Decatur Daily Democrat, Volume 25, Number 48, Decatur, Adams County, 25 February 1927 — Page 5

•*liw yoderstanding Heart bvpeter B- kyne I 1111 1,0^ y -j ' ,„,. iv ,, you of amusement, be-, M lO , s o t of lonely here in Honey cause' 1 kho" rnl far from atnus-’ Valley nit the fact is that if this i"S 10 >OU ?L > wasas real a gentle-1 — ml i 1' P"° > me he'd refrain from callwasnt horn te() all(l jjle “ are iossiping, so 1 reckon toiigue.s are s b tm aud uak his .Visits to versions i **’*!' commenced to cry Mhe raged a lot and forbade ;;" d t ' o do anything so humiliating to “"•.well then, you tip the genlle- ' iff yourself. Kelcey.’ I says. the telephone right now. call - ... and tell him your husband is h,n !|L to be suspicious and oldgoi and that his visits here dur- ’ X husband's absence arc oc- * • trossin and domestic (occasioning g° ssip ‘ % she wouldn't do that either n-t is she wouldn't do anything but F n me so 1 took the letter down be fellow and after he'd read it J,d Mr Bardwell, 1 don't wish to L discourteous, unfriendly or nhosHable, and you're certainly welcome ’. Honey Valley, because you re mighty good company. We like to J’ , ou and we flatter ourselves you Li us more or less agreeable, otherwise you wouldn't call. “Since you're a man of unusual intelligence’ an educated man with a knowledge of the proper thing to do, Im trusting to your own good sense w see to it that the gossips of this community get no further excuse to bandy a good woman s name about in low, unearned gossip.’ ‘‘He got kind of white and bowed and said he understood perfectly and thanked me for my generous attitude, for maybe two months he was cautious; then due day 1 came in from the round-up in the San Dimas two days earlier than I was expected. It »as dark when 1 rode up to the ranch and I found that man's horse tied to the hitching-post in front of my house. ■Sheriff, when a man knows his married life's a failure he's a fool not to face the issue. 1 wasn't selfish enough to bold Kelcey it Hying with me made her unhappy, but we had a baby, and I was that baby's father. It she couldn't respect the baby she couldn't have the baby. Fact is, she wasn't exactly the mother type, poor girl, although i don’t intend to complain about Kelcey, because she did file best she could. I reckon everybody does that, but some aren’t equipped to do very much of the best —to iollow along the lines of conduct our people have been taught to follow. "And never at any time did I charge icr with being unfaithful. She was ust young and Indiscreet, poor girl, and this fellow liad a mighty taking way about him. When he was present 1 was as much company as a graven image. In a gioup of ten men lie would have been number one and I'd have been number ten.” "No! with men,” Bentley defended Him. • Mason resumed: ‘ Not wishing to humiliate Kelcey, I didn't go into the house. The dogs commenced barking but recognizing my scent they quit almost as soon as they started. Kelcey came to the door and looked oat, but I backed away in the darkness and waited until he came out half an hour later. I rode behind him down to Dogwood Flats, where he went to his office. I followed him and he called the manager. "‘That’s good, sir,' I says. '[want that someone should hear what I've gat to say to you. sir. The next lime you set foot .on my ranch I’ll riddle you, and that's no threat. It's a promise. Good night, sir.’ 'Then I rode back to Honey Valley. Kelcey was in bed when I got there and she was more or less disturbed when | came in. I reckon she had a notion I was what the dogs had barked at earlier in the evening. She got up and cooked me some supper and all the time I was eating she kept giving me little sidelong s ances. 1 knew she was saying to Oow much does he know?’ When I finished supper I told her how much 1 knew and asked her if vie wanted a divorce from me. If ' e did I told her she could sue me snd | wouldn't defend the suit, provided she let me keep the baby. But Poor Kelcey wasn’t very brdve, sheriff. ‘ e tried throwing dust in thq air—- ' , a lot and said she'd never expected to b e insulted like that by her own husband. Well, there’s no use talking with people like that." „ 0 ' a can’t argue with a ii. at ‘ s l |, ’ r ‘ff observed. “I reckon „„„ 8 * h ? the good I>?rd invented in ” , t . arent - loaded, grade crosstt.L rai lroads, buzz-saws, whistles rhic W °2 f whlstle ‘ bells that won’t drln , , ' nules tllals sal e for ehil7 * =• Xcu was to« easy with or tw? K h f whale '* her a tinie Thnm l- i d h av e respected you. Them kind always does.” worn,,',, Masons don't beat their somni , an , y more n they cry when coiitinn' "'J ,< ;, ats tbem," the deary man take ■< un My father rai sed me to It smm„ Ckln . g if 1 ha,t and take whe n i ,£* J never knew a man had cnu l><allll yo ’ !r curc w h° ever self" age enou Bh to try it him“ami f ±.l, lee ? like n - > UBt the Well, what happened next?” CHAPTER 31. 'He'listen’ing‘sheHff:’ Bt °' y t 0 Things went on for another mouth

