Argosy All-Story Weekly, October 25, 1924 — page 20: what you’re looking at

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

val Bal . 7h See 10 But neglect had not subdued the flowering vines that crept, weblike, over the walls and - heavy upholding beams and as Old Man Parmelee sat there in the shadow, cheer- lessly regarding the wide domain which lay parched beneath the sun outside, these vines wove a patterned frame about him while he brooded in ignorance of the pic- ture which he made. He was not old. The name by which the range had learned to designate him was derived rather from a custom which, be- stowing it upon the boss of any single out- fit, bestowed it upon Bartholomew Parme- lee in a tacit recognition of the relation he bore to the entire district which he ruled. His lank, sandy hair was not yet gray. His eye was bright. He was in fact not yet long past the prime of his life, and the hale activity of the open range should have given him many more years in the saddle. Indeed he expected nothing less. In this sickness, this weakness which had torn his limbs with pain, and palsied his firm hand, he had never taken to his bed. “Tt will pass,” he had said, and his words had been a command. He had commanded that sickness to pass. Yet for many weeks now he had hobbled painfully down to this chair on the veranda, to sit and wait for its passing; to issue his mandates while it passed. And it had not passed. In the afternoon Snuff Tansey rode in from the sunlight to find the rancho de- serted save for the kitchen hands and Old Man Parmelee, brooding in his chair. Drawing up to the veranda, he dismounted and approached with the familiarity of the range and the propitiatory respect de- manded by the circumstances and the very presence of Old Man Parmelee. “ Jud Dasent, he’s holdin’ his hand.” It was a characteristic of Old Parmelee that he forced the other by silence to explain his coming. “ He’s got Preest down in the bottoms of the Verdi.” “ Rounded up!” Parmelee stretched his lips with a grin that brought a fierce glitter to his eye. He was a great hunter, was Parmelee, whether of man or beast. “Shore, seems like. Jud’s riders is cuttin’ down to head him orf from the Rio.” The boss leaned forward in his chair. ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. “What you sayin’ about Dasent holdin’ back?” Tansey recognized the sound in Parmelee’s voice, resembling that of a coarse file roughly drawn across bone, which signaled a warning of the Old Man’s displeasure. “He’s got. him herded in, ain’t he?” Tansey had a wedge-like face, the lines of which were broken only by the sharp pro- tuberances of his cheek bones; it gave him a general aspect of narrowness and craft, of foxy cunning. With narrowed eyes he ob- served the old man now, and tried to ap- praise his temper. “Give me answer to that!” demanded Parmelee. The hard contempt he had for such narrow, appraising glances as men con- stantly turned upon him, was instinctive and unaffected. It was part of the man and his strength that he resisted appraisal as the naked rock rebuffs the elements. “ Why ain’t he pressin’ ’em? Tell me that!” ‘“ Well,” Tansey was no diplomatbut he sensed the value of tact, ‘‘ Westock’s there,” he said. Parmelee drew himself up in his chair, clutching its arms with his long hands. ‘“Westock be damned!” he _ cried. “ What’s Westock doin’ out on Dasent’s job?” “He allows that you gave out you wanted this Harper Preest, an’ he’s taken a contract to bring him in.” ‘Tansey grinned. ““ Westock he spills a whole lot of language about how he’s sheriff of these parts and he’s a lot set on doin’ his dooty.” Parmelee considered that. ‘“‘ An’ Dasent talks down, huh?” he asked softly. ‘“‘ Dasent, he don’t see just how the cards lay. He holds up the game an’ sits tight, till you call a new deal.” Old man Parmelee sat in his chair and ran his cold eyes over the man who leaned against the solid support of his veranda, and while he did so, he turned over this situation in his mind, as a gambler shuffles the cards; laid its component parts before his direct, unwavering vision, as the cards are spread on the table, and then, firmly, with a gambler’s face and voice, he played his hand. * Westock’s out of this,” he set forth Gomichbooks (E@) ~ <i