Adventure Magazine Cover — page 45: what you’re looking at

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

The Warriors building against a series of attacks. Turner withdrew his men to Roswell, five miles up the Pecos, and left a scout or two to watch the neighborhood. Some days later the twelve fugitives made up their minds to have another try at Lin- coln. They left the Chisum ranch at night and rode straight up the Pecos to convey the impression that they were bound for . Fort Sumner; but when they had traveled northward for something like twenty miles they turned westward into the hills and pressed on hard toward the county seat. They did not know that Turner’s thirty- five warriors were riding less than twelve hours behind them—until they reached the little town in the cafion bed; and then it was too late. Sheriff George Pepin met them with a force three times the size of their own, and they took refuge in MacSwain’s adobe house. ‘Turner and his horsemen arrived a few hours later. The twelve men plucked up heart when Martin Chavez, who had been a Murphy & Dolan man in days gone by but had changed his allegiance that Summer, appeared with twenty-odd Mexicans and these allies en- trenched themselves behind a stone breast- work on the mountainside overlooking the town. But that joy was short-lived. A troop of cavalry rode over from Fort Stan- ton and established themselves before the MacSwain house. They trained a machine- gun on its walls. During the two days which had now elapsed since their arrival there had been intermittent firing between the lawyer’s home and the Murphy & Dolan store. Now the commanding officer sent word to the former building that the next shot from that place would be the signal for his machine- gun to go into action. It is stated that he gave the same warning to the Murphy & Dolan faction; but whether or not this is true makes no difference. The twelve fugi- tives knew that they were in a trap. During that day their enemies surrounded the house, finding cover under the river- bank and behind adjacent buildings, while the cavalry looked on. Marion Turner took eight men from the Murphy & Dolan store and walked up close to the front windows demanding surrender, which demand met profane defiance. Mrs. MacSwain, who had left her home for refuge with a neighbor, visited her hus- of the Pecos 39 band; and the fighting men withdrew into another room while the lawyer and his wife had their last talk together. Evening was coming on when Mrs. Mac- Swain left. The front door closed behind her and was barricaded from the inside. A man appeared from the direction of the street; and she halted, facing him. It was Jack Long, one of Sheriff Pepin’s deputies, and he was carrying a bunch of oil-soaked shavings. She pleaded with him not to set fire to her home; and while she begged he edged closer to the wall. George Coe stood in the front room lining the sights of his rifle through a loophole in one of the barricaded windows; but every time he drew his bead on the deputy the form of the weeping woman showed be- tween. He waited in grim silence until she gave up her attempt and started on down the path. Then he pulled the trigger; but Long meantime had come so close that he was able to leap within the angle at which the weapon could be trained before George Coe made his snap-shot. A moment later the burning bundle was on the roof. In those days they covered their houses with a mixture of brush and adobe, and the heat of Summer had long since dried this wattle until it was like tinder. The flames shot up, casting a wavering red light about the place. Dusk deepened to darkness. Outside the area of radiance the blue-black night of New Mexico hid everything. The thin orange flame of a rifle cut the gloom down by the river bed. A bullet spatted on the adobe wall. Several shots followed, and the close rooms were shaken with the heavy ex- plosions of Winchesters answering through the loopholed windows. “They done got us in a tight place this time,” Charley Bowdre said. ‘‘Reckon they’re going to smoke us out.” The yellow fumes were filling the front room now. A patch of blazing wattle fell among the men. They went back into the next apartment. Tom O’Phalliard, a tall, lanky young Texan who had thus far been entrusted with an old Sharps rifle and had been given the task of holding the horses when the others were fighting, had got a Winchester and was making the best of his weapon at one of the windows. An ember fell on his shirt sleeve; he slapped it out and grinned at Billy the Kid. He was getting into action COMmiCcLoooks (C@