Adventure Magazine Cover — page 62: what you’re looking at

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

60 out of Blue Wells, followed by the dog, and Sleepy cried against the shoulder of her horse. But Jimmy was too relieved to laugh. “Well,” he said solemnly, “I guess I'll have to pick something bigger than a man next time. Really, there should be some- thing big enough for me to hit.” “You ought to attack a fort,” laughed Sleepy. They unsaddled Marion’s horse, while Jimmy took care of his own exhausted mount. He was so happy that he tried to take the saddle off without uncinching it. “T expect the sheriff will be out here soon,” Marion told them. ‘He wants that dog. It bit Al Porter twice today, but they’ve got to keep it for evidence.” “They don’t know it’s here,” said Hash- knife. ‘‘Let’s hide it.”’ ‘Hide it? But that wouldn’t be lawful.” “Tt isn’t lawful to hold yore folks on that kind of evidence, either. Where can we put the dog.” “In the cellar,” suggested Sleepy. ‘“The one beneath the kitchen.” “But won’t they search?” “Prob’ly. Put a rug over the trap-door, and they’ll never see it.” It did not take them long to dump Ge- ronimo into the cellar, where Sleepy made him a good bed and put in a bucket of wa- ter. The dog accepted his new quarters without any protest, and Nanah grinned when she put an old rug over the trap-door, and moved over a table to rest on it. The three men were in the bunk-house when the sheriff showed up, about thirty minutes later. He looked around the patio, expecting to see the dog, and dismounted. Hashknife shook hands with him. Jimmy did not put in an appearance. “You heard what happened in town, didn’t yuh?” asked the sheriff. Hashknife agreed that he had. “Tt ended all right,”’ remarked the sheriff. “Except that the main exhibit of the Taylor case followed Legg out of town.” “What exhibit was that?” “The dog. Legg came here, didn’t he?” “Oh, yeah. But I don’t know anythin’ about the dog. Jimmy said the trouble started over a dog, and Miss Taylor said the dog followed Jimmy out of Blue Wells, but it prob’ly went back.” “Vea-a-a-ah? Went back—where?”’ “Why, to Blue Wells.” W. C. TUTTLE “T don’t think so, Hartley.” “Didja search the town?” The sheriff, of course, hadn’t. He had taken it for granted that the dog followed Legg all the way to the Double Bar 8, and upon sober reflection on his part it was rea- sonable to suppose that the dog had stopped and turned back to town. “The kid was kinda scared, wasn’t he?” asked the sheriff. “Naturally would be,” grinned Hash- knife. “He thought he had killed Por- ter.” “T dunno how he ever missed hittin’ Al some’ers beside in the heel. They wasn’t twenty feet apart. That derned tenderfoot is goin’ to kill somebody before he gits through. He’s comin’ closer every time. By golly, I dodge every time I see him. He’s such a bad shot that he worries me.” As they were laughing over Jimmy’s markmanship, Lee Barnhardt rode in on his sway-backed mount and dismounted beside them. “Vou rode too fast for me,” he told the sheriff. “I saw you start out, but you didn’t stop when I yelled.” “T didn’t hear yuh, Lee.”’ Marion came from the house, and Barn- hardt took some mail from his pocket, which he gave to her. “The postmaster said you forgot to get it,’ he said. ‘I was coming out; so I brought it.” The mail consisted of a few circulars and a weekly newspaper. “T asked for mail for you boys,” Barn- hardt told Hashknife. “We're not likely to get any,’ smiled Hashknife. ‘Thank yuh just the same.” Barnhardt turned to the sheriff. “What about that dog?” “Not here. Mebbe it never left town, Lee. Yo’re not worryin’ are yuh?” “Not me. I’d be just as well satisfied if it never came back.” “That’s what I thought. Are yuh ready to ride back?”’ The lawyer shook his head. “T’m in no hurry, Scotty.” | “Well, Iam. So long, folks.” Jimmy ventured out after the sheriff had gone, and wanted to know everything the sheriff had said. He was so glad to know that the law was not on his trail that he even spoke pleasantly to Lee Barnhardt. Marion went in the house, and Sleepy COMICooo Cc SS (C@