card out o’ the box. That’s you pirates all over. If it wasn’t for me I dunno what you lazy chunkers’d do.” “TI dunno myself,” Chuck agreed amiably. ‘“‘That’s it. Now get yoreself settled. When yo’re happy yuh can gimme the makin’s. I’m almost through this one.”’ “T always did admire gall,” observed Jimmy, dropping a well-filled tobacco-bag into Chuck’s outstretched hand. ‘An’ you gotit. Ill betcha yud’h assay eleven ounces to the pound, Troy weight.” COmicloo Yuh can stay round the ranch till C©