CHAFFEE ROARING HORSE •Y ERNEST HAYCOX T T ■ ■■ ■53»"jeg-: **Ride ’em down—block that Erch! Block It!” And ?sently, ripped and battered, stood in the doorway with half of the old crew ranged around him afoot while the others charged backward and forward with their horses. The tnob broke, re-formed, and fought for the door. Then it was split in fragments by the constantly circling horses and the foremost section left high and dry on the porch, threat ening the defenders. “Step back” warned Chaffee. •'■We’re taktn’ Woolfridge to the jug.” “Try it,” retorted a near figure, and smashed Chaffee’s face with a hard fist. Chaffee’s bead snapped back against the door frame, and a fiery rage came roaring to the surface. After that he almost lost ac count of his own acts. His gun Was out and he knew he felled the man with a sweep of the barrel. Another came on but never reached him; the rest V his partners were using the ptme tactics. That cleared the ^nmediate neighborhood of the door for a little while. “We mean business,” called Chaffee. “Go on and pull down few houses if you want to Work off steam. But Wool fridge goes to the jug.” Alki Stryker had been ■wallowed up during the me lee, but his voice rose like a rocket now. “Ne’mind—let’s get them buzzards which was Imported to kill. Let’s get Per rine and his outfit! They’re out the back end o’ tq,wn! Come on—come om That was a rallying cry. The porch almost instantly became deserted. The mob raced along the street and sifted down the alleys. Firing began and the yells came shrilly back, like the sounding of a wolf pack. Chaffee spoke hurriedly. “You fellows close In here. Couple hit for the back way to see they don’t try to fool us. I’m going after Woolfridge. Saw him a second ago climbin’ toward the sky.’’ He turned in and walked to the stairway. Looking up he saw Woolfridge standing on the landing and just about to disappear down the hall. It brought him to a full halt, for he discovered a gun in the man’s hand and a pinched look on the soft cheeks. “Come down, Woolfridge. Your skin ain’t worth much, but such as it is you owe it to Stirrup S. Step along. We can just make the jug before anybody gets rash." Woolfridge nodded slightly. •‘You made a worthy stand, my friend. But was it worth the trouble?” “I've got to live a long time,’ muttered Chaffee, "and I don’t want you on my con science. You’ve bothered me enough as it is. Come down. “And supposing I don’t?" asked Woolfridge in a droning monotone. “Then I’ll come up." said Chaffee. “Come ahead, grumeu ■Woolfridge, and immediately disappeared from ~*ght. One of Chaffee’s partners left the door. "That means business. He’ll get leaded yet before the night’s over. Better a couple of us take the back stairs and some more hike up thisaway. Mcbbe—’’ But Chaffee, still watching the landing, shook his head. “It’s my play, Mike. He expects me to try it. He’s issued the Invite. I’m goin' up there alone. Just stay right here and wait." , That drew the puncher s tmmediated protest. And the rest of the old Stirrup S riders closed in. dissenting. ‘‘What lor—to get ambushed?” de manded one of them. ‘ Don t be a durn fool.” Chaffee climbed the first Farm Solvency Prevail*. Nearly Two Thirds are Wholly Free of Mortgages. Wheeler McMillen in the Outlook and Independent. Despite all the expenditures for the machinery of the modem Amer ican standard of living, the agri cultural balance sheet indicates healthy solvency. A hard-up larm owner always ><14* recourse to mortgage his land. Imt the foreclosure man has to nail op hla sign before the owner can he put out of business. The posses sion of a mortgaged homestead has long since ceased to be a disgrace <«* almost anv city i.oma owner M step and turned about, face tremendously sober. “Now listen, boys. I've got first call on that gentleman. It was Woolfridge who killed Dad Satterlee, the finest friend I ever had. It was him that bought my ranch out from under me. He was responsi ble for havin’ Mack put out of commission. And it was the same gent who has sent me through all this miserable course of sprouts in the last few weeks. It’s my turn. He still thinks he’s top man of the two of us. What should I do—back down and let him keep on thinkin’ it? Not by a Jugful. Boys, you let me alone. I am going up there and call his bet. One of us is proud. Him or me. I aim to find out. Stay here. Keen everybody away lrom that second floor until you hear one of us sing out.” There vas a grumbling dis agreement among them, but Chaffee turned and continued on up, gun drawn. His face rose above the landing and he had one swift survey of tbe hallway, dark excepting for a patch of light coming out of an open door—the door to Gay Thatcher’s room. Then he ducked and lunged to the top; a bullet roared in the cramped space and ripped at a post in the railing. Swinging wide he reached the shelter of the wall leading along the back cor ridor and the back stairs. For a moment he rested silently, listening. He thought he heard Woolfridge shift and breathe somewhere In a room along the main hall. “Woolfridge—you had better give up and go to Jail.” The man’s voice, still even but rising to a slightly higher pitch, floated down the corri dor. “You will find me in my room. I am waiting for you.” “You won’t