Penny Dreadfuls, 1916 · page 55 of 400
Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil: A Young Virginian in the Revolution — page 55: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# The Rifleman, Page 39 This is running prose text from what appears to be the middle of a serialized narrative. The passage depicts characters discovering mysterious footprints and discussing an apparent abduction, then shifts to a character named Tom returning home to find the household in disarray—servants missing, stable keys gone, and what he suspects is deliberate sabotage ("spite work"). The dialogue employs Irish dialect and period vernacular typical of Victorian sensation fiction.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE RIFLEMAN 39 foot marks were obliterated. The only tracks to be seen were those of Unaka’s moccasins and Pat’s — single — hob-nailed shoe. There was nothing to show the whole thing had not been a dream. He came back to his friends and held the lantern up to their faces. Unaka was stony. Carr showed the qualms of superstition. However, he assumed a conclusive manner. “Somebody’s been before us. Picked him up an’ car- ried him off. Divil a liss! Now who the busybody is that’s done it—we'll be afther findin’ out whin ter-morrow comes. Indade, it’s a lonesome wake they'll be houldin’ — thim two! — all by thimsilves!”’ It was agreed that the Gray Goose had better be left in Carr’s care for the present, “till we find out whether we ve got the Divvle by the horn er the hind leg, ez I may say, Carr suggested. And when their roads diverged he made the boy take the old fish-oil lantern. “Ow! we’ll foind our way aisy-like. Don’t yez hear thim pea-sthicks? Sehoy an’ Bryan iz thrashin’ out thim pease loike hell- beatin’-tan-bark!”’ A light in the upstairs window at the southeastern cor- ner of the house told Tom, as he cantered up the avenue, that Mrs. Anderson was anxious. A pink glow from a western window, on the snowy shrubbery, meant that Dilsey was up still, and his supper keeping hot. The clamor of a dozen dogs brought Dare flying out. “Oh, Tom? Come straight to the fire, honey.” “Won’t I? Send somebody to take the pony.” “Tom, d’ you know, there’s not a boy about the house “What? Where the dickens are all the niggers? Some of Egger’s doing. Reckon as Picayune has to be stabled, he’s carried off the key! — to put me out.” So it proved. Moreover, there was nobody to be found about the stables. This was a predicament that Tom had never before ex- perienced. Spite work! In no good humor he “hollered” at the overseer’s house. “What air ye a-wantin’?”’ came from within doors. ‘Bring the stable keys here!” i CORNICLOO® SS (©) mn