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Show THE BULLETIN mmmmm k D. APPt ETON CENTURY CO. ii By -- Bruckart's Washington Digest KSS' WNU SERVICE KG WIRE x: Still he waited. He knew for a nothing better to do than sit in a lit- come here and uncover what has fact she was not fooling with him, tle girl's swing. If it was Bent happened." bed He heard her back away from Summoned to the C C ranch In central in spite of the smile. This light Lavic! Had they all gone to Walt Gandy la on and round-aboto some- then, to be sleeping soundly now? him, beard the door open and click Nevada, approach hii way to help hii old ranee partner, shut The girl was gone, but there filled with grave purpose was About as much as he had! UiU Holllster. Walt ia flopped ahurt by a thing of ftirl who holdi a rifle In firing position. not new. Let the girl take her time. Having shut the door behind him, was left behind her a turmoil She knows him. tells him how to get to It was fright and her desperate voice, and Her brown eyes fell and studied Gandy stood uncertain. the ranch, and tella him that they will black in this shed, blacker than in- the puzzle of what it all meant meet again. Within a quarter of a mile her slippered feet inside a tar barrel with the lid on. His from hii destination, Walt ia (topped Walt Gandy stood in the dark and she said, unexpectedly "Walt," attain. This time by a grotesque, misoutstretched hands found nothing at swore softly. No one had asked to understand want "I you timate, to who man out and tells him shapen get then tells him the CC crew is in Emi- something. It's about Bill Hollister first He took a few cautious steps him to come here and uncover what and touched the log horse where had happened! grant, the closest town, fur an inquest. and me." She hesitated. Someone has been murdered. Riding to five saddles had been deposited in A lot seemed explained in that "All "Sure, agreed. Gandy in the Inquest right" Emigrant, Walt leaves his horse at the livery stable. Walt learns go ahead." But for the girl to bring a row this evening. His was the one Was the whole C C covering up, in that Cash Cameron, ower at the CC in another man Just now. any man, on the nearest end. Groping, he stead of uncovering? Was that it? ranch, is in trouble. A hard but honest felt over the smooth leather of three Even Hollister? man. Cash has many enemies. At the abruptly cooled him. Inquest Walt sees liullixtcr and the girl "Bill Hollister," he heard her say. more. Then there was an empty He struck a match and swept it who had slopped him. Chino Drake, former cook at the C C ranch, has been "is one of the finest men I have space. along the saddle rack to the empty Someone had saddled and gone. sDace. The short flare died, but murdered and Sheriff Ed Battle is trying ever known, perhaps the finest to pin the blame on Cash Cameron. Who? like Gandy had an urge to strike Gandy remained rooted, trying to not another is There probably The girl is called to the stand. She Is Helen Cameron, Cash's daughter. She him in all the world. In some ways a match and see at once, yet intui make reason of what he had seen. tive warning checked that seemingly faints and, as Gandy rushes to can't be." For the missing saddle was Cash her aid, slips something in his hand. It there simply He stood for a time trying to re Cameron's. Walt Gandy granted every word. la the bullet from Drake's body. Walt rents a post office box and leaves the Yet hearing from her lips things call the exact placing of each man's bullet in it. Leaving the post ollice he that neither Is accosted by a dark, swarthy man that even he himself would have saddle, remembering CHAPTER X who offers him a Job. He draws the man declared on occasion, now brought Horsethicf Fisher nor Helen had out, finds that he wants to usurp Cam- a sudden stab of fire. brought theirs in here to the rack. eron's public range land. Gandy then A little more forcibly than need Their gear was in another shed. WHATEVER ride Cameron had turns him down in biting fashion. The man leaps at Walt, who whips him after night and Gandy "You aren't 'telling me That left Hollister, Cameron, Lavic, a hard battle. The man Is Pete Kelso, be, he said, and the boy. He shook his head saw signs that it had been a long that don't You 77 know, you, hostile an outfit of anything! the foreman ranch, to Cameron. Gandy Is called to the Hollister and I were paired in the over the boy and the crippled man one it had done the old man no sheriff's ollice, where he meets Holllster. . whoever had ridden off tonight good. The C C owner was worried. Battle tells Holllster that Cameron Is border patrol for several years? must be on some business more urIn the faintly graying morning be to down that hold men Two don't job through) Holllster and Gandy return THE STORY THUS FAB desert-win- e the C C. There they find Cash Cameron and Bent Lavlc. the crippled man who stopped Gandy on his previous visit CHAPTER VII Continued 5 "Lavic." said Hollister. "He does The swing used to be Helen i. Old Bent fixed it for her when she was little." Facing front again Walt said, "Looks like the devil had chased that Bent Lavic some time, and caught up with him, too! Who is he, that. anyway?" "He's a