Adventure Magazine Cover — page 181: what you’re looking at

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

THE APOSTLE ground. The muzzle of Tim’s gun swept in a little circle, and the crowd pressed back. Tim backed into the doorway. “Kid Bart!” cried Jake Sarney. ‘‘That’s Kid Bart. He’s the on’y one kin do the gun-twirl like that! He got away from the sheriff, down in Texas—twenty years in jail—reward—” His hand streaked for his gun. He got it from the holster, but a .44 slug smashed into his arm and jerked him off his balance. Tim Wiley leaped inside the sheriff’s office and slammed the door. The crowd waited. Many guns were out, but no one fired. The dozen old-timers found one another out and exchanged un- certain looks. “Well, what’re we gonna do?” demanded some one on the outskirts of the crowd. Mike Sloan tied a quick diamond hitch in his mustache. Then his teeth clicked together and he faced them all. “T tell yuh what we’re gonna do,” he rumbled fiercely. “We’re gonna call it off. Kid Bart just give up twenty years o’ life for law ’n’ order, an’ if he wants it that bad there must be somethin’ to it. An’ me, I’m ready to battle like to help him get it!” “Me too,” growled Frank Jessup, and then Jud Mace and the other old-timers chimed in agreement. They pushed for- ward and formed a grim little group before the sheriff’s office. Some one thrust a gun in Augie’s hand and he joined them. After all, Kid Bart was an old-timer like them- selves. ‘‘_____ Mike,”’ called a voice from the street, “if yuh feel that way about it, yuh ole buckaroo, yuh don’t have to go slingin’ any lead. We don’t know what it’s all about, but whatever it is there’s a lot of us here willin’ to go right along with yuh, just the same. Le’s ramble over to the Mirror and see ’f there’s any o’ this here newfangled law ’n’ order in any o’ them purty bottles.” Fifteen minutes later, Augie Underholtz was locking Kid Bart in a cell. “T sure hate to do this, old-timer,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘‘After yuh been around here all these years, never doin’ any harm, an’ always actin’ like a white man with ev’rybody—” “It’s all right, Augie,” said Kid Bart wearily. “Twenty years, hey?” mused Augie. “Ay mm!” 175 “T’ll never do it, Augie. Couldn’t stand it. Ain’t used to bein’ locked up, an’ I couldn’t stand it.” Augie nodded. Tim wasn’t so young as he had been, and twenty years behind iron bars and stone walls is a long, long time. Augie struggled with curious thoughts. “T dunno—well—’”’ He scratched his head. “I think I'll take yuh over to th’ county seat t’morrow mornin’, Tim. Yeah.”’ He grinned. “Think I’ll go havea talk with Mike Sloan ’n’ Frank Jessup. Got some- thin’ I wanta ask ’em about.” returned, Augie and Kid Bart started for the county seat, thirty miles away. Six miles out of town, Augie slowed his horse to a walk. ‘“Ain’t no hurry,” hesaid. “Take it easy.” He looked at his enormous silver watch. They were skirting a tumbled pile of rock at a mesa rim when three masked men ap- peared in the road ahead, each with a gun in his hand. “Elevate ’em, Sheriff!” The sheriff did. “T ain’t got no money,” he said. ‘‘We don’t want money. We want Kid Bart, that old-timer yuh got there. We’re friends o’ his’n.”’ “Yuh are, hey? Now ain’t that nice!” Augie grinned at Frank Jessup’s big som- brero with the cigaret burn in the exact front; at Jud Mace’s paint horse and silver- mounted bridle and saddle, and at Mike Sloan’s rivet-studded leather chaps. “Vuh fellers sure are disguised,’”’ he said. “Masks ’n’ everything. , 1 dunno who yuh are.” The men jostled their horses in between Augie’s and the wondering Kid Bart’s. The sheriff scratched his head. “Guess I better be streakin’ it back to town,” he said, “‘to raise a posse.” But he didn’t exactly streak. He slumped lazily in the saddle and let his horse amble along with drooping head. Now and then Augie stopped and rolled a cigaret, or waited with admirable patience while his horse chewed at an occasional bit of dried vegeta- tion. Once he glanced back and saw that his prisoner and the three masked men were gone. His horse stopped of its own accord. “‘Ain’t right to push a poor hoss to death on a hot day like this,’ commented Augie, and rolled another cigaret. Nee morning, when the deputy had COmiclboooks. CO