Diamond Dick, Jr.: The Boys' Best Weekly — page 18: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

16 DIAMOND DICK, JR. OUT OF SIGHT. Bertie shouted and asked her name, but his voice sounded dead in that tightly sealed and water-surrounded room. He saw her respond, but nothing more. Then to his ears, and also to hers—as Bertie knew by the start he saw her give, came a mocking laugh. ‘“AHa!l ha! ha! Discovered each other, have you? And you would like to get ac- quainted, eh? Well, if you know the deaf and dumb alphabet, go ahead.”’ It was the voice of the mad millionaire, as Bertie recognized, and it made him aware of one thing—that his words and hers could be heard by him, wherever he was at the moment. Bertie gave her a signal to be silent, as soon as she looked his way again. She nodded that she understood. Bertie looked around, then, for some means of setting up communitation with her. At first it looked impossible, with the double thickness of glass and all that space of water between them, but at last a thought struck him. Going to one of the tables, the one that looked the most likely to contain what he wanted, he looked around it and soon dis- covered a drawer, which he opened has- tily. It was there; paper, pens, everything needful in the line of stationary, and he quickly produced some paper and a blue pencil. He glanced across at the other pris- oner. She had followed his example, as he was glad to see, for it proved that she was quick-witted. ‘What is your name?’’ was what Ber- tiee wrote first, in large, bold letters, and he held it up against the glass wall for her to read. She, too, had written something, but she put it down and ran back to the table — to write the answer to his question, and when she held it up he read easily enough: ‘‘Hunice Joyce.’’ Bertie nodded that he tnderstood, and she dropped that sheet of paper and held up the one she had first written. ‘What is your name?” It was the same as Bettie’s first ques- tion; they had both written the same thing at the same moment. Bertie wrote his name and held it up to view, and she nodded and clapped her hands with delight, though not a sound came to his ears, of course. Back she ran to the table and wrote for some moments, Bertie watching and wait- ing to see what she would have to say to him, and in a short time it was ready. She held the paper up against the glass wall of her apartinent, with the writing outward, of course, and he read: ' “Tama prisoner. Matthew Forest holds me here. Heis ny uncle and wants to rob ine of my wealth. He can doit if I sign a paper, but I will never sign though he kill me!”’ “Good for you!’ Bertie displayed in response. ‘‘I knew something was up when I saw you get off the train yester- day. I came here to help you, but it looks now as if I would want some one to help me. But, never mind; keep a stiff upper lip, and Pll see if something can’t be done.’ — saw her laugh, as soon as sie had read. His presence there had evidently cheered her, even though they were sepa- rated most effectually from each other. That they were strangers did not count; she had evidently seen him brought there and knew that he was a prisoner like himself, and there was a fellow feeling. “‘T trust all to you,’’ she said in writ- ing. ‘‘I ain helpless and can do nothing. I was in despair before you came.”’ ‘‘Brace up,’’ said Bertie. ‘What more can vou tell me?”’ ‘What about ?”’ ‘OMese rascals. ’’ “T know nothing about them.”? ‘But your uncle evidently does.’ ‘Ves, he is one of them.’? ‘And you hate hitn ?”’ ‘“Ves, for his treatinent of me.”’ They made their sentences brief and to the point. “Know names any others?” ‘No, none.”? “Where they belong?’ ‘Uncle lives San Francisco.’ ‘‘And you are rich ?”’ ‘Ves, vety, if Ido not sign.’ COMmicloooe CO