The Deadwood Dick Library, Vol. III, No. 34

: # Catalog Note

This issue from November 1, 1899 (No. 34, Vol. II) of the Half-Dime Library features "A Game of Gold: Deadwood Dick's Big Strike" by Edward L. Wheeler, continuing the prolific Deadwood Dick, Jr. serial adventure series. The catalog additionally lists over 90 previously-published Deadwood Dick, Jr. titles available in the same publication.

The featured narrative opens in the mining settlement of Big Bonanza on the Sabbath, when masked members of an outlaw band called the Rough-and-Readys—led by the notorious Deadwood Dick—interrupt a church service. Deadwood Dick accuses a stranger named Frank Foster of treachery: Foster allegedly betrayed ten of Dick's gang members to Judge Lynch for reward money, resulting in their executions. Though Foster denies his identity and claims to be "Jon Fergus of New York," Deadwood Dick recognizes him. Rather than immediate violence, Dick proposes a dramatic wager: he and Foster will gamble by throwing dice to determine who must walk a wire cable stretched across a nearby abyss. The winner survives; the loser faces death.