Penny Dreadfuls, 1916 · page 386 of 400
Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil: A Young Virginian in the Revolution — page 386: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Page Analysis This is running prose from page 366 of Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil (a Victorian penny dreadful). The passage depicts a dramatic domestic scene during what appears to be a military occupation: Black Dragoons have invaded a plantation house, cooking suppers and creating chaos. A character named Dare overhears a soldier auctioning the location of a wine-cellar. When Colonel Tarleton's officer arrives demanding an interview with the house's mistress, the grandmother (ill in bed) sends a polite refusal. Dr. Pratt then arrives with news that British officers are searching for someone who shot a man named Leslie, and that Colonel Tarleton wishes to question a young woman called Miss Mary Josephine.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
366 Tom ANDERSON, DarRE-DEVIL maiden presence than a spirit downstairs, where doors were opening and shutting in stranger hands, where rum- bling voices gave orders, where servants tiptoed and tit- tered, boots tramped and swords clanked. From one end to the other the avenue blazed with campfires. [he Black Dragoons were cooking their suppers. Everywhere, move- ment and clamor. A voice like the squall of an ostrich was audible. It was Egger! ‘“Whut’ll ye gin me fer the key er thur wne-cellar ? Hong?” Dare, behind the Venetian blinds of an upper window, overheard the auctioning—and an ague seized _ her. She beckoned Dilsey from Mrs. Anderson’s bedside. ‘“Where are the keys of the wine-cellar? Where are they?” A heavy foot was on the stairs. A dragoon, candle in hand, came up on the second floor. He approached the two whispering outside the sick-room door. He brought a slip of paper addressed, “Io the Mistress of Oxheart House.” The note ran: — Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s compliments to the Mistress of Oxheart House, and requests the honor of an interview on a matter of the first importance. Grandmother, racked in body and mind, had the old mahogany teapoy pushed a little nigher her bed, and wrote: — ‘The Mistress of Oxheart House presents her compliments to the Colonel of the Black Dragoons, and desires that her bodily sufferings may not be augmented by the intrusion of His Majesty’s officers on her sick-room.”’ Dare, leaning over the banisters, listened to the growl of excited voices from the dining-room. But here was Dr. Pratt, coming upstairs. He told them that the Brit- ish officers were “raking the plantation with a fine- tooth comb” for the man who had shot down Leslie. And then he added, in a matter-of-fact tone, “Colonel Tarleton desires to put a few questions to Miss Mary Josephine —”’ ECONMMICOOOKSn(e© m