Beadle's Dime Novels No. 139: The Border Foes

The Border Foes

This serialized frontier romance, set in 1780 Kentucky, follows two travelers—George Ryeburn, a young Virginia settler's son, and Walter Wilson, a melancholic borderer haunted by his wife's murder by Native Americans—as they return home from Holston with supplies. Overtaken by unnatural darkness, they camp and discuss George's ominous premonition about his family's safety. George reveals a clandestine meeting with Kate Atlee, daughter of his father's enemy Simon Atlee, who warned that her father may harbor violent intentions against the Ryeburns while they're absent. Walter believes Atlee capable of serious crimes. As they keep vigil by firelight, increasingly oppressed by the overwhelming darkness, they contemplate the dangers of Indians in the region. The narrative establishes period tensions between settler families and frontier threats.