The Dread Rider; or, The Texan Duellist

This issue of Beadle's Dime Library (1886) contains the opening installments of "The Dread Rider: The Texan Duelist" by George W. Browne. The narrative opens with two prologue scenes: a woman drowning herself in the Mississippi River after betrayal and desertion, followed by a brutal midnight raid on a settler's cabin along the Red River where a family is murdered and their home burned. The main story then shifts to 1839 western Texas, where at a shooting-match in Chesterville, the vain Regulator leader Curt Dash is confronted by a mysterious, scarred, one-legged horseman who uses copper bullets and defeats Dash in marksmanship. Insulted, Dash challenges the stranger to a duel the following morning. Chapter II describes the assembled crowd awaiting the mounted duel between Dash and his enigmatic opponent. The narrative emphasizes the stranger's menacing appearance and supernatural rifle skill.