The Jasper news. [volume] (Jasper, Missouri) 1898-1924, 1920-03-18

cooked my goose. She'll not look at me
--even II they don't send me to the
pen. And she's the best ever. Her
names Myra Anderson"
They slept under live oak with the
soundness Of healthy youth. For the
time they forgot their troubles. Neither
Of them knew that as the hours slipped
away red tragedy was galloping closer
to them.
The sun was shining In his face
when Curly wakened. He sat I'D and
rubbed his eyes. Mac was nowhere In
sight Probably he had gone to get the
horses.
A sound broke the stiffness Of the
desert. Flandrau leaped to his feet,
and at the same instant Mac came
running over the brow OF the hill. A
smoking revolver was In his hand.
From behind the hill a gun cracked
then O secondhand q third. Mac
stumbled over his feet and pitched
forward full length on the ground. His
friend ran toward him. forgetting the
revolver that lay In Its holster under
the live oak. Every moment he ex-
pected to see Mac jump up, but the ng-
ure stretched beside the choila never
moved. Flandrau felt the muscles
round his heart tighten. He had seen
sudden death before. but never had It
come so near home.
A bullet sent up squirt Of dust In
front Of him, another just on the left.
Riders were making a half circle
around the knoll and closing in on him.
In his right mind Curly would have
been properly frightened. But now ne
thought only OF Mac lying there so still
in the sand. Right into the fire zone
he ran, knelt beside his partner and
lifted the red-thatched head. A little
hole showed back Of the left ear and
another at the right temple. A bullet
had plowed through the boys skull.
Softly Flandrau put the head back
In the sand and rose to his feet. The
revolver Of tho dead puncher was In
! his hand. The riders were closing In
on him. The nearest called to him to
surrender. Almost at the same time
red-hot pain shot through the left
arm Of the trapped rustler Someone
had nipped him from the rear.
Curly saw red. Surrender moth
ingl He would go down lighting. As
fast as he could blaze he emptied
Macs gun. When the smoke cleared
the man who had ordered him to give
up was slipping from his horse. Curly
was surprised, but he knew he must
have hit him by chance.
. 1--WE got him. His guns empty"
. some one shouted.
Cautiously they closed In. keeping
J him covered all the time. OF sudden
the plain tilted up to meet the sky.
Flandrau felt himself swaying on his
r feet. Everything went black. The
} boy had tainted.
, When he came TO himself strange
! faces were all around him and there
were no bodies TO 20 with them. They
, seemed to float about In an odd. casual
sort Of way. Then things cleared.
r Hes coming to all right" one said
''How 10 Cuilison3"
. This was said to another who had
I just come up.
E Hard hit. Looks about all in. Co!
MN In the SIDE"
h The rage died out of Curly. In O
!. flash he saw all that had come Of this
r drunken spree; the rustling OF the
q Bar Double II stock, the discovery
the death OF his friend and maybe o.
Cullison, the certain punishment thai
!. would foilow. He was horse THE
caught almost In the act. Perhaps h'
. was a murderer, too. And the Who'll,
I thing had been entirely unpremedi
: tated.
v you've played b." one OF tn
|. men told the boy.
: He was sawed-off little fellow
known as Dutch. Fiandran had seeI
him In the Map OF Texas country |
) year or two before. The rest wer,
strangers to the boy. All Of then
/, looked at him out OF hard. hostile eyes
He was scarcely a human being 4
N them; rather a wolf to be stamped on
d Of existence as soon as It was conven
4 lent.
d AT shift in the group Flardrau'
eyes fell on his friend lying in tn
n sand with face turned whitley to III
ii sky he never would see again. A Ium
came into the boys throat and he ha
D. to work It down before he spoke.
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