Argosy All-Story Weekly, December 4, 1926 — page 67: what you’re looking at

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

EXCITEMENT TRAIL. lax his grasp, and then watchfully, a little at a time. But the vaquero was through, and an instant later Rusty had his gun. To make sure of a good job he bound. and gagged the fellow, leaving him sprawled helpless on the cot where he him- self had been lying so long. Warily he slipped from the outbuilding, glancing about for any evidence that the sounds of their struggle had occasioned an alarm. Everything seemed quiet. One or two lights glowed through the tree from the hacienda, a hundred yards away. “So far so good,” the late captive’ mut- tered. ‘“‘ Wonder if Rosita could be on deck now.” Moving with due caution Rusty turned his steps toward the meeting place. The grove by the roasting pits was deserted. “‘ She ought to be here,”’ he muttered un- certainly. “I know it’s nine; later, meb- be,” A disquieting thought occurred to him at that instant. Rosita had seemed con- fident of her ability to escape from the hacienda, but her father could easily pre- vent it if he had any notion of her in- tentions. 3 ‘Looks like this whole proposition was up to me,” Rusty mused. “I don’t seem to have any luck a-tall when I depend on other folks. Oh, well, at that, I ain’t got any just cause to complain—yet. Now about a cayuse—guess [ better scout around and locate the stables.” At the rear of the hacienda he presently found a low barnlike structure, an occa- sional stamp and the characteristic odor proclaiming that horses were within. His eyes caught a moving light which resolved itself into a man carrying a lantern, doubt- less busied with some belated chores about the barn. Rusty entered, keeping well to the shadows. “ Guess I ought to collect a horse and saddle out of this combination,” he cogi- tated. The stable hand moved his way, wholly unconscious, while Rusty crowded back out of his path. On the fellow came, lan- tern swinging in his hand, passing not a yard from the hidden intruder. Rusty stepped out behind him, deftly O17 crashing the butt of his recently acquired pistol on the Mexican’s cranium with one hand while he grabbed for the falling lan- tern with the other. “T got only one thing to say, hombre,” Rusty muttered as he dragged the uncon- scious man off to one side of the passage- way where this impromptu meeting had taken place. “I’m sure hoping you’re the lad that bent a six-gun on my head a couple days ago. If that’s the case I’m satisfied to call it quits.” Carrying the lantern he started on a hunt for horseflesh, at once locating a num- ber of substantial looking brutes. But Rusty eyed them with disfavor, for they were obviously work horses, quite unsuited for his purpose. What he wanted was a lean, rangy cow pony, similar to the one he had been rid- ing. His escape might easily result in a wild dash for the border, thirty or more miles north, and Rusty accordingly con- tinued his search. } “This here Don Perenzo ought to keep some riding cayuses on tap in his stable,” he reasoned. Then in sudden ‘triumph: “ They’s a row of saddles! Must be some- thing to use ’em on.” At the opposite side of the barn from that Rusty had entered, he found a cor- ral, in which he perceived the shadowy forms of a dozen or more horses. From one of the saddles he took a coiled lariat. “T’ve got to do this blind, sort of,’ Rus- ty muttered. ‘Hope I draw a likely cayuse.”’ Selecting an animal at random he roped it, leading his captive into the stable to be saddled. By the lantern light it proved to be reasonably satisfactory as horses went. All the spare saddles he made temporarily useless by cutting the latigos. A little further exploration disclosed a gate to the corral, and Rusty rode out through this, thoughtfully leaving it wide open: ““ Mebbe they’ll be wanting saddle horses in a hurry later on,” he thought. ‘I don’t think these here brutes ’Il be available; not very long, anyway. Strikes me I got the opposition pretty well coppered now.” Rusty headed for the little grove, though €O . COMMEOOOLK<S eye,