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Show A liannat. tyictixM. Sdial .,,..-.,,,. By HAROLD CHANNING WIRE SYNOPSIS Jim Cotter, forest ranger, had been mysteriously killed inhe pursuit of his duties. Gordon Breck, his" best friend, takes over Cotter's job, hoping to avenge his murder. "Dad" Cook, forest superintendent, super-intendent, warns Breck that the Tillson brothers, mountain moonshiners, are apt to give him trouble. Before leaving for his mountain station, Breck buys an outfit and decides to attend the public dance run by the Tillsons in Lone Tree. At the dance Breck dances with Louise Temple, pretty "cowgirl" for whom he takes a liking. CHAPTER III Continued 3 Another man edged through the mob and glowered out of a flushed face. "Something wrong?" "Yes, you arel" Louise answered, giving him a little shove. "Get along. Why spoil a dance?" Behind them the group broke up as quickly as it had formed. Men returned to their partners and swung on with the music. But when the waltz ended Breck felt a heavy grip on his shoulder. He whirled from it and confronted Art Tillson. It was a handsome, arrogant face that he stared into; not much more than a boy's. It had the sharp-featured Tillson strength, save for dull, somber eyes. Even this moment's rage did not hide that deep brooding. brood-ing. "Is this fellow botherin' you, Louise?" Lou-ise?" he asked. "If he is " "Art!" she broke in, "You're a little bit drunk. Go outside for awhile." It was a command, given as if she expected to be obeyed, and for a second the boy seemed on the .verge of going. But then he looked at her sullenly. sullen-ly. "Throwin' me down?" "No, of course not!" "You cut a dance." Tillson swayed unsteadily, clutched her wrist and started to draw her close. "Come on, Louy, this is mine." Breck saw her hold back. He stepped between them, forcing young Tillson away with his elbow. The boy whirled, his face livid and tightened into knots over his jaw. He stood with eyes narrowed in the way Breck had already seen Jud narrow his. "Buttin in,areyou!" he snarle".. JVJant-tcT fight about" itj" The music had stopped. Everybody Every-body had turned, waiting. Breck's mind worked swiftly. "Well," he heard TiUson sneer, "are you crawlin' oS?"-"Not oS?"-"Not a bit." "Come outside then!" "Why outside?" Breck demanded. "What's the matter right here?" Outside, in the dark with few to see, was not what he wanted. He glanced at the stage, then beckoned to a grinning cowboy in the crowd. "Get up there and clear a ring! You're going to have a show!" The puncher yelled and others joined him. They leaped across the old footlight trench and booted the orchestra from their chairs. A squared circle was made in the wreckage of broken scenery. They tried to roll the curtain up but it stuck halfway. "All right," Breck cried, springing spring-ing ahead of young Tillson. "This art's ours!" Half a dozen cowhands had appointed ap-pointed themselves seconds on each sioe; one stepped into the square to referee. None was too steady on his feet. Tillson's first plunge at Breck knocked the referee into the sceniM-y and after that no other vol-unteeiVd. vol-unteeiVd. BrecX had counted on his knowledge knowl-edge of boxing. He found instantly that this was a fight. Tillson came with head lowered, right arm driving driv-ing with killing force, and followed up with a left equally powerful. When Breck struck, it was as if his fists had crashed into iron. He saw a brown, mallet-like thing rise, and partly turned that blow from his jaw, yet faces spun about him dizzily. dizzi-ly. A roar filled the room. Stepping back, he gained his balance, bal-ance, judged his position better and closed in before Tillson had recovered recov-ered for a fresh attack. He jabbed as their bodies locked, heard a grunted oath, took a terrific thrust against his own side. Two arms tightened about him, crushing his ribs. Tillson's head rose under his chin, snapped his head back, butted upward until breathing was stopped. He tried to struggle out, found himself him-self powerless, and then the truth of this fight came in a mad surge of strength. Art would kill him if he could. With that, all semblance of what the city was pleased to call civilization civiliza-tion slipped from him. He had no sight, no feeling, no thought save one tear o(T this thing. Locked in Tillson's arms, he let himself drop backward, squirmed from the embrace as Tillson relaxed in falling and was free as they struck the floor. Instantly then he sprang up, took the advantage and struck the other down the moment he rose. The roar that had filled the room died suddenly. Silence made him conscious of things outside his bat-tic. bat-tic. He heard a warning voice snap, "You, Jud, stay out of it!" Tliore was a retort iind ao immediate imme-diate shifti-g of men. They seemed to be taking sides, some back of Art Tillson, a good many others behind himself. What happened then passed actually over his head. He had crouched to meet a blow. At once the space that had been a ring, was a crush of men, drunken curses, the spat of fists upon flesh. In a wave of bodies he was borne on, knocked down, cast over to the edge. Before he could move, the house was plunged Into darkness. Someone had pulled the light switch. A match flared at one end of the stage and in its short glow Breck saw a grinning face. The man's voice was lost in the tumult of bellowed bel-lowed shouts, but his mouth framed a word: "Fire!" Laughing crazily, he dropped the match into a pile of boards and scene canvas, and danced about as the flames shot up. Breck lunged to his feet. On the floor below him the mob surged to the exit One girl stood over at the side, alone, motionless against the wall. In springing toward her, he jerked the ropes that held the stage curtain. It crashed down and about them was piled with boxes of provisions, fire tools, telephone supplies sup-plies and other equipment ready to be packed to the mountain station. A flivver truck stood outside the door. And beyond that, past the first fifteen miles of sloping desert and red rock hills, rose the granite wall of the High Sierra. "You'll ride the cushions today," Cook said, when the meal was finished, fin-ished, "but tomorrow you'll be forking fork-ing hard leather." He crossed to a plank chest and unlocked it, asking over one shoulder, "Have you a gun?" "No," Breck answered. "I intended intend-ed to buy one in town this morning." "Don't do it" Cook stooped, dug in the chest, then came back with a German Luger. Breck stiffened with recognition. 