have to wait long,” muttered Chaffee, and without stepping away from his protected spot, shuffled his boots against the carpet. The answer was quick in com ing, gun roar following on gun roar. Both shots crashed through the flimsy boards of the far wall. “That,” said Chaffee to himself, “is three cartridges gone. Three to go unless he’s got a supply in his room. I’d better cut this short.” He drew his bream ana swung around the corner into the main hall. As he moved he fired point-blank at the black end. raking the left wall where Woolfridge’s room was. He had to keep the man humble while he ran the distance; he had to keep the man flinching. There was no time for him to duck, and even if there had been time he would have never thought about it. Jim Chaf fee’s blood was on the race; all the old. berserk anger swelled his veins and over whelmed his caution. He I wanted to crush, to destioy. He wanted, at the moment, to wipe out whatever lay before. And so he raced past the lane of light, battering the black ness with his gun, and hear ing an answering roar match his own. One bullet cut a path across the plastered expanse beside him. Another he felt strike the floor at his feet. : There was a third—some cool s monitor in the recesses of his brain kept counting the shots ■ -—that he thought touched him. Then he was at Wool fridge’s door, turning on his heels, poising, plunging through. Immediately he col lided with the man and was locked in a hand-to-hand struggle. The bitterness and the fero city of Woolfridge’s resistance was something he never dreamed the man capable of. ! That mediocre body with its I softness and fashionable or look at the bonds issued by al most any industry!) The sheriff will have a long wait before he gets around to all the barn doors, because most of the owners so far have not even put on the plasters. Nearly two thirds of the total number of farms, and nearly four fifths of the total value of farms, are wholly free front mort gage indebtedness. The figures in percentages are 64 per cent of all farms, and 78 per cent of total farm value that are to tally unencumbered. There can b« a lot of borrowing ! on the old farm yet. In bleeding Kansas 59 ner cent of the farms grooming was a collection or striking, c1 awing, twisting muscles. Chaffee wrapped one arm around the man's neck and compressed it with every cruel ounce of strength he owned. He heard the actual snapping of vertebrae, but he could not catch Woolfridge’s gun, and his own face and shoulders suffered a constant battering from the weapon’s constant slashes. The front sight ripped across his cheek; he felt the blood warming chin and throat. It roused him to incredible fury. He released his grip and freed himself for a terrific sweep at Woolfridge with his own gun. It struck bone. He heard the man whimper. Resistance for the moment ended, and in that moment Chaffee secured an other clamping hold on Wool fridge, whirled him around, and smashed him against the edge of the door frame. It re vived the last of the man’s energy, embarked him on a series of violent, jabbing punches. Chaffee made no at tempt to block them. He had Woolfridge out in the hall and was slamming him from side to side like a figure of straw. The light coming through Gay Thatcher’s door fell upon them. At the same instant Woolfridge, crying with a shrillness almost impossible to the human throat, brought his knee into Chaffee’s groin and jabbed the thumb of his free hand in Chaffee’s eye. It scarcely missed its mark but the pain of the nail’s slicing impact was worse than any thing that had so far hap pened. The man was spent, reeling in Chaffee’s arms, re sorting to all the last and most vicious tricks. Chaffee drew back, struck a slanting blow across Woolfridge’s head. The overlord of Roaring Horse went down, sprawled face on the floor, half across the threshold of the girl’s room. He was finished, for the time being dead to the world. Chaffee sagged against the wall, struggling for wind, hearing his partners calling from below. He shook his head, beginning to feel the throb of his slashed face. Then the I stairway drummed with boots and a handful of Stirrup S men were crowded on the scene. “By Jo, yuh give us a scare,” said the foremost. “Why didn’t yuh sing out?” “Don’t feel much like sing ing at this precise moment,” muttered Chaffee. “Bleedin’ like a stuck hawg,” commented another, and walked around the prone i Woolfridge “Dead, or ain’t ! yuh lucky thataway?” “He’ll be ail right in a few minutes,” said Chalfee. He discovered his gun still in his ; fist. Holstering it, he wiped his face with a handkerchief. But there was a throb to one arm that he couldn’t locate until he skinned back his coat. The last Woolfridge bullet had drilled a neat hole in the fabric and broken skin. One of his partners was sharp eyed enough to discover it and he swore. I “Pinked yuh and scratched I hell out o’ yore face. The very j same dude you was so all-fired anxious to save from bein’ sprung on a limb. Beebe yuh’il get over these fancy notions sometime. He musta clawed like a woman.” “Pick him up.” said Chaffee. “Down the back stairs and through the alley to jail. Got to get him inside before these homesteaders catch wind of it.” They hoisted the inert Woolfridge