Argosy All-Story Weekly, June 13, 1925 — page 92: what you’re looking at

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

064 wind of his devouring speed. And Pat Grover was speeding away toward the trail which led to the old Peabody Mine. What for? The answer seared Bud Halliday’s soul like a white hot iron. Marion was sending a message to the man, Fenton. And the white heat of the iron, entering Bud’s soul, fired it into a blaze of anger and of hate. He would follow the boy. He would wring from Fenton what that message was. He would tear it out of him. If Fenton did not deliver it, he would kill him. With a madness that surged in his heart, leaving his mind as clear and cold as ice, Bud galloped forth after the boy. What part the girl had in Bud’s thought in that hot moment was chiefly concerned with a scene which he bitterly felt assured must inevit- ably come later. But Bud never overtook that speeding boy. And he did not visit Fenton in his lair. He galloped carefully through the cafion trails and over the twisting hills until he came, strategically, to the chaparral forest that lay behind and above the mine which Fenton so fatuously worked; and in that thicket of brush and thorny scrub he rode with eyes downcast, closely seeking a trail which would bring him unsuspected upon his quarry, for it was in the light of a hunted thing that he had come to look on the perfidious Fenton. Surprise was to be the most important element of his approach. And then, while his eyes examined the trail before him, they fell upon a tiny, almost indiscernible object which fluttered on the ground amid outcast cans, cartons and bottles. He drew up his pony with a jerk that set it to flinging its head wildly in the air. But Bud paid no attention to that. He slid from the saddle as though it was burning hot, and stooping, fixing his eyes on the ground, then snatched up the fluttering object which had caught his eye, and seeking found another exactly like it. He grinned then, and still grinning, he mounted, to trot back to Prairie Grass, his vengeful mission unfulfilled. He met Stockbridge outside the depot, and, dismounting, addressed him curtly, but with a certain confidence, a note of incon- testable command. ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. “I’ve got a job for you to-night, sheriff,” he said. Stockbridge grinned. ‘ Been thinkin’ it over?” he scoffed. “ Been finding out facts,” answered Bud. “IT can hand Conway over to jou to-night.” Stockbridge gasped. ‘“ How come?” he asked. ‘‘ Just raise me fifteen men who can shoot, and play your hand like I want.”’ Bud saw the doubt rise in the weak man’s eyes. ““ You can have the glory,” he added. “Gimme the facts,” protested Stock- bridge. So Bud gave him the facts, and Stock- bridge hurried off to his flivver. “Tl be down at the depot in two hours’ time with anyways ten men that can shoot the holes out of a sieve,” he promised. VII. THe depot at Prairie City that night re- sembled the guarded headquarters of any army in action. No mere citizen was allowed to approach within a block of it, and armed men trod the platform and the street beyond. If Conway could see the preparations made to greet the express mes- senger who was to deliver the company’s pay roll, reflected Bud, it was not probable that he would laugh. Bud himself sat in the station office, a long gun on his hip and an armed man on either side of him. Half sitting on the Station agent’s desk, Marion Grover was watching him anxiously. ‘“ Where’s the master mind?” asked Bud. ‘“ Mr. Fenton told you plainly enough,” she answered, “ that this was your affair, not his.” She regarded him for a moment with cool, inquisitive eyes. “ For Heaven’s sake, Bud, don’t make any mistake. I know vou’ve got something at the back of your mind, but don’t let it ball this thing up.” Her voice was tensely nervous. ‘We're playing with twenty thousand dol- lars, and they’ll never forgive you if you lose it.” ‘“ IT won’t,” Bud laughed, and Marion was vaguely conscious that he was taking his turn to baffle her. She could not understand that laugh. It seemed to contain some cComicbooks CO