Genre Western. Page - 15

ed quickly to the door and shook his fist at the departing horseman."Don't you tell Logan that I sent you!" he shouted belligerently. The stranger turned in his saddle, grinning cheerfully, and favored his late host with a well-known, two-handed nose signal. Then he slapped the black horse and shot down the street without another backward glance. Pop, arms akimbo, watched him sweep out of sight around a bend. "Huh!" he snorted. "Wonder what yo're doin' down here?

et--but 'The Flowers o' the Forest,' and from that wandered through 'Auld Robin Gray' and 'The Land o' the Leal,' and so got at last to that most soul-subduing of Scottish laments, 'Lochaber No More.' At the first strain, his brother, who had thrown himself on some blankets behind the fire, turned over on his face, feigning sleep. Sandy M'Naughton took his pipe out of his mouth, and sat up straight and stiff, staring into vacancy, and Graeme, beyond the fire, drew a short, sharp breath. We had

o wrong in it still."And if I done wrong then, I've got my share of hell-fire for it. Here I lie, with my boys, Bill and Bert, sitting around in the corner of the room waiting for me to go out. They ain't men, Pierre. They're wolves in the skins of men. They're the right sons of their mother. When I go out they'll grab the coin I've saved up, and leave me to lie here and rot, maybe. "Lad, it's a fearful thing to die without having no one around that cares, and to know that even after

to that same back. Ronicky Doone clasped his hands around his knees and rocked himself back and forth in a silent ecstasy. He was delighted.And now he saw Blondy slowly produce cigarette papers and tobacco. He saw the cigarette manufactured; he saw it placed between Blondy's lips; he saw the sulphur match separated carefully from the rest of the pack; he saw the cigarette lighted; he saw the handsome head of Blondy wreathed in thin blue-brown smoke. And every other person on the veranda was

to the opening came Baldy and he peered in, though he remained at a distance of five or six paces. Ronicky Doone poised his gun, delayed the shot, and then frowned in wonder. Baldy had turned and was sauntering slowly back toward his companions."Nothing there," he said to the chief, as he approached. Ronicky hardly believed his ears, but a moment of thought explained the mystery. It was pitch dark behind that screening wall, and the darkness was rendered doubly thick by Baldy's

ure of speed like the wind, goaded by fear and knowing the limitations of his rider, was a different matter. The swift flight took her breath away, and unnerved her. She tried to hold on to the saddle with her shaking hands, for the bridle was already flying loose to the breeze, but her hold seemed so slight that each moment she expected to find herself lying huddled on the plain with the pony far in the distance.Her lips grew white and cold; her breath came short and painfully; her eyes were

t make much of a job at it. The indisputable facts were that Mac was an outlaw and a horse thief. Very likely a price was already on his head.The redheaded boy rolled another cigarette despondently. "Sho! I've cooked my goose. She'll not look at me--even if they don't send me to the pen." In a moment he added huskily, staring into the deepening darkness: "And she's the best ever. Her name's Myra Anderson." Abruptly Mac got up and disappeared in the night, muttering something

the saloon he heard a snicker from behind him. He, thinking it was one of his late tormentors, paid no attention to it. Then a cynical, biting laugh stung him. He wheeled, to see Shorty leaning against a tree, a sneering leer on his flushed face. Shorty's right hand was suspended above his holster, hooked to his belt by the thumb-a favorite position of his when expecting trouble."One of yore reg'lar habits?" he drawled. Jimmy began to dust himself in silence, but his lips were

ig chief," went on Jones, "me go far north--Land of LittleSticks--Naza! Naza! rope musk-ox; rope White Manitou of GreatSlave Naza! Naza!""Naza!" replied the Navajo, pointing to the North Star; "no--no." "Yes me big paleface--me come long way toward setting sun--gocross Big Water--go Buckskin--Siwash--chase cougar." The cougar, or mountain lion, is a Navajo god and the Navajoshold him in as much fear and reverence as do the Great SlaveIndians the

start, he noted it and halted his pony after reaching the level to look about him.There was no sign of any cattle. But he reflected that perhaps a new range had been opened. Thirteen years is a long time, and many changes could have come during his absence. He was about to urge his pony on again, when some impulse moved him to turn in the saddle and glance at the hill he had just vacated. At about the spot where he had sat--perhaps two hundred yards distant--he saw a man on a horse, sitting