Adventure Magazine Cover, October 10, 1921 — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

om vt RE WY SOREIOOORD | 1:1 THE SILENT CAPTAI Oct .10.1921 Vol .31 No.1 F. iA . . C8 BY t , . . a3 or ae ws “ ‘ AS A Complete Noveletie oy E.S.Pladwell Author of ‘‘His Word of Honor,” “A Pot of Gold,’ etc. E WAS the last of his family and heir to a cattle king. He was also a tenderfoot and a total stranger. When he arrived to take charge of the great collection of buildings, barns, corrals, sheds and truck- gardens which constituted the old Wilcox ranch headquarters a delegation of hard- riding employees was present to look him over but without wild enthusiasm. They grouped in front of the porch of the old hacienda and watched him arrive. That was all there was to it. As a spectacular entrance of a new Arizona cattle king the affair was a fizzle. The new boss didn’t look spectacular. He was just a stocky man of medium size wearing wrinkled gray city clothes and betraying a shy manner. He had a straight nose, a high forehead, a heavy jaw, a mouth that sagged downward at the corners and a pair of ruminative hazel eyes. As he clamibered down from the buckboard which brought him, some of the gun-toting ob- servers muttered. “A runt!” grunted one with a sombrero over his eyes. ‘‘He’ll last quick!” “Less’n that,” agreed Old Man Shay, official oracle of the ranch. “Shut up!” hissed Foreman John Hast- ings. “He’s the owner. Give him a chance.”’ The foreman crowded forward to the newcomer. ‘I’m Hastings,” he announced, extending a hand. ‘Mister Wilcox, I’m glad you’ve come.” The new owner looked quizzically at the tall, mustached Westerner, shook hands and beckoned the foreman into the ranch- house. Perhaps the new boss gaged the emptiness of his reception. “Talkative Injun, ain’t he?’ remarked an observer. _ The heir entered the musty, dusty -old front room of the ranch house, laid his battered valise on the floor and raised the shades, throwing sunlight boldly upon the patterned blue carpet and the great leathern chairs which had been darkened since the “The Silent Captain,’ Copyright, /92/, by E. S, Pladwell. Copyrtght, 1921, by The Ridgway Company, tn the Unsted States and Great Brstain. All rights reserved. 3 SS 1e@) MICLO©