story," Hollister an- swered. "A long one. Tomorrow you and I'll be together, working steers down into the sink. I can talk to you about Lavic then, and about some others." Suddenly the dark face turned into full view. heavy eyebrows were gathered. "How much money have you got. Walt?" "On me?" Hol-liste- "Yes." Walt felt himself over; pockets, bill belt, remembered the in his hatband. "Two hundred bucks," he said. "That's paper. A few more in silver and a couple of pesos Mex." Hollister looked away. "Let me have the two hundred." ten-doll- together without each becoming mighty sure of what his partner is made of. I could pay oil Bill with everything I've got, or ever will have, and my debt to him wouldn't be half settled! What are you smiling at?" "Not at you, Walt," said Helen gently, and her mouth was serious again. "Sometimes a girl smiles to keep from crying. Didn't you know that? It's a deeper thing than women ever know, this working companionship between men, and what you have just said is almost word for word what BilF Hollister once told me about you." She gave herself a little fling from the table edge and came back across the room, and as she stopped, a fragrance stirred with a current of air that her movement made. She held out her hand. "Good night Walt: I'm glad we understand each other. That's all I wanted to know. I wanted to tell you how I felt about Bill, and to know Good how you felt about him. gent than could involve those two. It sifted down to Cash Cameron or Bill Hollister. His exploring hands came back to his sides with a jerk. Behind him, slowly, the shed door was opening. Gently Walt lifted the thirty-eigbrought it up into the crook of his left arm and let it lie there, pointing. He took a tentative step backward along the log saddle horse, ht "West" the lank man was night" the kitchen GANDY blew out poked his nose outside for a breath of cold air, saw that the "Sure." said Walt "When?" "Now," came the answer, and sky was overcast and the wind had risen. that was all. CC foreman's headquarters just off the kitchen was a large square CHAPTER VIII d, suggesting iron-bande- d Hoi-liste- r's m m in the white, helpless way of sheltered women. The beauty of this girl was something more; mountain wind had been in her hair and a look of the limitless desert was in her deep-seyes. Her blood was of this open range, and it knew the full hot pulse of hate and passion and love. With a quick smile she brought her eyes back to his. "Let's do the dishes! I'll help. The new cook shouldn't have such a pile to begin on!" She waved toward the heaped sink. "Put those hands in dishwater? Walt asked, looking down at them with a serious face. He shook his head. "Nope. I'll do my own pearl diving." Helen dropped him a little bow. "You are a gallant man, Mr. Gan iter crown head tipped up dy! again and her eyes danced. "That was well said. No other has ever told me that my hands were not made (or dishwater!" But then laughter died uii her parted lips, and the lift of her shoul ders una me rise 01 ner voice were Walt Gandy rolled another smoke and started the argument all over. But he took only one drag on it suddenly crushed out the cigarette, swung himself upright and stood motionless in the dark. An unmistakable sound had jerked him up as if yanked by a rope. He listened, waiting for it to repeat At a distance, he could not tell how far, cattle had bawled. It had come to him on a wave of night wind for only a moment then the wind had swept on, and the sound had faded. Yet he stood fixed in its chill grip. Somewhere out along the mountain slope cattle were bawling at the smell of old blood! Never had he buckled on his belt with such reluctance. Something told him that if it was a man dead out there, for the good of the C C and all its people, the body had best not be found. Checking the gun's full chamber with his finger tips, he moved soundlessly to the window and raised the sash. Two short wings jutted from the long front part of the CC house. From one. O.incly looked across an gone. inner put in to the other. Under the "Come on. she said. "We U do overcast d sky only the the dishes." outline was visible; windows there He stood were durk He threw his "No," Walt refused. leg over planted, waiting. They had more to the sill, tuuehed ground and stepped talk about than this. out. Helen turned from him. "Oh, all With that first un right then." there was little for him to repealed, across the wide Slowly she moved go by in giiuginj; distance and direc kitchen to a table, and facing him, tion. He would rather not be dis propped herself against the edge. covered saddling and riding out of palms pressed upon the boards, the this place Secrecy seemed to be autumn-goldress Mowing softly the thine here. With the whole down the length of her slender body ranch crew going their ways under "You are a gallant man. aren't cover, he'd pi ty that came ulso. you?" she asked from that distance. Curiosity prompted him to lift the "No. don't blush. I'm not fooling " saddle hed latch and step inside. She smiled a little Cash Cameron had not showed up Wall Gandy said nothing k after the meal Bill Hol tonight "And a determined one, too aid lister had taken two hundred dolHelen "Look at that