The Flying Glim / The Island Lure

This January 5, 1887 issue of Beadle & Adams contains "The Island Lure" by Leon Lewis, a serialized adventure tale beginning in Chapter I. Peter Mapleton, a impoverished "poor relation" living on Mapleton Island in Lake Michigan with his wife Molly, grows resentful of his wealthy brother Harmon's control of the estate. Molly proposes they exploit Peter's physical resemblance to Harmon to commit crimes in his name. They devise a scheme: Peter feigns paralysis while secretly wrecking ships using false lights—"The Flying Glim"—to cause shipwrecks and plunder valuable cargoes. By Chapter II, set three years later, their operation has succeeded, terrorizing lake commerce across Michigan, Huron, and Superior. The narrative shifts to Chicago's waterfront, introducing Walter March, a lake pilot, and an elegantly-dressed youth inquiring about a departing steam-yacht, whose destination March claims he cannot disclose.