1918! In a flash of memory he saw that same round, cold bore thrust between his own eyes; then a vision of Cotter, himself wounded, a struggle, strug-gle, the gun turned, Its sharp spat muffled, and only Cotter rising where there had been two. He saw ly, "Howdy, Ranger." At which ons of a pair who might be from the mountains, or the desert, or neither, nei-ther, offered a low grunt Breck climbed Into the truck, asking ask-ing as soon as Cook started on, "Who are those two at the end of the line?" "In black ranch hats? They're nesters from the Pothole country. The Potholes are a bunch of small meadows along a mountain Just south of the district you're going to take over. These people homestead-ed homestead-ed before it was put In the forest reserve." "Not very friendly to the service, are they?" "No, I guess not. The Tillsons use them one way and another. But we don't have much trouble except over a brush fire now and then il their grub runs low." "How do you mean?" Cook's gray brows drew together In his quizzical smile. "Why, they get thirty-five cents an hour for fire-fighting. fire-fighting. , Easy money at that if they keep their fires out of big treei He whirled from it and confronted Art Tillson. for a time the house was again black. His hands found the girl as he stumbled along the wall. "Quick!" he ordered. "This wayl" When she did not move, he picked her up bodily, thrust her feet-foremost through an open window end let her down outside. He followed, saying again, "Quick!" The high board fence was not far off; he struck against one plank, crashed through, managing somehow some-how to drag the girl with him. Suddenly the girl halted. "You might," she said, "tell me what it's all about. And please stop hugging me. You hurt." Breck stared. Looking back, he saw there were no flames from the building. Someone must have thought to stamp out the fire. He could hear motor cars being started, and through the trees casual voices called: "So long. Adios. See you later." He felt stupid. Apparently most of the tumult was in his own head. "I thought Jud Tillson" he began. be-gan. She cut him off with a laugh. "So that was it! That's good enough for news, really. Louise Temple, rescued! res-cued! Having to be rescued. And from the Tillsons!" Breck met her laughter with a shrug. She leaned toward him, softly soft-ly smiling. "Of course I'm grateful. Even if it wasn't necessary. It only seemed so funny for a minute. Good night." He offered his arm formally. "I'll see you home, if you wish." "No, thank you again, but I'm staying at the hotel, and so are the Tillson brothers. I think you have seen enough of them for one evening." eve-ning." At this moment he could work up a good rage when he thought of Louise Lou-ise Temple. He could easily hate her. Yet he knew that after a while he would remember her eyes, with their half-amused, half-unhappy look, the tilt of her small dark head, and that in the dance she had been a wholly satisfying partner. CHAPTER IV "Say, Dad, who Is Louise Temple?" Tem-ple?" Breck paused in his early morning meal and glanced across the table at the ranger. "Old man Temple's kid," said Cook, continuing with, flapjacks, ham and eggs. Interesting, Breck thought, but not very complete. Yet he did not press the question, for there were more immediate things to occupy him. Both he and Cook had been up at daylight, and by this time the room the grin on his distorted face and heard him say, "I'll keep this. Might bring good luck sometime." Cook placed the gun on the table without speaking. Breck picked it up, feeling the old familiar balance of the brown grip in his hand. "I've seen this before," he said. Cook bent over the gun with fond eyes. "I suppose so. And I guess Cotter would want you to have it. So it's yours." He straightened, turned and gazed toward the mountains before he spoke again. "I'm a peace-loving man, Breck, but I hope you get a fair chance to use that gun and use it plenty I" By mldmornlng they had the flivver fliv-ver truck loaded to its top, had made last-minute purchases of more tobacco, and locking the Lone Tree house, left it to a summer of desertion. deser-tion. At the postoffice where Breck stopped to give orders about forwarding for-warding his mail, he caught quick glances from a line of men who squatted along the board walk. Most of the men were cowhands, though a few in mixed garb were not to be definitely placed. When he came out of the postoffice one of the cowboys looked up with a friend- where It would make real work." "Am I hearing you right they set them?" "I reckon they do, son," Cook laughed. "They're twenty - five miles from your station. What's to keep 'em from sticking a match in the brush?" He shrugged and his smile faded Into serious eyes. "In a way it's a good thing. If they burn off little patches of brush every year we'll never have a big area go up all at once." "Well I'll be darned!" Breck was beginning to sense that this ranger business was something more than riding a horse and carrying a gun. He shot a glance at the man beside him. Cook's seamed, angular face had the fighting set He would not be one to cross. And yet he winked at these deliberate fires! "You see, son," the ranger went on, as if answering Breck's mental question, "you don't want to have too many enemies on your trail at the same time. Right now the Tillsons Till-sons are plenty. After awhile we'll get around to the nesters; though I think removing this other crowd will settle that too. The head gun in the Potholes is a man named Weller. You'll meet up with him soon enough." (TO BE CONTINUED) |