law!" lars. Old Bent Lavic had found et blood-bawlin- g By WILLIAM BRUCKART WNU Service, National Press Bldg., Washington, D. C. WASHINGTON. Early in Mr. Roosevelt's first term as President Democratic Chairman Farley voiced a thought that his party, then preponderantly in control of the machinery of government would be much better off if the opposition was stronger. Later, he amplified that thought with a statement to the general effect that intelligent opposition always made for good gover- nment The thing that Mr. Farley feared was that the overwhelming Democratic strength in the house and senate would run away with itself would get out of hand. That happened. Not exactly in the way, perhaps, that Mr. Farley had suggested, but the majority did get out of hand to the extent that congress became known for at least six years as a rubber stamp. Almost any sort of legislation that was conceived within the administration became "must" legislation. The result was, of course, that there has been a pile of laws passed and a good many of them are so impossible and so unsound that they will rise to haunt the political party that sponsored them as time goes on. Paradoxically, this discussion about Mr. Farley's views and the developments that followed is only a prelude to some observations and reports of what is going on within the Republican party these days. The facts that have come from the situation of the last six or eight years Cameron's white' head nodded. He beginning his retreat with all senses alert His second step had not yet started when there came the fact that someone else was moving. The air had stirred. Next through the dusty smell of the shed he breathed a certain fragrance. "Helen!" Walt Gandy gave out the name in a whisper. A startled gasp answered; a sharp indrawn "Oh!" After that only the fresh, stirred air told him that the girl was still near. i He put out hand, whispering It's Gandy." His again, "Helen. fingers touched her dress and she jumped back. He asked, "Shall I strike a match?" Words burst from her in a voice held low, hoarse with tension: "No! Don't!" Then rapidly, "What are you doing here? What are you looking for? You tell me . . . prowling like this!" What was he doing here! Gandy stared hard at a faint grayness that now, at arm's length, was all he could see of Helen Cameron's face. What was he doing! The reverse accusation stung him. That wasn't what he had in mind. What was she doing out here? His gun was bolstered; suddenly with both arms he reached out, caught the girl in his hard grip and shook her. "I've had enough! I'm going to find out what's happened. Understand? There's been one murder on this ranch maybe more. Do you know that? I almost think you do! There's a devil of a lot too much under cover on this place!" Under his clamped arms the breath gushed out of her and she was all at once limp against him, for the moment unstruggling, and he was ashamed as if he had grabbed and was shaking a helpless kitten. Words formed to say so, but '.he girl jerked and tore from his hands. "You! Let me go!" Her voice choked in rage. She broke off. He imagined dark eyes blazing. But then she turned him cold with the dead quiet completely final tone of her next words: Bill Hollister's "Call yourself friend! Saying you owe him so much. And now. spying! Oh! Oh, I'm glad I watched. Glad of it. do you hear? I know I don't trust you now!" On the instant she regained control of the bitter emotion that had swept her, or else, still bitter, could yet feel a certain sympathy, for she said, "I'm sorry. I am. But all 1 can say is you'd belter leave this ranch. No one asked you to continued Hollister directions. hooked into a with a lower strand of the barbed wire fencing. "That crazy Lavic!" Hollister exploded. "No use mending fence out this far. Snow'U have it down again this winter." "Nuts is he?" Walt asked. "Don't you think It!" "I don't" laid Gandy. Hollister looked across at him. "Queer though. Lavic is." A grin broke the gravity of his face. "I guess, Walt you've come to think we're all queer on the CC" He sobered. "We are. Queer. Worse than queer. Any man is who'll set himself to have one thing and let nothing else matter." "I'm all ears," said Gandy after a long silence. "This was to be your morning to talk. Maybe you can begin on the easy ones and lead up to the tougher propositions. Give me a line on this Horsethief Fisher. He's a likeable cuss and all right I figure or isn't he?" "Sure." Hollister agreed. "Horse-thie- f s all right now. But he came into the country rustling C C stock. Went to jail for it, and then Cash bailed him out and made him go to work on the place. Cash is like that Horsethief has been on the C C ever since, and that was fifteen years ago. Cash took the kid, too, Paul Champion, when his old man died in a gunflght. put him through school and made him one of the He's a good boy, if his family. dad's gunning streak is held down. Then there's Bent Lavic." A coulee cut the bench top. and they put their horses slantwise down to the bottom, (hen up the other side. They jingled on across the claw-hamm- er flat (TO UK CnTIM ED Veteran Party Workers Should Get Preference Back of these efforts of Mr. Martin, however 'way back in the