The Argosy, Vol. XXIV, No. 1 — page 152: what you’re looking at

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

152 THE MAIOR’S PLOT. “Bless my heart !’’ exclaimed Mr. Grimwood; and Dr. Galen, as the truth flashed across his mind, dropped feebly into a chair, The stranger walked straight to the squire’s bedside, and clasping the sick man’s pale, wan hands in his own, he dropped his head on the bedclothes and burst into tears. ‘' Bress de Lawd, Massa Horace has come home dis time,’’ sobbed Pompey from the hall, and then all was silence for the space of a moment or two. The squire, still erect among the pillows, looked wonderingly at those in the room, hardly understanding what had taken place. ‘“Ah, there is Dick !’’ he muttered, as his eyes fell on the lad. ‘‘ Dick is a good boy ; he has come home again. ‘Tear up that will, Grimwood. I have changed my mind. There is plenty for both. Don’t cry, Horace, don’t cry. You ought to be glad Dick has come back ; you ought to be, glad #3 Then he closed his eyes, and sinking low on the pillow, went calmly to sleep, entirely ignorant of what had just occurred. The stranger rose to his feet and dashed the tears from his eyes, ‘I am the real Horace Penrose,’’ he said/calmly. ‘‘I thank God that I have come in time to frustrate the most fiendish crime ever attempted by mortal man. ‘There stands the scoundrel you have known as Major Horace Penrose. I denounce him as Eugene Maillard, the branded criminal from Toulon, the perpetrator of the great Bannister robbery, for whom the police have vainly searched for years, and I accuse him of attempting to poison my father and of trying to kill my son Dick, first by bullet, then by drowning. He has committed other terrible crimes, as these men can and will prove to your satisfaction,’’ and Horace Penrose turned to Dawson and Ford, who were standing directly behind him, the one savagely triumphant, the other pale with fright. It was a terribly dramatic scene, and all eyes were fixed on the false Major Penrose, the self convicted criminal; for the convulsive workings of his face, the trembling lips, the wildly rolling eyes, expressed the despair, the agony, and the deadly passion that were raging in his heart. ‘T'wice he attempted to speak, but his lips refused to frame the words. Then, with a fearfully quick movement, he drew a revolver from his pocket and turned the muzzle on Ford. You traitor !’’ he hissed, as he pulled the trigger, The report was followed by a loud cry, and as the smoke cleared Ford fell back on the floor. Before any one had time to act, the assassin sprang headlong through the window, carrying sash and all with him. He cleared the porch roof at a bound, and swung nimbly into the yard. “*Qne tHousand dollars to the man who stops him !’’ shouted Horace Penrose, as he bounded through the window in pursuit and ran to the edge of the roof, trampling the broken fragments of glass under foot. Miller and Jackson were in the vicinity, but the assassin’s weapon speedily scared them away; and when Horace Penrose reached the ground the desperate villian was spurring at full speed across the fields, mounted on ‘ the best horse in the stables. comicbooks