Argosy All-Story Weekly, 4 February 1922 — page 129: what you’re looking at

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

Part IV Y Kenneth Perkins Author of “The Bull-Dogger,” etc. CHAPTER XX. LAVA COMES TO WORSHIP. OTHING could have suited Quade better than the truce which was pro- posed to him. He realized that to stay cornered in the little crevasse, with four men guarding the opening and a man above, meant certain defeat. If he refused to give fight he would be left to starve. If he offered to enter into a shooting-scrap with his five opponents the chances against him were insurmountable. -Taurog, it was obvious, could get reinforcements at will. And he could send his men into the fight without for a moment endangering himself. Quade knew that he was beaten. To have this truce offered to him was something approaching a miracle. Without a second thought he accepted Taurog’s offer: a fight with bare fists in a corral in the presence of witnesses. Taurog rode back to the crater alone, and Trilles and the others escorted Quade. The latter was allowed to keep his gun. And his horse, which had been browsing on the weeds at the mouth of the crevasse, was brought to him. He mounted and rode up to the gorge trail with Pedro and Juan Scaly preceding, and the two stablemen fol- lowing in company with Trilles and Kirbie. No look was exchanged between Kirbie and Jim Quade. The latter still believed— as all appearances showed—that the girl had tricked him. He set his mind resolute- ly upon his affair with Taurog. He knew that it would be a fight to the finish—even though it was to be without guns. With the same resolute trend of mind he deter- mined to see the girl after the fight and bring her around to his side: The sun was fairly well up over thé mountains when Quade first saw Taurog’s house in the crater. The eastern rim of the crater cast a big gray shadow across the adobe walls, but the sun’s rays slanted across the red tiles of the roof and a bril- liant light was diffused through the skeins of smoke from the chimneys and the chuck- house. In one of these outer houses Quade was led. Here Pedro brought him a break- fast — pomelos, canned beans, coffee. Pedro’s capacity was twofold: he served as Quade’s valet all that morning and also— with the polite suavity that he always as- sumed when he was not sulky drunk or dogged—he served as the guard. Quade understood without being told that he was This story began in the Argosy-Allstory Weekly for January 14, 439 Gomichbooks (eo)