Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 1167 — page 2: what you’re looking at

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

> j ~~ ae Cons . ‘was necessarily slow. the path. Simon, not missing him for the thay the ghostly hemlocks around. _ For one moment he ot when, spring- ing t sis feet, ho dashed through the ‘forest, Tat w ee vy the jumpin’ ingo! the fool went back to fight it” he said. } eld . war at his heels.” 2 ee ee Ce ee ce lt A A LLL LLL LLL LLL LL LLL LO LLL LLL LLL LL LO horror of “circle traveling ”—to pass over its | through the Adirondack woods, breaking the young bushes down, and startling more than boundaries, and dissipate the spell and supersti- on which sat like sheeted specters in their earts, They started forward, refreshed by the rest Tarsus NMightwell in advance. The trailed their long rifles at their sides, and kept their ears trained to catch the slightest suspicious sounds, The journey through the nocturnal forest It led them over high hills and through rocky gorges, out of which naught but their experienced woodcraft brought them without breken limbs. The sound of the Ausable grew more distinct, _andit at last became evident that the spell of bewilderment had been broken. They were ina country where the hemlocks were young, a good place for the shy deer, and their enemy, the ravenous wolf. It was in this place that Nightwell, com- muning with his superstitious thoughts, started when Simon’s hand fell upon his shoulder, and pressed his wet garments upon his skin. The giant began a sentence of expletives which his companion quickly broke. sh Bh! Stop an’ listen! By the holy stars we’re followed!” Followed! and in that wild land of forest and stream? Trailed! and at the dead of night, and lost in the woodland of mystery and death? Tarsus Nightwell could not speak. The sound of the Ausable seemed to die out in an instant, and the stillness of the grave to him swooped silently down like a spectral eagle. ‘‘ Hollowed it is,” repeated Simon, ‘*Can’t ye hear, Tarsus? .Thar’!” The superstitious hunter did hear a footstep among the young leaves which their own feet had lately passed. It sounded like the tread of some animal trot- ting leisurely along, like a tired: dog on the scent. - When he found his tongue he eccked his rifle and said: ‘A wolf, mayhap, Simon. It’s got the trot of that beast.” : ‘* But it’s no wolf! I’ve been listenin’ to it fur miles. When we stop it stops. Thar! ye can’t hear it now.” ‘ ‘What do ye think it is?” If Simon had seen his companion’s face he would have started back with a cry of horror. It was hideous in its ghastliness, for Tarsus Nightwell had been thinking how terrible it would be to be followed by some vengeful enemy in that land of terrors. | “What do I think it is?’ said Simon Oldfoot. “Tt isn’t a wolf, that’s sartin; nora bear. — It’s a m ” **T don’t know, because I can’t see ’im.” “* Now let’s go on ag’in till I kin f° the hang of the step,” said Nightwell, “ take the rear. Now pushon.” — The journey was resumed, with Simon in the an. Tarsus Nightwell kept his ears strained to war any sounds that might follow them. e heard the footstep which had attracted Simon. It followed them in that peo dog- trot of the Indian; it was monotonous, never var yin ae Stopping, save when the giants aed n. b worked Tarsus Nightwell into a passion of ess. He drew his knife, and crouched in roar of the Ausable, went on. | Panther-like, the giant waited for the mys- a trailer. It continued to approach, and in the very path which the hunters had made in roach by the footsteps. Slowly he drew the leaves.. : Nightwell saw it not, but marked its ap. 6 ong knife backand held his breath. __ : trailer was before him—a figure darker nt saw for a moment, and then, throw- ing a ae y, tiger-like, forward, struck with all | But nothing o er went headlong across the trail to fall into a, clump of busbes, from whose recesses he fright-- ened a coyote with a loud Oldfoot. y heard the call and halted, for to discover that Nightwell was 1 8 aes for Simon .. ‘*He’s runnin’ as if the Like a wild deer the giant was pushing e- * ‘ . - * . : ; oe " ° a i a - . fF. ~ 7 en OT i. ~ Soars . i J ‘. - a. ? ee - - ** ~ we _-_ <—Z pn ‘ = ws —_-* : : . = | e--3 = ,* + re . -? he were =. . * : z 2° ee a eed . . * Lal ad . ; - « _ —- - hv ~~ _ 6? a=" oe oe ‘| but which was in reality a bu g his knife, and the hunt- | the oa ; - 7 Pu ant ¥ ee EP an a4 Beadle’s Half-Dime Library. ae —_—_-_-- eer eee ewe - SC ee one animal from its covert. He would have rushed et Simon, if that in- se age had not checked him with his great and. “You'd run spang into the Ausable!” Simon said, harshly. ‘‘ Thar isn’t a sleepin’ thing in these woods now—my head on thet! What hev ye seen?” : “Don’t ask me, Simon; it war nothin’ thet hes blood. I struck with all my might, an’, by the holy stars! I fell right through it! Come, Simon, let’s git out of this devil-land. It war a Se SB oo an’ cold as the air—fur my blood ‘oze as I went through it.” Tarsus Nightwell, the giant, was the incarna- tion of fright, and Simon Oldfoot caught the disease, ' He felt the chill of terror in his heart, and as he lisitened, not # the natural unterrify- ing roar of the river, but to the sepulchral drip, drip of the water through the trees, he be- came incapable of flight. And, added to other sounds, came that awful trot of the mysterious trailer. Ghost it certainly was, for Tarsus Nightwell had fallen headlong through it ! CHAPTER ILI. PINEY PAUL AND NOKOMIS. Not trotting, but walking rapidly through the Adirondack woods was the “ ghost ” which had frightened the two men, who would have attack- ed an entire Indian village or stood their ground against a pack of mountain wolves. Of course it was not a specter, but a person composed, like the giants, of flesh, blood, bone and sinew! The easy swinging motion of the body and the elastic step were the causes of that gait, so like the well known dog-trot. It was the figure of a boy that glided shadow- like under the rain-burdened branches of the trees—a boy clad in wild and fantastic garb of buck-skin, with a cap of fur, and moccasins of elegant workmanship. The contour of face and figure was remarkably handsome, and the youth still in his sixteenth year, though strong and ile for one so young, would at any time attract attention. : And then he was a character in those. dark tarns of the Adirondacks; ji: feet knew the trails that led to Whiteface’s chp eae: as his paddles knew the sleeping depths of Tupper Lake. He carried a light rifle at a trail in his right hand. It was his only visible weapon ; but he had others as the reader shall see. He wore in his fur cap a sprig of pine which looked very like a plume, and at his side hung what appeared to be an oversized powder-horn, le. Thus os ge the ‘‘ ghost” flitted through the forest while the two giants listened to his steps with the feelings that fill the captive’s heart when he hears the ’sfeet coming down the corridor of stone. | But all at once the boy stopped and listened. There were sounds in the w ahead, besides those made by the Ausable. ees The giants had found their feet and were run- a : , 8 ftoned with a smile on his well-formed face, but did not pursue. Tarsus Nightwell and his companion might harbor their breath, for the footsteps so sugges- tive of doom were not pattering at their heels. The boy did not pause till the sound of flying te were lost, seemingly among the waves o seemed out of place there at that ho : “ Back pike lodge!” he said, as if addressing a command to a party of Indian braves. ‘‘T bad men of the city send their tools after the lost girl. There are many among the mountains now, and ce be bloody. 4 the | abode. 7 hiding _ A couch of skins directly beneath the drawing | ree the of the one iney Paul fears not the hand of 1 He saw them in the woods to-day, and they ran from him with all their speed.” There was the braggadocio of the boy in all his tones; but he uttered his words with deter- fiends: to an ek “Trails in the mountains and along the streams!” he continued, elevating his voice. “Trails to old Whiteface’s top, and beneath Racket’s waters! i nong the pines, and trails to the wigwam of the an! Every- be a an for one purpose. They come others who hunt for gold. Back to the hidden lodge now! They know not where they run; Se - ? ” ; - x‘ *.. . —y * - : P ixy ~ a : + ee ~ > ay eae ® Then a light iavghy though a strange