Adventure Magazine Cover — page 189: what you’re looking at

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

THE FALLACY OF FARO “T was —— fool enough tuh think yuh couldn’t handle the deal, Faro. I shore made a mistake. Now that yuh got him, what do yuh aim to do with him?” “The boys,” grinned Faro, “ ’lowed they’d string him up. Bein’ as yo’re the gent that stopped his bullet, I’m leavin’ it tuh you.” ‘‘An’ I’ll be as good as you are, feller. I don’t eat dark meat. He’s yourn fer better er worse, no holts barred an’ devil take the hindmost. Yuh might jerk his meat an’ scatter it fer coyote bait. It’d have pizen a-plenty in it without puttin’ strychnine in it.” The crowd had followed down the street and again grouped themselves about Faro and his prisoner who still sat their horses. When Turkey Track finished speaking, Faro turned to them. “Turkey Track has checked the bet to me, boys. You heered him. In lookin’ over my cards, I reads ’em as a fair to middlin’ hand. There ain’t goin’ to be no lynchin’.”’ “The there ain’t!”’ called some one. “Keep yore shirts on,” grinned Faro. “Leastways till I’m done talkin’. Twenty years ago I killed Jack Manton. This son uh his, gittin’ some wrong information some- how, thinks it’s me that owns the Last Chance Saloon. So he shows up tuh collect some damages fer the killin’ of his father which he admits was no account. He made the crack that I was too low down a bum tuh be a man. That it’d be rank murder tuh take a shot at me. An’ I dunno but what he hit the nail on the head. “Now, gents, I’m gonna turn this Jack Manton loose an’ give him his gun. [’m heeled likewise. Him an’ me will stand twenty feet apart an’ shoot it out fair an’ square. If he wins, let him go free.” Faro jerked out the two guns and hung them from his two forefingers crooked in the trigger guards. His eyes were two danc- ing blue lights as he grinned mockingly into the set face of Jack Manton. “T spent twenty years regrettin’ the killin’ of the coyote that sired you, yuh yaller- eyed, white-livered coward. But when they plant you alongside him I’m gonna learn that song called “The Circle C Dun’ an’ sing it when they throw dirt in yore face. One uh you boys cut his hands loose.”’ Grins of expectation rippled over the faces of the crowd. A ready knife set Manton free. Then, Faro Furnell, smiling 187 grimly and holding Manton’s eyes with a cold blue stare, handed the ’breed his gun, butt first. His own gun balanced easily in his right hand, Faro reined his horse backward, step by step. The crowd hastily got out of the line of fire. Manton, his face a pasty yellow, was breathing like a man who had been running. He held his gun stiffly, awkwardly, his eyes shifting as if they sought some path of escape. “Well, Jack Manton,” Faro Furnell’s voice snapped the silence, “I’m waitin’. You got a even break. Take it, —— yuh!” With a hoarse cry, Manton flung the weapon from him as if it burned his hand. Jabbing his spurs deep, he whirled his dun horse, flattening himself along the neck of the racing animal as it tore down the street toward the prairie beyond. Faro, a tired smile twitching nervously at his bruised lips, watched him out of sight. Then, so that Tolliver from his window, and the others who watched might see, Faro Furnell painstakingly shoved brass cartridges, one after another, into the empty chambers of the gun Tom McDonald had given him. The man who had acted as leader of the lynching party picked Manton’s gun out of the dust, examining it. The gun was loaded. Turkey Track Tolliver knew that Faro Furnell, in his own way, according to his own lights, had laid forever the ghost of Jack Manton. “T’ll be seein’ yuh, Turkey Track,’ he said, “in a week er two when the Bear Paw Pool wagon comes tuh town. Tom lowed he was short-handed an’ there’s a boy with the outfit that I’m gonna git tuh learn me the words uh ‘The Circle C Dun.’ Mebbeso they’ll hook on the last verse now.” And so Faro Furnell, shoulders sagging wearily, full of aches and pains, rode out of town and across the hills, back to the coun- try where he belonged. 3 It was none other than Turkey Track Tolliver who, months later, added the final verse to “The Circle C Dun”. Ol’ Faro is a dealer Whose game is on the square He’s roddin’ of the Circle C An’ makin’ good out there. Now empty down yore licker To the gamest cuss alive Who killed Jack Manton’s speerit With a empty forty-five. comicloolk CO