until I trapped them both again and | now we’re down to where I met him i •riding in through my gate. Well, as I I aay, he sat there trembling on his i horse. I saw he had a gun on his pommel, but I didn’t bother about 'that. I knew I could kill him twice while he was reaching for it and I didn’t even bother to puli my own gun and get the drop on him. because I'd changed my mind about that man. I was going to do something worse I than kill him if he didn't take pro•gram." 1 | "What was you goin' to do. Bob’" the sheriff inquired, profoundly in11crested. “Make him marry Kelcey 'after she’d divorced you?” I "No, 1 planned to tie him up to an adjacent sycamore and wear out my t quirt on him unless he agreed to leave the country. So I told him what was in my mind and asked him which he'd have. He said he'd like mighty widl to hold on to his good job with the Hercules people and obey my former injunction, it so be I'd give him another chance. “ ‘No,’ 1 replied, ‘you thought 1 was weak when 1 spoke to you like a gentleman the first time. You thought I was weaker when I didn't kill you instead of warning you the second time, and you think I'm a plumb weakling because I didn't keep my I promise and riddle you the second, your horse set foot on my proi»erty. However, we won't «rgue that point. If I let Kelcey have a divorce, will you marry her?' “‘I wasn't figuring on that,’ he answered. "'Well, you've compromised her] and made it impossible for me to live I wi'h her. How docs my compromise proposition strike you?” “'I rather leave the country.’ He was cool and collected now and smiling sort of high apd .dghty at me. "I know them sort o’ smiles. Bob. They'd anger a sheep. Well?” “'For that insult to my wife,' II told him, 'l'm going to strip the hide from your back and then you can go. Get down off that horse’.” "Ami then he led with tint curse o’ Scotland, eh?" "Well, he thought he was holding a full house, sheriff. He pulled, fired, 1 and missed me. Then his horse com- ' menced cutting up didoes. 1 had my gun in a shoulder holster under my canvas coat, but I didn’t pull it. I swear to God 1 didn't. I figured, with his horse pitching, he couldn’t hit me —and 1 wanted to give him plenty of I chance to empty his guu and then see what he’d do.” "You tarnation fool! Why did you take such a long chance?” Bob Mason smiled a twisted smile. “Os course I kept moving myself. | sheriff, and he kept banging away, missing me every time. When his ( gup was empty he got his horse under i control and saw me standing looking at him. ‘Get down off the horse,’ 1 says. He did, on the right-hand side of the horse, and stood there, looking over the animal's hack at me. I knew he was slipping more cart- j| ridges into his gun, so I waited —and when 1 saw by the look in his eyes . that he was ready for action again—well, I was ready for him. He stepped out from b ehind the horse and raised his pistol to bring it down and then shoot — like one of those western motion picture heroes.” The sheriff spat contemptuously into the fireplace. "Don’t it beat four of a kind how they’ll never learn?” j. he cried. They bring their weapon up and then down, when anybody's who's ’ ever learned to. do fust snap-shoot-> 'vrJjw.t. nulls.,iniiu.-jh.up and lets her • go!” ' f "I had two in his guts before he d , finished raising it. That paralyzed him. and while he was falling I put I another through his heart and one through liis head. And I'm not sorry. I left him where he fell, got into my car, drove over to Dogwood Flats and surrendered myself to the deputy sheriff there. The Hercules people had a watchman on their property and they’d had him made a deputy sheriff." "That's where you failed to make your head work, Bob.” The miserable man nodded. "He ■ turned me over to Jed Martin, a forest-ranger who used to have the I Tantrum Meadows station. Jed hail [ ridden over to Dogwood for supplies and was sitting on the stoop at the general store when I drove up. Jed guarded me — not that he had to—while the deputy and Jethroe. the presiilent of the mining company, went out in one of the company's light motor trucks to bring the body in. “They brought his horse in too, but they never brought in his loaded pistol or the six empty shells lying in the road. They kept that quiet and when my lawyer questioned them about it at the trail they said they hadn’t seen any loaded pistol or empty shells. , 1 "The storekeeper testified he'd heard me warn Grant Bardwell, so I got the credit for murdering an unarmed man in cold blood. Kelcey took the stand and testified she'd heard ' six shots with considerable time between shots; then, after about two minutes, she heard four more, but she hadn't seen anything. That city lawy--1 er.reminded the jury that she was my ' wife, and naturally she'd try to pro--1 tect her own reputation by protecting meWell, here 1 am!" I The sheriff shook his head with a ' gesture of iiupotfciicc. "1 wish I had- ! n’t run into you, Bob." He helped > himseft to another peg of moonshine whisky and gave Bob Mason one. "D'ye suppose Jethroe and the deputy 1 sheriff found that pistol and the six 1 empty shells?” ’ ITO HE CO.NTIXLICD) ! Copyright 1926 Peter B Kyno by arrangement with King Features Syndicate, Inc r —g — Card of Thanks We wish in this manner to thank the many neighbors and friends for their expression of sympathy in our recent bereavement. C. S. Major ami family. > ■. — r () i Get the Habit—Trade at Home, It Pays

