Code of the West
First Skyhorse Publishing edition 2015 by arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency
Copyright © 1934 by Zane Grey.
Copyright © renewed 1960 by Romer Zane Grey, Elizabeth Grey Grosso, and Loren Zane Grey.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Grey, Zane, 1872-1939.
Code of the west: a western story/Zane Grey. -- First Skyhorse Publishing edition.
pages; cm
Summary: “A thrilling tale about the code of honor in the Old West”--Provided by publisher.
ISBN 978-1-63450-497-3 (softcover: acid-free paper) -- ISBN 978-1-63450-073-9 (ebook) 1. Frontier and pioneer life--Fiction. 2. Man-woman relationships--Fiction. I. Title.
PS3513.R6545C63 2015
813’.52--dc23
2015024679
Cover design by Eric Kang
Printed in the United States of America
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
CHAPTER
1
OF THE many problems that had beset Mary Stockwell during her two years of teaching school in the sparsely settled Tonto Basin of Arizona, this last one was the knottiest, the one that touched her most keenly. For it involved her little sister, Georgiana May, who was on her way to Arizona to be cured, the letter from their mother disclosed, of a slight tendency toward tuberculosis, and a very great leaning toward indiscriminate flirtation.
This day Mary was unusually tired. She had walked all the way up to the little log schoolhouse on Tonto Creek—six miles—and back again to the Thurman ranch at Green Valley, where she boarded. Her eighteen pupils, ranging from six-year-old Mytie Thurman to sixteen-year-old Richard, had broken all records that day for insubordination. Then the hot sun of the September afternoon and the thick dust of the long dry road through brush and forest had taxed her to extreme weariness. Consequently she was not at her best to receive such a shock as her mother’s letter had given her.
“Well, there’s no help for it,” she thought wearily, taking up the letter again. “Georgiana is on her way—will arrive in Globe on the ninth. Let me see. Goodness, that’s tomorrow—Tuesday. The mail stage leaves Globe on Wednesday. She’ll get to Ryson about five o’clock. And I can’t get away. I’ll have to send someone to meet her. . . . Dear little golden-haired Georgie!”
Miss Stockwell seemed divided between distress at this sudden vexatious responsibility, and a reviving tender memory of her sister. What would she do with her? How would the Thurmans take this visit? Georgiana had looked very much like an angel, but she most assuredly had belied her appearance. Taking up the letter again, the perplexed schoolmistress hurried to that part which had so shocked her and scattered her wits:
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