Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 6, 1923 — page 105: what you’re looking at

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

THE AVENGING SHEPHERD. It made no cry as it advanced. Peter’s mouth had sagged open. As in a daze, he stared at the sleek feathered thing stand- ing before him. He drew back into his blankets, his blood cold. Watching, he saw the great bird spread its wings and rise to the table, where it perched in forbidding importance, its black head rolling from side to side—ominous, chilling, the hand-servant of Death. For forty years this grisly bird had scoured the desert, despised of men and feasting on the dead, but doing that which nature had intended it to do; justifying its place in the great scheme of things that is life; its only law, the survival of the fittest. Ever had man’s hand been raised against it. And yet it entered the dug-out this night, unafraid. Peter wanted to cry out and ask what ill- omened business brought it there, but his voice would not come. Everything that happened this night had a queer draw to. it! end? He wanted to get out—away; to fill his lungs with clean air again. He willed his hands to grasp his boots, but they re- fused to obey, and he could only sit and stare at that great, black, blinking thing there before him. “Look not on this bird as an enemy,” he heard Joseph say. “ He is an old friend —I call him Grimm. He passes on all that I do; and he is never wrong. He never mis- takes an enemy for a friend. He it was who told me you were coming up the moun- tain to-night. He says nothing now because he accepts you as a friend.” ‘““Take him away,” Peter gasped. “ He makes my flesh creep. Are you mad? Havin’ such things about you!” Joseph smiled at him. ‘“T understand you,” he said. “ Here you see me, clad in rags, my companions the scavenger coyote and the carrion crow— outcasts of the desert—reviled, unloved— what a picture! And yet it is given even unto the lowest to reward kindness with faithfulness. ‘When you speak of me, speak of my companions, for we are three; and if the least of these shall love me, I will not fail. ‘“T can read the present; Slippy-foot the Where would this hellish nightmare. 887 coyote reads the past; and Grimm, most maligned of all feathered creatures, un- veils the mysteries of the future!” CHAPTER IX. TIMOTEO SPEAKS. ROM the day that he had returned to Buckskin, Joseph had cast his eyes at its rocky crest. Throughout the years he had looked forward to the time when he should stand there and read the message his mother had left him. In fancy, he had done so a thousand times. And yet—now that he was there—he had found himself reluctant to face it. As he had grown older, a fixed idea of what he would find had settled on him; but his return to the mountain had de- stroyed that assurance. He had expected to find his old home still standing and in his bitterness at finding it destroyed he had told himself he dared not hope that any sign remained for him on Buckskin. Peter Organ had explained many things to Joseph. For a day after the old man had left, the boy did not leave the coulee. With great patience he arranged in his mind what Peter had said. Of one thing he was certain—his mother’s message was a secret no longer. He felt that he knew its con- tents in full. It was not what he had ex- pected. But his way was clear before him now; and at sunrise, the following morning, he stood upon the mountain top. The world was still—hushed with the wonder of the coming day. Far below him, the desert floated in a lavender sea; to the east the distant Tuscarora Mountains were splashed with warm yellows and cold pinks. Slippy-foot leaped to the topmost pin- nacle and, lifting her head, she barked a greeting to the sun-god. Almost at once the sun leaped clear of the far horizon and flooded mountain and plain with vibrant light. As if pursued, the gray shadows, lingering in canon and draw, took to flight and were gone. At this moment the glory of the universe was God’s. Joseph raised his hands de- voutly and, lifting his eyes to Heaven, he gave thanks to his Creator. COMiclooe ©