hinterland, the prospects of Republican victory, or partial victory, this fall, have brought out the usual number of seekers after the spoils when the sense of smell tells of possible pie counter membership. Now, I don't care whom voters may select but being a believer in party responsibility for governmental ad- ministration, I always have felt those fellows who have done the work in bad times, politically, should be allowed to have more voice in party affairs than the type when the harvest is to be test say- "Fisher, you and the kid can take the north bench. Sand Canyon will be far enough. Remember, back here at three." Horsethief Fisher gave a wry accidents," he said. grin. "Ban-in- ' "Gandy and I'll take south beyond Willow Spring," Hollister ended. "We all ought to get these strays cleaned up and shoved into the sink by noon. We might meet there, but no need to make a point of it" Passing a vegetable patch to the right of the fenced lane he stared with open curiosity. In there the cook, Chino Drake, had been found dead. Hollister rode with his face held front The lane ended, and they turned into somber shadow of the pine slope, still following a fence that snaked an irregular way from trunk to trunk. They came upon a bucket of staples left beside a blazed tree, well-train- ly reaped. To state a specific case as an illustration of many such instances that have been reported in primaries, let me refer to an Indiana con- said nothing. He listened, waiting for it to repeat ocratic majority, the program of revived party activity will work. If, for example, the Democrats should control the house, there will be that "intelligent opposition" which Mr. Farley suggested as necessary to good government; if, on the other hand. Republicans win control of the house, there will be men in the posts of leadership that are represented by chairmanships of important committees. This job, of course, is attributable directly to the brains and the political capacity of one man. He is Representative "Joe" Martin of Massachusetts, Republican leader of the house. It has taken him quite awhile to accomplish the end that is now visible, because for some months there were not enough Republicans in the house to form a bucket brigade. But the fact remains that Mr. Martin has laid his plans well, and I think the Washington writers almost without exception give him credit for a job well done. Johnny-come-late- later than three." Hol- lister in its economy of furniture, SOME time tonight, Walt knew, he everything for definite use a nargoing to see Helen Cameron, row cot chair, a tall chest of alone. That was bound to happen. drawers and an box, There was too much at stake beWith a match Walt lopadlocked. tween them. Yet when he tramped cated the cot and flung himself down up to the kitchen door, he was not upon it He rolled a cigarette lyprepared for the girl who met him. ing on his back. The door opened inward as his It was plain to him then that he boot heels clicked on the stone step would have to go. This was holdoutside, and Helen stood there country, Hollister's girl, and ing it for him to enter. No one was there was trouble enough here withwith her, nor in the dining-rooHe would go out adding more. beyond. through with whatever job Bill had The boy's shirt was gone, and the cut out for him, then leave. Toboots and blue jeans. She had morrow they were working cattle dressed, and in dressing had made into the sink. That promised acherself a stranger to him, disturb- tion. He had not forgotten the man ingly feminine in every line of her named Pete Kelso who had been in neat little body. But then the can- town hiring extra hands for the 77. dor of her brown eyes reassured If those gunmen had been hired, him, lighting quickly as she nodded this range war could break wide to a door next the dining-rooarch. open within twenty-fou- r hours. The "In there," she said. "Leave your end would not be long in coming aftthings and come back, will you?" er that, and he could travel. Helen Cameron was not beautiful So with a conclusion reached, Republican Party Is Beginning to Realize This Fact And Has Started a Move to Tut Its IIouse' in Order. ing, "is toward the 77. What are you taking Helen for, Cash, and why You know well that direction? enough how the sink feed looks. If you're figuring . . ." He cut himself short compressed his mouth, and this CC foreman and the CC owner sat looking at each other eye to eye. Hollister said then: "Well, only one thing. We're all to meet back here not CHAPTER IX room, clumped stiffly down to where horses stood ready outside the corrals. He moved with saddle tiredness, no spring in his step, shoulders drooping, his large figure in a rainproof canvas coat looking heavy and leaden. When forms appeared out of the faint morning, mounted, and when all were ranged before him in a half circle, Bill Hollister gave orders. He turned in his saddle to Cameron on a tall gray. "I've got plans for the rest of us. Cash; what do you figure on doing yourself?" "Never mind me," said Cameron. "You boys can do what combing is left on the benches. I'll cut west to the rims and see how feed looks." "You riding alone?" Hollister demanded. "No. The girl's going." Bill Hollister was foreman of the