Argosy All-Story Weekly, January 21, 1922 — page 31: what you’re looking at

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

THE GENTLE ART OF BANDITTING. arets in these here parts,” he said. ‘‘ Now, them there cigarets of yourn—they come from the East, I suppose.” I nodded. ‘ Go right-to it, Six,’ I en- couraged. He lighted up another, and continued his narrative when he had got it going to his satisfaction, inhaling his puffs tremendous- ly and blowing them out luxuriously through. his nose and mouth simulta- neously. “To head off a man from braggin’ you gotta hit him in his pride—in his conceit; ‘that would ’a’ been the only way to stop this man, anyway, an’ I was thinkin’ along them lines when the ideer came to me, jest outta the sky, you might say. Anyways, Skinny an’ Bob seem to be kinda barren of ideers, so I springs mine, an’ they took to it complete. “The plan wuz simple, an’ has been worked previous, but that don’t hurt it none, so we decide. It wuz this: Windy’s talkin’ so much about what he’ll do in case of a hold-up—why, we’ll jest kinda give him one to play wit’, an’ see what he’ll do wit’ it. “That wuz all. We aimed to get him down in Dead Man’s Gulch, where the road is narrer an’ he can’t get by, tie him up good an’ proper, gag an’ all, an’ drive the car in ourselves, makin’ up some story about havin’ scared the bandits off. “ Perfectly simple, you might say, wit’ no chance of it’s going wrong. You see, the psychology—I’ve been goin’ into book ‘learnin’ a little lately, an’ it’s sure great stuff—the psychology, as I say, wuz all on our side. “Tt’s a psycho—psycho—psychological cinch that a man who’s always braggin’ about what he kin do will fall down hard in a pinch—the guys who does things hard- ly ever talk, unless they has to open their mouths to say, ‘Gimme three cards,’ or some other equally scientific an’ innocent remark. We figured Windy wouldn’t put up no fight to speak of—an’ even if he did, we wuz three to one regardless of the fack that our six-guns was loaded wit’ blanks. So it looked like a copper-plated cinch, as you might say. “Bob an’ Skinny wuz strong for the Since’ 21 plan, Skinny especially, an’ I happens to think of this guy’s stealin’ Delia from me, jest at that moment, so I’m kinda strong on it myself. The ideer promised a lot of fun, anyway, an’ we had got away with worse stuff than that around here an’ never been canned, so we thought we’d give it a whirl. | ‘IT guess most every man has an ideer that he knows more about the gentle art of banditting than Jesse James himself— he figures all he needs is the chance, an’ he’d show the woild what a real pirate wuz like. Jest like every female woman has an ideer she could be a movin’ pitcher star if she only had a crack at it. I guess they could, too. “* Well, we decides to pull this stunt off next day. It’s gettin’ about dusk when Windy’s chariot pulls into Dead Man’s Gulch, if he’s on time, an’ he gener’ly is, so we figger he won’t be able to recognize us none, what wit’ the excitement an’ the growin’ darkness. ‘We're there on time the next day, all dolled up like any bandit that ever bandit- ted, an’, if I must say it myself, we looked pretty bloodcurdling, wit’ our nice masks an’ six-guns. ‘‘ We proceeded to block up the road wit’ stones an’ logs, so as Windy’s simply gotta stop, whether he’s a mind to or not, an’ then settled ourselves as comfortable as possible in the bushes at the side of the road to await future developments. “We didn’t have long to wait, because developments began to develop right away, an’ these here developments wuzn’t none that wuz on the program neither. Three shadows fell over us while we wuz a sitting there, an’ a voice behind us sez: ‘Well, well, if this don’t look like com- petition!’ ‘We whirls, an’ you kin believe me when I tells you we seen the real stuff there. No make-believe hold-up about them three— we looked kinda like stage villains, along- side of them. We had butted into a real hold-up, that’s all. “Stick ’em up!’ says the leader, all three coverin’ us wit’ them wicked-lookin’ guns. ‘ Reach up for the sky — grab a star!’ comicloool C©