Argosy All-Story Weekly, December 4, 1926 — page 57: what you’re looking at

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

EXCITEMENT TRAIL. double without a whimper. It’s only thirty miles or so to the border. They’ll miss you after a few minutes, likely, but we'll have a start anyway—and it’s dark. Nobody’d ever catch us. Are you game for it, Ro- sitar” ‘““ Ket weel be glorious to ride away weeth you, my Rus-tee,” she whispered. “ Held close in your strong arms. Weeth you can no harm come to me.” “TLet’s travel, then,” said Rusty Tow- ers. Hand in hand they started from the con- cealment afforded by the bushes, necessar- ily crossing a portion of the lawn illumined, though not brightly, by swinging lanterns. “We must go queekly,” the girl mur- mured, glancing over her shoulder fearful- ly. ‘“ To be discovered now—that would be terrible, Rus-tee.” “Don’t be afraid, carissima!” and he pressed her hand reassuringly. Suddenly a voice called sharply, peremp- torily—a voice, one gathered, used to com- mand and accustomed to obedience. “ Rosita!” Two figures swiftly approached them. Rosita, trembling, pressed close to Rusty in terror, ‘Ah, Dios!” she gasped. “ Eet ees my father—and weeth heem comes Don En- rique!” Rusty abruptly thrust the girl around to his left side, thus leaving free his right hand, should occasion require use of the deadly pistol which sagged heavily against his thigh. Flight was now out of the question. The two men drew near; and Rusty was gratified to observe that the situation was not further complicated by the presence of others. ‘What does this mean, Rosita?”’ The foremost of the two spoke savagely, in Spanish. Rusty, recognizing in this man his future father-in-law, glanced at him curiously in the half light. He was under average height, but well filled out, and he strutted pompously; on the whole his appearance was rather ridicu- lous. His companion was taller and of a more athletic build. From a silver case the latter extracted 367 a cigarette, with an air of extreme bore- dom, as if this tiresome affair did not in the least concern him. A torrent of Spanish burst from the lips of Don Perenzo, but Rusty did not hear it. He was hardly conscious even of Ro- sita’s slim body shrinking against his. _ Fixedly he stared at her father’s choice, this supercilious Deon Enrique, whose cupped hands held a flaring match, pre- paratory to lighting the cigarette between his lips. Its flame clearly lighted the fel- low’s sneering face, but it was not the sneer that attracted Rusty’s attention. In the black hair, just above the right temple, was a blotch of white; and deep in his firm chin, plainly visible, one of those characteristic scars left from smallpox. CHAPTER V. THE SHOW-DOWN. USTY TOWERS felt no fear as he faced these two men—Rosita’s out- raged father and her ex-fiancé—only a profound sense of satisfaction that his twofold quest had proved wholly success- ful. a He had at last found Rosita, his rose of Mexico; and at the same time fortune had been doubly kind to him, for here was also the slayer of Chuck Peters, that masked outlaw who had led the raids on his father’s steers—the man Rusty had sworn to kill in vengeance for the black murder of his friend. “ Business is sure pickin’ up,” Rusty mused, as he calmly regarded his adver- saries. It was their move; not his. Perenzo bubbled, like an erupting vol- cano, a storm of reproach on his daughter. From the tenor of his remarks Rusty gath- ered that she had missed a dance promised to the estimable Don Enrique, who had reported the lapse to the girl’s father. “Then he don’t know anything at all yet,” Rusty chuckled to himself. “ Pretty soon now the-poor devil’s going to get a terrible shock.” His left arm still circled Rosita’s waist. “You keep still, Rosita,” he whispered. ‘Let me do most of the talking.” COMIC OOOKS (e(0)