between them and lugged him along the hall. Chaffee followed, scouted the alley, and then went ahead to the rear jail doer. A few minutes later Woolfridge lay on a jail bunk, locked behind the bars with six punchers on guard. Chafiee sat a moment in a chair and soothed him self with a smoke. Outside, in ! the main street and down along the various alleys, he heard parties of the home i steaders beating around for i fugitives; a shot broke are mortgage free: and even in poor old mortgage-ridden Iowa, where land speculation rode the whirl wind without directing the storm, 44 tier cent of the farms have no mort gages to worry their owners. Good Effects Expected. Prom the Cedar Rapids Gazette. The new license law places no obstacles in the way o' rationally planned marriages. It does place obstacles In the way of tho^e that are conceived on the spur of the moment. Prom the sociological viewpoint .if ;.ot from tha mer cenary angle, that effect U u> be through tne town occasionally, but '.i appeared a." if the mob had spent its fury and that a certain calm was returning to this embattled town. ‘ Believe I'll stroll out and see the extent of the dam ages,” said Chaffee, heading for the door. “You fellows stick close, now. I’ve had enough trouble getting that fellow, and I don’t desire to lose any more hide on his ac , count.” ‘ Bein’ such a big-hearted guy,” retorted one of his part ners, “yuh shouldn’t mind a little item like that.” He cruised along the walk, finding the homesteaders col lected in parties and going about with something like a military orderliness. Ap parently they had gotten to gether and adopted a thorough plan of policing the town; both street ends were blocked by sentries; there was a guard at the hotel now, one at the bank, and a few at the stable. But he saw that the danger of mob action had passed by and their anger cooled to a reasonable determination. They had vented their des tructive temper. Arriving at the far end of the street he was met by a party and chal lenged with an abrupt ques tion. “Where s Woolii'idge/ “In jail,” replied Chaffee. “Well—mebbe that’s the best place for him. He’ll hang, any how. We been snoopin’ around. Got five more for yuh to put in the cooler, includin’ Lock lear. They’s three fellas layin’ cold in the stable, a couple bein’ them imported gunmen. But we ain’t through yet. That man Perrine ain’t to be found. While we’re cleanin’ up this one-horse town we aim to get him.” Chaffee turned back. Abreast the bank he was stopped a second time. Josiah Craib came out of the door, ducking his bald head. He was, as usual, solemn and seem ingly bowed by the weight of his thoughts. His gaunt cheeks lifted to Chaffee and he spoke a sparing phrase. “Jim, gather all gents for me and stay around while I say my say.” • Chaffee raised his gun and sent a shot to the sky. Home steaders tumbled out of the buildings and through the shadows. They collected in front of the banker, eying him with a close and not altogether friendly interest. They knew nothing about him, nor had he played a part so far in their tangled affairs. Yet he was a banker and they had seen Woolfridge often talk with him. Therefore he was under the cloud of suspicion Josiah Craib must have felt that suspicion, but if he did he gave no sign of it. He stood on the steps, watching them group nearer—a clumsy figure convening the impres sion of sluggish moving blood. Nobody knew what lay behind the deeply sunken eyes; whether that turning glance concealed craftiness or whether it covered nothing more than the short and colorless thought of one who passed his life without im agination. When they became quiet and he said that which he wanted to say, they still didn’t know. Nor did they ever know. But this is what he said: (TO B* CONTINUED AUTO-PHOTOGRArilY. How off to the photographer In days gone by, you've hied, And drioped with icy sweat the while That oily worthy cried: “Chin higher now—eyes to the front Hold that a minute, please!" Then all at once your beipp quaked— A cataclysmic sneeze! Old stuff, and soon out moded. nov There is a new invention; Self consciousness to oanish quite is its proclaimed intention. You walk into a cabinet And sit down in a chair; Then view yourself, this way ana that, In mirror hanging there. If you're a maid, you’ll note which Pose * , Best shows your pout or dimple; Then press a button heath your hand— . , , Your picture—Just as simple! \ —Sam Page. I desired. Iowa can afford to be at ’ the bottom of the list in number of marriages if those that are ef fected are permanent and happy Ancient Temple Idola Turned Into Swords Peiping — (UP) — Ancient Chin ese idols are being turned into swords for use in modern warfare, according to a report from Kaifeng, Honan. . The idols were discovered in an old temple, made of brass and Iron. Local military J-adns decided the tivatai ahouM ha tuarf for sword* Plans fcr “Air Calls” in Far East Watched With Interest EY HARRY W. FRANTZ, United Pres* Correspondent. Washington — (UP) — When Col. Charles A Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh pay iheir friend ly •‘air calls” in far eastern coun tries, It is certain that no group in the world will follow their adven tures with greater interest than students of the Friends’ School