Penny Dreadfuls, 1916 · page 57 of 400
Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil: A Young Virginian in the Revolution — page 57: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a page of running prose from the middle of a Victorian penny dreadful serial titled "The Rifleman" (page 41). The text depicts a domestic scene where a young man returns home to Sarah Anderson, who offers him supper and hospitality despite sensing he is troubled and distracted. He has apparently been absent since leaving school and is preoccupied with recent events involving an overseer and Major Anderson's son, as well as some unspecified promise to "be on his guard." The prose combines melodramatic dialogue with psychological observation of the characters' emotional states.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
THE RIFLEMAN ) AI insisted upon answers, too! But this was the woman out of a thousand. As she surveyed him, something stirred within her — as the shrunken fountain shakes at the leap of the cataract it suckled. He broke the silence. “If you please, madam, I’d rather not say what I’ve been about since I left school.” They looked steadily at each other. “When Sarah Anderson distrusts her own — God for- get her!” ‘Thank you, madam.”’ “Have you had no supper, my dear? Go right down- stairs. Dilsey’s there. And Dare’s made you a glass of ‘lamb’s-wool’ to keep out the cold, and saved you a big piece of tipsy squire. Gabe’s keeping up the fire in your room. Good-night, my boy.” And then she weighed his step on the stairs, and drew conclusions from his move- ments. They were reluctant and abstracted. “He has something on his mind.” The events of the night had blotted out yesterday. He felt as if a year or two had passed since he talked with Ishmael. He had promised to be on his guard — and Major Anderson’s son and his overseer had come nigh to blows. “And I’ve been galloping after the Devil’s fox-horn!”’ | CORNICLMOOO® iS (©) m