Argosy, Vol. 118, No. 4 — page 17: what you’re looking at

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

THE Lawler’s sinewy hands fell on his shoul- ders. The fingers bit deeply into. the flesh, drawing a groan of pain from Hamlin. He was lifted to his feet—off his feet, so that he dangled in the air like a pendulum. He was suspended by the shoulders, Law- ler’s fingers gripping him like iron hooks; he was shaken until his feet, powerless to retard the movement, were flopping back and forth wildly, and his teeth rattled de- spite his efforts to clench them. It seemed to him that Lawler would snap his head from his shoulders, so viciously did Lawler shake him. . Then suddenly the terrible fingers re- laxed, and Hamlin reeled and swayed, dizzy and weak from the violence of movement. He was trying to keep his feet solidly on the floor when he felt Lawler’s fingers at his throat. To his astonishment, the fingers did not sink into the flesh. They touched -his throat lightly, and he dazedly met Law- ler’s eyes, burning, flaming with a passion he had never seen in them before. And Lawler’s voice was dry and light, but steady —so steady and cold that Hamlin realized that only the man’s complete mastery of himself had kept him from committing murder. _ “ Hamlin, I ought to kill you. I’m l!et- ting you off on one condition—that you break off with Singleton, and that you keep silent about the things we both know. If you confess to Ruth that you’ve been rustling cattle, or.if you tell her—or hint of it—that I know you’ve been rustling— I'll tear you apart! “You're like a lot of other damned, weak-kneed polecats. You’ve got a girl who is good as gold. And you’re making a regular hell for her. She’s wise to what you’ve been doing—she suspects you. And frem now on you’re going to show her thate she was wrong—that you're straight and square. | “ There’s a job for you over at the Circle L—if you want it. Dll throw things in your way; Ill put you on your feet again—give you stock and tools, and pretend I’ve sold them to you. Ill do anything to keep you square. But if you tell Ruth, Ill kill you 17 as sure as my name is Lawler! TRAIL HORDE. 487 ‘Tm agreein’,” said Hamlin thickly. “I ain’t wanted to do the things I’ve been do- in’. But things didn’t go right, an’ Single- ton—damn it, Lawler; I never liked the man, an’ I don’t know why I’ve been doin’ what I have been doin’. But I’ve wanted to do somethin’ for Ruth—so’s she could quit teachin’ an’ live like a lady. I thought if I could get a bunch of coin together that mebbe she’d have—” ‘“She’d see you dead before she’d touch it,” scoffed Lawler. “ Mebbe I’d be better off if I was dead,” said Hamlin glumly. ‘You'll die, right enough, if you don’t keep your word to me,” grimly declared Lawler. -He strode to the door, leaped upon Red King, and rode away. Inside the cabin, Hamlin got to his feet and swayed toward the door, reaching it and looking out, to see Lawler loping Red King toward Willets. CHAPTER III. WARDEN GRINS. "T HERE had been a day when Willets was but a name, designating a water tank and a railroad siding where pening locomotives, hot and dry from a long run through an arid, sandy desert that stretched westward from the shores of civi- lization, rested, while begrimmed, overalled men adjusted a metal spout which poured a stream of refreshing water into gaping ' reservoirs. In that day Willétsesat in the center of a dead, dry section, swathed in isolation so profound that passengers in the coaches turned to one another with awe in their voices and spoke of God and the insignifi- cance of life. | But there was a small river near the water-tank—the headwaters of the Wolf— or there had beeri no tank. And a prophet of business, noting certain natural advan- tages about the place, had influenced the railroad company to build a corral and a: Station. From that day Willets became assured of a future. Cattlemen in the Wolf River Go NOOO SJ (C(O)