at Washington. Lindbergh attended this school, in seventh and eighth grades, dur ing 1913-14 and 1914-15, and the students and alumni naturally have been eagerly interested in his aeronautical exploits. After his suc cessful trans-Atlantic flight special exercises were held to commemor ate the event. But the Friends’ School also has extraordinary ties of sympathy with the countries of the far east, be cause of the large number of Jap anese, Chinese and Americans now resident in the Orient, who attend ed it. The modest brick school house cn I street, in fact, seems peculiarly identified with the devel opment of good will between the United States and far eastern coun tries. Famous Alumni Most Famous of the school alum ni is the Princess Chichibu, who graduated in 1929, a few months prior to her marriage. She was the daughter of Ambassador Matsudaira and during her school years made records fcr scholarship, athletic pro ficiency, and personal charm which have become a “tradition” at the school. Her sister, Masa, also attend ed the school and was exceedingly popular. Children of other distinguished diplomats from eastern countries have attended the institution. Julia, daughter of former Chi nese Minister Alfred Sze was there six years, and her daughter, Betty, a year, before the minister was transferred to London. The boys of former Ambassador Shidehara of Japan attended the school. Last year Nasaru Debuchi, son of the pesent ambassador of Japan, graduated there, and since has entered Princeton university. The ambassador's daughter, Taka, is now at the school. Many in Far East Among famous American gradu ates of the school, now well known in the far east, is Nelson Johnson, United States minister to China, formerly chief of the far eastern division at the state department. Mrs. Cabot Coville, w.fe of an American diplomat in Japan, is another alumnus of Friends’ school. When a student she was Lillian Grosvenor. She is the daughter of Gilbert Grosvenor, president of the National Geograph ic society. These are only a few of the form er students of Friends' school who are widely acquainted in the Orient. The list inciudes numerous Chi nese students sent by the govern ment, and many Japanese of offi cial and diplomatic connections. The superintendent of Friends’ school is Dr. Thomas N. Sidwell, al so its founder. The curriculum is supplemented by an encouragement to moral purposes, and particularly the cultivation of friendship and good will among the various peo ples of the earth. Since Dr. Sidwell has spent a life-time inculcating the thought of international good will In his young charges, the school naturally has taken special interest and pride in the former attendance of Col. Charles A. Lindbergh, now known w'orld-ide as the “Air-Am bassador of good will.” The Birth of Our Solar System. From Journal of Commerce. A British scientist, Prof. Harold Jeffreys, has a new theory of the creation of our solar system, in cluding the earth and the other planets that revolve about the sun. It is, needless to say, a natural and not a supernatural birth that has given our system to creation. As Jeffreys has it, billions of years ago a star, chancing to pass close to the sun, caused huge tides of gaseous matter to rise from the sun and whirl off into space. This matter developed into "knots,” which gathered other particles in space, and in time came to be the planets and their satellites—Nep tune, Uranus, Saturn. Jupiter Mars, Mercury, the Earth and Ve nus—all the result c,f a chance star! That flying matter exists in space is a scientific fact, and a "knot” of matter attracts smaller masses. So, according to this theory, our solar system, like Tousy, “Just growed.” Let it go at that. But ages passed before the earth' cooled, gathered water and an atmosphere, and developed plant and animal life. Man came to be the highest form of animal life. He picked up somewhere reason and spirit, and learned to love and hate. So far no scientist has accounted for him end his characteristics so satisfac teorily as the Good Book, the Bible, and we let him go at that. TWIN’S ONLY QUARREL London—Thomas and William Hamer have been twins for 75 years and they've lived their lives togeth er, doing everything alike and en tering the same bi nness. Their only quarrel arose after they were mar ried. fhey were both married on the same day, but in different churches. It is known that one was married an hour before the other, but both claim the distinction. That caused their only quarrel. AIRCRAFT SALES New York — The aernautical Chamber of Commerce reports that sales of American military and commercial aircraft and engines during the first three months of 1931 totaled $9,018,914. an increase of $39,252 over the first three months of 1930. Although sales in creased, production was off 10 4 per cent. i ——' Never Mind How. T won $20 playlhg cards night." "Honeatlrr* , MW*U, I won . fislereoiizedWax Keeps SkSn Young Oei an ounce nod nao as directed. Fine parti cl <*»of tuted •kio peel off until all defects such M pimple* liver *»« *Qd freckle* disappear. 8kin is then soft and vdvety. \ oar fare looks years younger. Mr lisiaf " a a brings out the hidden beauty of your akin. T# rerojve wr nkfes use one oun..x City Pt®. Co., f!j. 33-1031 • •tIMO'KI