CC, but it seemed to Walt Gandy next moment that even so, he worked with an unusually high hand on this place. Intelligent Political Opposition Results in Better Government REP. JOSEPH MARTM-- lle is getting credit for a job tcell done. shows what things are engendered by success or prospects of success. Republican wheelhorses tell me with great enthusiasm that this is certain to be a "Republican year." The voters will determine the answer next November, of course, but it is only a reporting job to repeat that the Republican leadership is expecting to control the house of representatives after January 1, 1941. It is only a job of reporting to say also that within the Republican party there are some factions that are snarling and baring their teeth at each other because each side thinks their party will run the show for the next four years. Rep. Charles Halleck of Indi- ana's second district had opposition for renomination. It is to t assumed that his rival was a capable young man, but the thing struck me as rather sour because Halleck had fought through the days when a Republican member in the house could count on being nothing more than a piping voice in the wilderness. But when the prospects were such that many looked upon a house seat as a plum, up jumps opposition to a man who has learned much about handling legislation and who stands in a position that will give him a strong say-s- o about national politics in event the house is controlled by his party after election. To have upset Halleck in the primary would have gone entirely con- trary to good politics. Mr. Farley's assertion applies again. In event of victory for Republicans, a man that is capable and informed is available to help in party leadership; in event of continued control by the Democrats, the needed "intelligent opposition" is provided. Mr. Halleck won his primary battle and it is a tribute to his district's voters as well as to him that he was victorious. G.O.P. Presidential Aspirants Are Using Wrong Tactics On the other hand, it begins to appear that supporters of some of the candidates for the Republican presidential nomination are not to be commended in the same fashion. Supporters of the three best known candidates Taft, Dewey and House Committee Lists are using some tactics Are Being Renovated that do not make for Jiund governOne of the things that is happenment That is to say, there are some things going on within the ing within the Republican leadership, however, displays none of the ranks of each candidate's backers signs of the scrap for nominations that likely will rise up one of these or places of control. It reflects prob- days and smear somebody with a ably as nearly the true type of polit- beautiful coat of tar. ical intelligence as Mr. Farley had As these lines are written, it is in mind. scarcely a month until the RepubliIn the house of representatives cans hold their convention at Philathese days, plans are going forward delphia. Chairman Hamilton of the for renovation of Republican lists national committee has called for on house committees. There have the delegates from the several been many changes, usually made states who are to serve as members of the convention committee on resosingly and without apparent relation to each other. But the shifts lutions to get together ahead of have been going on for several time. He has asked them to start months and they have attracted work so that the party platform will little attention, generally. Yet, they not be a clapboard house through make a pattern. The pattern obvi- which the winds of opposition ously is predicated upon a desire of charges can sift snow. But there the mainstays of the house Repub- has been objection to that. I regard licans to sec the best men they it as a good move. On the other have placed where they will serve to hand, there are those politicians who are shooting at Mr. Hamilton about guide their parly policies. Now. it may be that that repre- it and they are stirring up quite a sents the peak of optimism. The stink. Their attitude simply reexplanation given me, however, was flects a greedy desire to get in on that whether the Republicans con- the backbone at trol the house or whether, after next when there had been no hog killing January, there still will be a Dcm- - to speak of for several years. From conversations I have had Van-denbe- rg POLITICAL INTELLIGENCE William Bruckart explains in e his current dispatch that politicians realize that intelligent opposition makes for good government Democratic Mr. Farley voiced this idea at the beginning of the present administration. Now the Republicans, who believe they will be in the saddle come next January, arc reorganizing their forces along more in tclligent lines. big-tim- with politicians who know from experience, I have a feeling that the Democrats also are going to have trouble in promoting "intelligent opposition" if there should be a Republican victory. There is the same greed, the same conviction of great capacity, on the part of many men now in official position, that constitutes the bone of contention among the Republicans. It looks like a hectic campaign, a year of ruffled feathers nrd. perhaps, a year when some m.Ii I. n ah f.i lical heads win fall |