DECATDK DAILY DEMOCRAT FBI DAY, FEBRUARY 25, 1927.

BIG SHIRT SALE

✓rv .-rm. V’K X I alii Lx, W 8 I X ' <Ss x. V' iff

PRICES 51.50 SHIRTS . . . 98c 53.50 SHIRTS . . $2.45 $2.00 SHIRTS . . $1.49 $4.00 SHIRTS . , . 2.95 $2.50 SHIRTS . , . 1.75 SHIRTS . . . 3.45 $3.00 SHIRTS . . . 2.25 $6.50 SHIRTS . . . 4.95 WORK SHIRT SPECIAL Big and roomy full size shirt in all patterns, heavy material that washes easy and wears fine. Exactly same as our SI.OO shirt —Saturday Only, size 14 to 20 OVERALL SPECIAL Heavy Blue Denim in 220 and 8 oz. weight, full size spring suspender. All sizes and lengths. Usually sold for $1.75 and $1.50 Sold here Saturday 1-2 PRICE SALE " Fine Wool Shirts 42 Boy’s Suits Final Cleanup of Woolens. All pure wool, in checks, stripes patterns in good serviceable material. All have two pair or solid colors. Surely a Bargain 1 n H $1.50 ‘...Saturday 75c of knickers. Our entire stock Saturday s2.ooSaturday...sl.oo s3.ooSaturdaysl.so fl SB M Bi $4.00 Saturdays2.oo * § ® ra g ■w w SrS ss.ooSaturday...s2.so | " Sweaters Painters Overalls Right in season—a nice sweater to pull on in the evening. Our Heavy white overalls, for painters, carpenters and bakers, entire stock on sale Saturday—Coat, Slipover, percent All sizes and lengths, SOf* Shaker knits, crickets, all colors, all sizes. Mit) OFF Was $1.25 Saturday 0«/ V ■ I iimniiiw~nTnmTi —nrniT-Tninnnr-irrriiT- 1 Our New Spring Suits Are Here!! SHOES and OXFOJRDS Exceptional special on men’s dress shoes and oxfords. 70 pair of spring patterns thrown in one lot at one price Saturday. A’l solid leather and snappy styles. Sizes 6 to i I'/j—Ail widffis ’orn-crly sold for $5.00 and $6.00 a'urtiay * | I Illi I — -WWMHHiMMnMnMMMMMKMWKaB ““- m I Tohft-T-My&cd & Sen I All Bal! Band and I J CLOTHING AND SHOES J FOR DAD AND LAD I All Ball Band and 1 Converse Boots I ''DECATUfk' INDIANA** [ Converse Boots

Saturday We just got in a shipment of our Spring Shirts and we will throw the entire lot on sale Saturday. All colors and styles, band, collar attached or collar to match, size iJl’i to 21.

FIVE