one, ri pled over his lips. It im ml = |. Eee aa Ce er ee EE EennnEinaneinnnnnenannnnnnnnn . but I know every trail in these mountains. Every trail? No, There is one which even I do not know!” The last sentence was spoken with much evi- dext chagrin. The boy was moving toward the Ausable as the last words fell from his lips. A short walk brought him to the river, flow- ing through one of the ge aay gorges of the Adirondack country. The pines on each bank bending one toward the other, almost met above the center of the stream, from which, in yoo places, they excluded even the fair day- ght, The boy reached the river at a point that. called forth an exclamation of joy. © Securing his rifle to his back by means of a strap which had been coiled at his belt, he caught the slender trunk of a pine that ven- turesomely grew at the very edge of the preci- pice, and lowered himself into the chasm. But it was not his intention to dash himself to destruction amid the whirlpool of waters that hissed several hundred feet below. His feet struck a network of vines that clung to the rocks, and for a moment he was lost to the view of the few stars which, at that point, threw their beams into the gorge. But the mo- tion imparted to the strong creepers—a motion which snake-like crept downward toward the river—told that he was descending. At last, by the aid of this natural stairway, the forest sprite reached the bottom, where the roar of the Ausable was almost deafening. The rocks at his feet were spray-washed and slip- pery, and the spectacle which the river possess- ed ec the daytime was hidden in the darkness at night. ) urrying along over the rocks with the sure steps of a person reared in these awful solitudes, the Sip reached a place which, in daylight, would have revealed an opening like the forbid ding mouth of a cavern, This he entered like one in authority, there, and soon a singular apartment was revealed by a fire that blazed on a stone floor. Then the wood ghost stood revealed in the mellow light of a fine fire, and his features were brought into view, Around him were walls bare, but not mon- otonous. Some hand had covered them with singular ictures drawn with various colored stones, with ws and arrows and the heads of the animals and fowls then found in the Adirondack coun- try. Further up than the tallest man could reach those grotesque pictures adorned the light stones, and the ceiling, fifty feet above the fire, was covered by the monster head of a demon — flanked by bat-like wings, a picture truly hideous and frightening in its aspect. The majority of the drawings bordered on the grotesque and horrible; but there was one which was so suggestive of happy days and home, that it deserves more than a passing notice, It represented a cottage B panies as if by fairy hands upon the side of a To the left ran a little stream rustically bridged, and very beautiful. Beneath the great: tree that grew before the cottage and drooped protectingly over its eaves, several children were playing. e picture was life-like ry done in ‘‘keel,” and the colors were not dull and dead; the magic of varnish and oil seemed to have been imparted to them. If the wall had been decorated by the hand of : the sole occupant of the cavern there was genius encom by its walls. But how did he paint the ceiling? and why cover it with that terrible monster whose presence seemed a spiritof evil brooding over all? ; Within the cavern, strange to say, the wild song of the Ausable wasscarcely distinguishable, The cavern was above the level of the stream; the corridor had led gradually up until it was Noarticles of furniture filled thesubterranean of rural peace and simplicity was the only ob- ject that st ited re ‘ ws Besides several guns and a eed Provision chest, it was the there. ld sent them here, and there are | The bo at once seemed at home in this strange almost tossed his gun into one corner, couc ‘‘ Piney Paul is at home!” hie said, ma tiok voice, aad a tone of undisguised joy. “His the guard keeps v ard and watch over it,” and he grinning face over “ The k prancedt at the | ng trail beginsnow. They are herefrom the city to the south, and others will come. 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