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Show THE stuk i &u rAit: uia hui cole, having been fatally shot by an unknown assailant, made two Identical wills, leaving leav-ing all bis money and the King Cole Ranch to Ann Lee and to Cole Cody, children of his two old cronies, Busty Lee and Buck Cody. Ranee Waldron, who claimed relationship, appeared at the Rancb just prior to Old Bill's death. Meanwhile, Ann and Cole were on their way to the Ranch by stage coach. Long Peters, the stage driver, was shot through the arm during a hold-up, so Cole Cody took his place on the driver's eat where be was Joined by Ann. Finally Final-ly they arrived at Bald Eagle, where Cody met Porfirio Lopez. Now continue with the story. CHAPTER VI Porfirio snatched up his glass. "We drink together, you and me, Senor Codito! To one gr-reat gentleman! gentle-man! To one of the soldiers of the good God Himself! To Don Senor Early Bill Cole! To him, forever and ever, 'Salud y pesetas!' To Don Senor Early Bill Cole!" Then Cole Cody, forgetting other things, gripped him by the thin shoulders. "What are you talking about?" he demanded sharply. "Early Bill Cole? Of the King Cole Ranch? You say he is dead?" "Only two days ago, Don Codito." "But I had a letter from him, Porfirio, only a few days ago! And dead now!" Here was news! Cole Cody stood frowning at nothing, telling himself that all along this had been a funny howdy-do: First the letter from old Early Bill, which he had been utterly ut-terly unable to explain; now the violent vio-lent removal of the only man who could tell him. Well, he'd go to the hotel over night, then in the morning morn-ing turn tail and leave Bald Eagle snd a lot of unanswered questions behind him. Along with a girl he never wanted to see again. He lifted his glass. "We drink together to Don Senor Early Bill Cole!" cried little Porfirio, Por-firio, and snatched off his hat. "The two of us together." It was far too early for bed, so Cody and Porfirio Lopez dawdled over their supper in one of Bald Eagle's little restaurants for the better bet-ter part of an hour, and thereafter . set out to see the town. Cody was about to call it a night and go off to bed when be was accosted by a lean and wiry old man with a mane of snowy hair and a mammoth, un-pruned un-pruned white mustache, with a broad and battered old black hat and sleek high-heeled boots and a long-tailed black coat. None other, in fact, than Mr. Arthur Henry Pope the Judge. "Mr. William Cole Cody, I believe?" be-lieve?" he said sonorously. "That's my name, sir," he said. "And I, sir, am Arthur Henry Pope. I know something about you; not much, but something. I'd like a few words with you, Mr. Cody," said the Judge. "In private." "What is it?" asked Cody. "I have taken a room for you at the hotel where you'll want to stay overnight Will you step over with me?" "I'm with a friend " "The matter is of importance. Also of an entirely private nature " "Go 'long with him, Don Codito," said Porfirio, and began a discreet withdrawal. "He is a man they call the Judge here. He is all right, you will see, because they tell me he was a very good friend of Don Senor Early Bill Cole." Then Porfirio bolted, bolt-ed, headed for the bar, again flourishing flour-ishing his colorful bandana. "Certainly," agreed Cody, his curiosity cu-riosity now riding high, and the two went out together. A bit earlier in the evening, the Judge and Doc Joe having a few moments together on their porch after Doc Joe had tinkered with bis new patients as best he could and got them off to their beds, the Judge had been led to remark with a snort, "Old Early Bill, confound his ornery or-nery hide, having sworn by all that was good and holy he'd get him his fun after he was dead, ought to be laughing his fool head off now!" In his turn Doc Joe had snorted. "The fools were you and me, Judge," he growled. "Two softies, a couple of mush-hearted sissies. We ought to have stood up on our hind legs and told him to go to the devil." All this was because before his demise old Early Bill had instructed this precious duo, laying down the law to them and exacting their promises prom-ises to carry out his bidding. If he died before his "heirs" arrived, the Judge and Doc Joe were to look out for the two, and were to tell them just as much as Early Bill