The Key West Citizen Newspaper, September 8, 1952, Page 8

Paget THE KEY WEST CITIZEN Monday, September 8, 1952 BARNEY GOOGLE AND SNUFFY SMITH . 2 OU TIGER (1s eRdup OF YC By Fred Lasswell THAT AIN'T / ALLE ‘LOOK! HEY, TIGER! LOOK AT ME! 'M CHURNIN' !! HOME=--I’LL NOT SIT AT THE TABLE Bie ; ‘Copr. 1952, King Features Syndicate, Inc; World rights 'revarved, | By Paul dic Caran = wi _____( | vax !~ GEE TONIGHT’S THE BEAUTY ) WE BOTH You Look uTrerLy )\ CONTEST FINALS! CAN'T WIN.” LOSING TO ‘YOU ~ ‘T{ so0b Luck! Bn 4 TON He. + Chapter 29 A MONTH passed and things changed on the ranch. The basin’ bloomed and grew still greener and new men came. Up in a cleared spot ‘in the timber, grass began to grow over five un- marked graves, beneath which rested Black Jack Caswell, Dutch Saunders, Buckner, and two of their riders killed in the bunk house, Seven more went on trial in Cheyenne and, with Austin and the two women testifying, heard | a judge close the doors of a peni- tentiary upon them with a sen- tence of from thirty to fifty-five years. Carsen returned with them on the train and got off at Smeller-A-Mile to find his friend Pete had sold out and disap- peared. The spring lengthened into summer as two more months rid by. were still chang- JEW men had some into the back country. Quiet-men who wore: the badge of U. S. deputy marshals beneath their shirts, backed by other men who had been picked for their jobs. Lone riders hiding out in cabins stepped out of a morning to find them- selves facing guns in the hands eine trail j ae tia ng a trail jerked up sharp and raised their hands as other men step) ‘from concealment. Some of those captured were the King’s former riders, the men who had rustled his stock while they drew his gun pay. Word went out along the dim trails that the back country wasn’t safe any more, and the cabins soon became shelter only for the pack rats who. scurried past open, wind-banged doors. ‘The law was coming in. On an early afternoon in July a rider jogged out of the timber headed his horse toward the creek that flowed through one end of Buckner's corral. It was a ittle wider of late from recent Chapter 30 Se didn’t speak as he took off his hat. Just as she had done to her father that night at Buck- ner’s so she did to her brother. She came forward without a word, put both arms around his neck, and kissed him, Her eyes were a ale misty when she stepped “How are you, Belle?” he asked, trying to be casual and findi: hard, A lump had come into throat. “I couldn’t be better, And you?” “Fair to middlin’. I reckon,” he replied, “Where have you been?” “Up north, taking care of a little business. I kind of wanted _ to clean a couple of things off the slate first and start’ fresh.” “We thought perha} you'd gone back to Carson's,” Belle said. ‘But when we met him in Chey- enne sain’ the trial of Black Jack's men he said he hadn’t seen er They got from thirty to fifty- ive years on charges. I feel a lot better now.” “You look a lot better,” he ob- served, for want of anything bet- ter to say. She laughed, a low, rich laugh. “Much better than you. think. You're going to be an uncle.” _ For a moment he didn’t quite comprehend and Belle laughed in, “Tm going to have a baby,” she explained, “Austin and I were! married in Cheyenne during the trial. Look—there he comes now.” Austin was striding up from the corral. His shirt was open at the neck, displaying an area of sun- burned skin, and his big hat was| back on his head. He wore leather | chaps and carried a saddle carbine in one hand. His face split in a wide crin as he came up and) seized Montana's hand, | | “Brand, you old sonuvagun!” he said delightedly, “I’m really glad to see you back here, boy. How's! things goin'?” “No complaints. I guess.” ‘Me neither, Brand. I'm run- ning the spread for Helen, and) the abduction}. “| new sheriff told me it was all HELL'S HORSEMAN BY WILLIAM HOPSON rains, but the water flowed and clean over the gravel the horse sank its warm mi leep. Montana sat there in Me saddle, a little surprised ze smoke coming from the hen stove- pre and a couple @g horses in\the of she hollers. ‘I'm damned if I win? I holler back. Then she throws the bloomin’ skillet at me. Look at ‘em! Now they're laughing at me. They drinks up my whiskey an’ then laugh at me. Me—the scsat of the, place “Owner?” lontana queried. rae own, this A agli e-el-l,” te admit little sheepishly, “T ag aorta moved in 2 couple months after I sold out in Smeller-A- mio = se up here.” fontana laughed in, bade ‘ood-bye, left Ma) to | Three months seemed to have done wonders for him. He was filed out and _healthy-looking and the haggard look was gone from his young countenance, There was in it. both eagerness and longing as his eyes swept past the house and along the road 4 that led to the ranch four miles | marital woes, and rode on toward away. ‘ the cut. He was in no particular As the horse raised its dripping | hurry. Austin probably wouldn't muzzle and rolled the bit in its} be in until sundown. tana let mouth the back door of the for- | the mount under him take its own mer stage station flew open. Aj time, and the sun had swum: man came through it, running. He | far down toward the west rim legged it straight for the bank of | the basin when he finally rode the creek, turned long enough to/ through the cut and headed i shake his fist at the belligerent | horse toward the ranch buildi arent bwige he the door- on reached the lo way, en did a beautiful | and jogged slide down the bank. He sat there, | bunk fo hs a look of disgust upon his face,}lounged on the until he saw the grinning rider. | waiting for sup) Recognition was mutual, and| them, not a Pete, the saloonman from Smell-| looked up, recogn er-A-Mile, got to his feet. He| and lifted a hand i jammed both fists upon his hips} Montana went on and _glared. Austin over beyond the i “What in the hell are opening a gate to enter and um- sa lanka % Raa Soa iled, lankety ~ bla polecat?” he} The ranch had changed a lit roared. in that just north wig’ > a .You,” Montana said, urging | and not far from the big mansion his horse on across. “I thought|a small but comfortable house, yore stomach hurt—or maybe it|new and gleaming with fresh was yore feet.” Paint, had ys erected. On the Pete turned long enough to} Porch stood Belle, his half- shake his fist again at the full- | Sister. bosomed young woman, who by She saw him coming and her now had been joined by Leota| hand went up to her throat as he and the other girl from the ranch. | rode up. He reined up and swun; He let go an indignant snort, to the ground in a long step, pe “Of course my belly hurt,” he|he noted the clean house dress snapped. “That's just the trouble.