Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 23, 1924 — page 75: what you’re looking at

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

oh SS 3-1 WU ne a ENTE 7 ; Wests are 2ies4 3, SS... ” a . a3 Sy < CaaS foo ( 4 A / a Net 4 * yy 1 ¥ i SS : 9 ai We BS os <r" By STANLEY WALKER HE weasel,” says the dictionary, “is a small, elongated musteloid carnivore of the genus Putorius.” So far, so good. But Ross Maguire, the roaring, red headed foreman of the old Oliver ranch up in the Devil’s River coun- try, was not addicted to the close perusal of dictionaries, and even if he had stumbled across that definition of a weasel he would not have known much more than he did before. Nor would he have been much better off if he had read a little further, where the dictionary says: ‘‘ It (the weasel) preys on the smaller mammals and birds and is noted for its bloodthirstiness.”’ Ross Maguire would have laughed at that, for he had just called little dried-up Pancho Jones, the new ranch hand, a weasel. Certainly Pancho was not blood- thirsty. But the foreman was not interest- ed in definitions that morning. All he saw was that Pancho Jones had a streak of yellow, broad and glaring, clear up his back. In short, the foreman had spotted Pancho for a coward. It happened this way. On this particular morning Maguire had ordered Pancho and three other cowboys to get on their ponies and round up two hundred head of year- lings that had been ranging up along the river bluffs and had evaded branding. Pancho Jones had drifted in on a little rag- ged burro three days before, with a banjo strapped on behind the saddle, and had asked Maguire to hire him as a cow hand. Ordinarily, Maguire would have laughed at any tramp that came riding a burro, especially if he turned out to be as skinny, ornery, and all around worthless looking as this fellow. But he was short handed, and he agreed to take Pancho Jones on for a while. On the third day the foreman decided it was time for Pancho to do a little work in- stead of spending all his time playing the 233 CORNICGLOOOL< hoy =