wanted told, not a single syllable Wore. Doc Joe was to explain matters mat-ters to the girl, the Judge was to do likewise for young Cody. And they "ere not unduly to stick their noses Into subsequent happenings. "Let nature take its course!" old King Cole had chuckled. And now the Judge and Doc Joe, having in due course learned that both Cole Cody and Ann Lee were on the stage, were faithfully if irreverently ir-reverently carrying out orders. Thus, while Doc Joe was expounding expound-ing to a round-eyed, breathless girl and her quietly attentive Aunt Jeni-ler Jeni-ler in one room of the Bald Eagle Hotel, the Judge was letting head nd ears if the cat out of the bag for the astounding of William Cole Cody in another room. "And that's the way of it," concluded con-cluded Doc Joe, glad to be at the end of the crazy business, and opened a carpet-bag at his feet, took from it an old iron box from which long ago the black paint had scaled, and set it down on Miss Ann Lee's knees. "But but " the girl sputtered. "I can't understand it! This Mr. Early Bill Cole you are talking about Why, I don't know him! I never saw him even, in my life! I never heard of him! Of course. Doctor, there is some mistake. It must be some other girl some other girl, maybe, named Lee. Maybe even named " "There may be a lot of mistakes in this whole deal," the old doctor grunted, "but that's not one of them. You're the girl all right Say, haven't you got the key!" "The key! Why, of course I have!" She jumped up, the box in her hands, and ran to the walnut bureau; she pulled and tugged until un-til she got the lop-sided top drawer open and extracted her purse. "Here is the key! He sent it to me with a letter that made me terribly curious, cu-rious, saying some things, half-saying some, leaving out the things I was dying to know!" "That would be old Early Bill for you," said Doc Joe tartly. "And I reckon that's the key all right. You might try it." She got the key in one of the locks. It fitted! It turned easily. "It is the right key!" she exclaimed, ex-claimed, and tried it in the other lock. She withdrew the key, looked iJfSl "You take mighty good care of that box, Miss Ann," he said hurriedly. hur-riedly. at it, stooped over the box again, tossing her head impatiently to throw the hair back from falling over her eyes. "Something's the matter with the crazy thing," she said, baffled. "Will you try it, Doctor?" Doc-tor?" He shook his head. "No use, Miss Ann. One thing I didn't tell you. Your key fits only one of the two locks. There's another key. It ahem! it's being kept by someone else. A man that old Early Bill trusted it to. You can't open your box until he shows up." r "Why, isn't that funny! Who is this man? Is he here in Bald Eagle? When will he give me the other key?" Doc Joe was already edging toward to-ward the door. "You take mighty good care of that box. Miss Ann," he said hurriedly. hur-riedly. "Just you remember that it's worth a power of money! The whole King Cole Ranch is in there and a heap of gold and greenbacks besides! Just you take mighty good care of it, Miss Ann. And now, good night to you, Miss. And to you also, Miss Jenifer," he said, and ducked out and fled. And in that other room under the same roof the Judge had, finished imparting to young Cody all the facts in the case which he had been authorized to make fairly clear. Cody Co-dy had heard him out in silence, his eyes dark between narrowed lids, his face stilled to expressionlessness. And when the Judge, too, grew silent si-lent Cody still sat on a moment or two, pondering. "Thanks, Judge," he said. "I guess that's all you've got to tell me? Wouldn't do much good to start asking questions?" The Judge rather liked him for that He shook his head, ready to go. "Come to me later, if you want to," he said. "I'm hoping that things will work out all right for you. Maybe they will. That's what that infernal old devil wanted." Upon its gentle knoll, its whitc-; whitc-; washed adobe walls a snowy, gleam ing white in the distance under the eastern sun, the old Casa of the Estradas, the home for many a year of Bill Cole of King Cole Ranch, was like an alabaster palace out of a fairy tale. The low, massive building was surrounded by a wall akin in construction con-struction to itself, a wall of adobe, white-washed, topped with