Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 957

Deadwood Dick, Jr.'s, Ten-Strike: A New Romance of Old Mexico By Edward L. Wheeler

This serial installment begins on the trail between Chihuahua and Santa Fe in New Mexico. Samuel Hedgeworth, a wealthy American railroad magnate, travels with his son, four companions, and two Mexican guides. Mexican bandits known as "the Flock of Forty," led by a masked chieftain, ambush the party. They rob the travelers and abduct Hedgeworth for ransom, forcing his son and companions to ride ahead to Chihuahua penniless.

In the city, young Hedgeworth seeks help from the hotel proprietor, an American expatriate, who suggests contacting the famous detective Deadwood Dick, Junior. Hedgeworth visits merchant Sigmund Bamford's business establishment seeking the detective but finds he has recently departed with Bamford's son on a mission—which coincidentally involves hunting the same outlaw band. Bamford reveals a twenty-year-old vendetta: the criminal Franklin Furniss, ruined through fair competition by Bamford, disappeared after swearing revenge and later kidnapped Bamford's five-year-old son, who vanished mysteriously. The text breaks off mid-narrative.