Argosy All-Story Weekly — "The Purple Limited" — page 161: what you’re looking at

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

SHAG. 127 shoulder to flank. The Red One was fight- ing for the stranger! Making no move, he stood and looked as the Roan Bull scrambled to his feet; then, when the’ Red One nosed at the bleeding wounds of his conquered enemy, Shag turned and silently, with a broken heart, walked away. For three days he ate no food. Ona lonely point above the cluster of willows in which Brown Sides gave him life, Shag stood, silent—scarcely moving, and brood- ed over the curse that had been laid on him - the day, at the North Springs, the rope - dropped over his head and he was dragged to the knife and the branding iron. Then he tasted the loco—the devil- weed. He had crossed to Capaline, to that side of the dead volcano on which grow the few mesquites, and here and there a pinion _—and the scattering ,Spanish daggers. © Grazing carelessly, without interest, his nose touched the deadly plant. Instantly Shag knew and paused, smelling curiously at the white, velvety leaves. Deliberately and with reckless design his tongue’ whipped the sprangling stems into his mouth! A miracle happened. A strange abandon came over Shag; queer dreams filled his brain; weird, dis- torted images appeared and disappeared before his eyes; his body throbbed with energy beyond all measure; he seemed to grow, suddenly, into a supercreature, with power to master all the world! His mus- cles tingled—he was strong—strong—noth- ing could resist him! The blood in his veins was fire; in his feet there was a new lightness, and speed swifter than the roar- ing winds was in his legs! His mighty horns—he could drive them through the very rock walls of Old Capaline! Under the spell of the loco, at one step, he could cross the Cimmaron—with a single push of his great head it would be easy to throw «down Sentinel Mountain or plow a path through Del’ Christo range! Then came the hot passion to kill. He would seek the Roan Bull and kill him. He would kill all bulls—all the bulls in the world. Then he would search for the human creatures whom once he had shunned and. dreaded to meet—and he would kill them—kill them— And the Red One, he would find her also, and she _ should die—no, ah, no—he would not kill the Red One—instead, he would lead her to the wonderful loco, the magic weed, that she, too, might eat and become as he had become, greater than all others, and they alone — he and the Red One — together would rule the mountains and the plains, even from the tops of the blue Costejos, beyond the Vermejo, to the far edge of Llano de Gato! | He went down among the cattle, search- ing for Roan Bull. Though he reeled when he walked, he was not afraid, and the cattle, when they saw the look in his eyes, made way before him. Even Black Horn, the old bull that, since Shag could remember, had been mas- ter of the herd, would not fight him. They knew—these puny things—that he, Shag, was the Great One! . He lifted his head, shook angrily the mighty horns, and with one shrill trumpet-call challenged all crea- tion to witness that he, alone, of all steers, none, not even the bulls, dared to battle! The delirium passed. The spirit of the loco died within him. Once more he was only Shag, the brown steer, with the scar of the K-Bar brand on his hip, trembling with the dull hurt that gnawed at his heart when he thought of the Red One. He went away to brood in solitude, or search again for the plant, the devil-weed, that would make him forget. So fled the months. When the spell of the loco possessed him he lived in the glorious world of his own wild dreams and wilder passions; when it left him he stood, with drooped head, dazed and weakened, his gaunt figure sil- / houetted against the sky-line above some lonely ridge or bleak point, while black horror tore at his soul. Such times, though the gray wolves howled dismally through the long nights, Shag gave no heed. and, somehow, even Crooked Fang, the fero- cious, with his pack, dared — not yet at least—attack the great steer standing moodily far from the herd. (C(CO)INN) DOO) A S (C(O)