Adventure Magazine Cover — page 167: what you’re looking at

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

The Grub-Line in company with the sheriff, arrived at Dunlap’s at daybreak and found the hide. ‘‘Want to see the hide, Judge?” a: ed the sheriff. ‘It’s over at my office. l->puty euardin’ it. I put it in a tub uh waiter to keep it from dryin’ hard.” “Don’t know as it’s necessary, Sheriff. You seen the brand on it there at the ranch. Evidence is strong enough to bind Steve Dunlap over to the district court fer jury trial lessen he pleads guilty now. How about it, Dunlap?” Steve Dunlap rose to his feet, pale but self-composed. “You think [’m guilty, Judge?” he said the asked in a low tone. “It ain’t what I think, son,” judge in a kindly tone. “It’s what the evidence shows. I punched cows with your daddy and I’ve knowed you since you was a baby. If it was up to me, Steve, I'd turn you loose in spite of all the evidence this Slash R outfit could bring against you. But I’m under oath to do my duty and my duty is to bind you over) The lowest I can make the bail is five thousand dollars.” Steve gasped. “YT can’t raise it, Judge. years!” “And I don’t know where we can get it for yuh, son. It’ll mean a month in jail, I reckon. Order in the court, there, Austin! Twenty-five dollars for contempt. If you and that breed wants to snicker and run off at the head, go outside.” The white-haired old judge glowered at Ribs and Frenchy. “Evidence is all in. Clear the court, Sheriff. Prisoner is done bound over to dis- trict court for jury trial.” “You never give him a chanct to plead guilty!’ roared Ribs. “Guilty?” bellowed the irate judge. “Guilty? Why the should the boy plead guilty. Twenty-five more for con- tempt, Austin. You ain’t in a bar-room!”’ ‘nm lay the Larbe Hills. Steep ridges, dotted with scrub-pine, narrow ca- fons choked with buck-brush and spotted with the tell-tale white blots that marked treacherous soap-holes where a four-year- old native steer would slip from sight in less than half an hour, leaving only a black spot in the dry white surface of the decep- ‘tive ground. Gyp-water springs, bitter as Not in ten TO THE south of the Slash R range 165 quinin and clear as crystal. The home of the black-tail deer, gray wolves and black diamond rattlers. ‘The hiding-place of men with a price on their heads. The burial ground of lost hopes and broken dreams. Silent, sinister, uncompromising. These hills that men called the Bad Lands. The chill gray of dawn found a thin spiral of blue smoke drifting skyward from the mouth of a box cafion. The odor of frying bacon and boiling coffee assailed the nostrils of the two men who hovered over the tiny blaze, shivering as they smoked thin cigarets. Bearded, ragged, unkempt, the men watched the frying bacon and steak with hungry eyes. ‘“‘Weather’s gettin’ crimpy, Tad,” grunted the smaller and more ragged of the two. “Yeah. Yuh shore pulled covers last night, runt. And if yuh don’t quit snorin’ thataway, the Ribs feller’s goin’ tuh hear yuh some night. I bet the echo uh that snorin’ carried plumb to Mud Crick.” ‘“‘Never snored in my life, yuh ox. How many days till the trial?” “Ten days. And we run outa flour yesterday. Looks lke we gotta coyote another sack from the Slash R wagon. That danged cook is shore a light sleeper. He like to caught me the last time we played burglar.” Shorty had picked up a rusty lard can that stood near the head of the tarpaulin- covered bed on the ground. He tipped it upside down, spilling a number of bits of hairy gristle on the tarp. These he counted absently as he put them back in the can. “Twenty-eight,” he grinned. “Twenty- eight ear-tips offen twenty-eight mavericks. Not so bad, Taddie. And that Paint is gettin’ to be plumb good fer a rope hoss. Yuh mind how he held that yearlin’ on the . slope yesterday? A man could take him and Skewball, a good rope and a runnin’- iron, and shore build hisse’f a good herd uh cattle in a year’s time.” “Tf he didn’t git caught at it,” agreed Tad. ‘Better turn that steak, pardner.” They ate breakfast in silence, kicked dirt on the fire, and just as the sun peeped over the ragged ridge, they saddled and rode — up the cafion. The cafion narrowed to a breadth of thirty feet. The walls were perpendicular, rising to a height of perhaps a hundred feet. Tad and Shorty halted at a brush fence that DOOLK CO inn