| She wore and the apron around ‘Me good cook,’ she says. ‘I don’t her waist. She looked fresh and care if you are,’ I says. ‘I wholesome, and yet this was a blankety-blank stomach won't different Belle from the one he take them steaks of yourn.’ Then known. so briefly before, she gets mad. ‘You eat more,’ her cows are rolling fat. We won't RK make any money this year, I reck-| aga N on, but you watch the beef crop| quite a lot of money in her own next year. That’s not the only crop| right, and there's a place about either, Belle anc me are going to} five miles north of here on. the have a son.” creek where they're going to “T've already tolé him,” Belle| build, He’s going to work a small said indignantly, her arm going| spread a: raise some blooded around his waist. “And I’m not/| horses.” sure about the son business either, GAIN that awkward pause, mister.” “Well,” drawled the grinnin, Belle waited, finally looked Austin, “I don’t know what he’ll| toward the front porch, took him be, but if he’s a half Tex: alf|by the arm and turned him, He page he ought to be a hum-| saw a lone figure in white, her dinger. Just wait'll King finds|eyes going far over the basin to out.” the distant horizon, perhaps to- Montana had forgotten his fa-| ward the junction where Holland ther for a moment, He asked a/ Forrest lay beneath a new head+ question. stone spat up by Old Appleby. “King?” Belle said, “He’s back} Over Montana’s shoulder came in East, He was pretty badly hurt/a soft whisper the voice of thi with that bullet through his side,| half-sister he so loved: but within two weeks he forced us| “She's been like that week after to make a bed in the stage and| week. Brand. I think she was make a slow trip.to the junction.|something a little afraid you didn’t care enough to come back.’ The minute he got there he start- ¢ ed burning up the wire to every| “Care?” he said, low-voiced. “If she only knew.” sheriff in ‘ontana, He finally found out the details about those} “Perhaps she does, Brand. But if-you knew a little more about . , that trouble you'd been in, And his name was still powerful| women, you'd know they like to enough to get results.” be told . Go to her—she's “So that’s how it was?” mused | waiting.” Montana thoughtfully. “I figgered| He went, feeling, strange inside, T'd have to stand trial on at least| the tightness reminding him again the deputy sheriff fracas, but the| of the night in Buckner’s wi the guns he no longer wore had water over the dam. We had a|spoke out; of the night on the hearing on the Bostick charge up} train when the horse thief McBain in Billings. I found a couple of| died. the boys who had witnessed it, ie saw her turn at the sound of | So they called it self-defense and cleared him of the charge.” “I'm glad, terribly glad, Brand,” Belle answered softly. “And King will be pleased too. He went on East on the train, still in pretty bad shape, and if en ever met my mother, you’d have known what would happen when he was carried in wounded. It’s probably the only ring: that could have brought them back together.” “What’s he going to do now?” Montana asked. Austin was divesting himself of | his ony He kicked the leather) free and tossed them over a porch} chair. “They're coming out ease | this fall.” he said. Major Hawkins Assigned To Duty | At Fort Dix, N. J. | Fort Dix, New Jersey, September 8 — Major Robert L. Hawkins, son | of Mr. Charles D. Hawkins of 377 East 8th Street, Brooklyn, New j York, has been assigned here for | duty with the 9th Infantry Division commanded by Major General | | Homer W. Kiefer. His wife, Marian Francis, is presently residing at 1122 Fleming Street, K. W. Fla. Entering the Army in April 1941, | Major Hawkins served in the | European-African-Middle East The- atre of Operations during World War Tl. He participated in the ‘Italian Campaigns and the action in Southern France, Centra! Eur- ope and the Rhineland. His other | assignments have included duty at | | Fort Jackson, South Carolina, | Camp Barkley, Texas, and the Far | j Command FOR HOME or his jangling spur rowels and her face change, It lit up with some- thing new he had never seen in it before. He saw the beauty of it and the welcome, for some strange reason as he went up the steps to meet her there floated into his mind a sities of the valley far up under old Horse Thiet Peak’s craggy. shoulder, Old Jorg, he thought, would have liked it very much if he had known that one day in the not too distant future that cabin would shelter two who wanted to shut out the rest of the world bem they spent their there. THE END COMMERCIAL USE... | Among his awards are the Dis- | | tinguished Service Cross, Bronze | Star Medal with Cluster, Distin- guished Unit Citation, Combat In | fantrymen Badge, Glider Badge World War I Victory Medal and Army of Occupation Medal (Jap- an). A graduate of Eraxmus Hail High School, Brooklyn, the Major was formerly employed by Consolidated | Edison Company in New York | | sometimes a differ-/ betucen bout 40 feet i Windsor ; jow tides at We Are Prepared Te Furnish You With Clear, Pure Cube» Crushed ICE TELEPHONE HO. 8 Thompson Enterprises, Inc. (CE DIVISION) <EY WEST. FLORIDA