warm red tiles. Ann Lee, leading the way, her carpet-bag containing the precious pre-cious iron box caught tight under her arm, threw open a gate and hurried hur-ried along one of the paths radiating from the old home. And Aunt Jenifer, Jeni-fer, her cheeks almost as pink as her niece's, her eyes almost as bright, came hurrying after her. The place seemed deserted. The two women came to the patio and stood very still; it was as though they found in the silence a gentle command for like silence on their part. Aunt Jenifer reached for the bell cord and gave it an emphatic yank setting the bell echoing through the house. A man's voice they were sure they had brought him rudely out of sound sleep called out, "Hello, who's there?" And then, without awaiting an answer, "Wait a shake: I'll be right out." ''They had to wait more than a minute. At long last they heard a heavy bar let down, and the door opened slowly only a dozen inches or so. A tall young man looked out at them. "Good morning, ladies! This is a surprise! You're twice as welcome as the birds in spring. Come in, won't you?" They entered just a trifle hesitantly, hesitant-ly, the house was" so dark and, at the moment somehow sinister and forbidding. But that was only because be-cause all the shades had been drawn down and it was dark in here after the sunshine outside. He said pleasantly, pleas-antly, "Just a second and we'll have some light in," and went to one window after another flipping up the shades. The sunlight streamed in joyously; of a sudden, with the dark put to flight, it became a genial and friendly room. And now they could" see Ranee Waldron clearly. "I am Ann Lee and this is my Aunt Miss Jenifer Edwards. We had an invitation from from Mr. William Cole to visit him here. We got to Bald Eagle only last night and now Well," and she too smiled faintly, "here we are!" "I am taking care of things right now," he said. "I was lucky to get here just before my uncle died." "Your uncle?" spoke up Aunt Jenifer. Jen-ifer. "Old Bill Cole was your uncle?" un-cle?" Ranee made a little deprecatory gesture. "I've always called him that," he said easily. "Not an uncle exactly, but related. I am, I believe, his next of kin; his only kinsman, in fact I am Ranee Waldron; my mother and the old man were cousins. cous-ins. It's because of tha"t," and he lifted his broad shoulders in the hint of a shrug, "that I am staying on here. Unless there is a will, and I don't believe he ever made a will, I suppose I am the next owner here." - ' At the mention of a will, Ann's lips were parted to speak up, but by the time he had added a final clause she had become conscious of Aunt Jenifer's eyes stabbing warn-ingly warn-ingly at her. Aunt Jenifer said, "It's a mighty nice place out here. He wanted us to visit him for a while. We've come a long way, too, over a hundred hun-dred miles. We got to town last night on the stage." What she was driving at was obvious ob-vious enough, and there didn't seem very much he could do about it. Had it just been the older woman alone, Ranee Waldron might have been the man for putting her out bodily; his eyes, however, quitted her face while she was still speaking and drifted, openly admiring, to Ann's. He said with a semblance of heartiness, hearti-ness, "Well, the thing that counts is that you're here now! And I am glad that I happened to be on hand to welcome you in my uncle's place. And I'll bet you haven't even had breakfast yet I know I haven't" "Will you show me the way to the kitchen?" asked Aunt Jenifer. "I'll be glad to get breakfast for you." "Say, that's great!" said Ranee. He showed them the kitchen, a room big enough for a barn, with an enormous cook stove which Early Bill had had installed here many a year ago and which had had scant use for a dozen years, and there were ample provisions. "Now," said Aunt Jenifer, sleeves rolled back on a pair of pretty, white arms and a clean sugar sack pinned about her waist, "you can skedaddle and I'll call you when things are ready." "Fair enough," said Ranee. "I'll go clean up a speck; haven't even washed my face or combed my hair yet!" And he hurried away; they heard his boots echoing through the big rooms with their bare floors and few scatter rugs; they heard a door close, then, from some farther room, another door. (TO BE COSTIMEDJ |