Beadle's Half Dime Library, No. 196 — page 6: what you’re looking at

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

- Pe —— 2 — ont X 6 tight as a shadow against a brick wall. They nad searched the two rooms out there, you know. Bntas soon as their backs were turned { slipped into one of those rooms. I knew it wasn’t safe to try the stairs, except [ wanted - drop from the frying-pan straight into the re. “* But the officers searched them rooms twice afterwards,” cried Beau, in surprise. **Only once,” replied Bob, positively. ‘‘ The first time they only looked in at the open door, if that sharp-eyed chap had taken a squint be- hind the door then, lam afraid it would have been all up with my bacon. I was looking out at him through the crack of the door, and just wondering what was the next card to play, when he was kind enough to carry his ugly phiz out of sight.” ‘‘ Laws bless us!” ejaculated Beau, in admira- tion. ‘ That was a narrer squeak.” “The rest was all plain sailing,” continued Bob. “ After they had passed, I slipped out, picked up your key, which I saw shining on the floor, and, as I had happened to hear that little confab about your closet door, | saw my way clear as sunlight. 1 slipped in here, locked my- self in the closet, and laughed in my sleeve at the whole party of you.” Beau started up and clapped his hands. “Well, if you ain’t a cool one [ll be blowed. Why, if V’d ‘done sich a thing I'd ’a’ shivered down clean inter my boots, when the officers come back.” “T ain’t that kind,” answered Bob coolly. Beau sat and stared at him for several minutes, as if not quite knowing what to make of him. “I guess maybe you kin hide about here till dark,” he muttered. ‘‘And then you mought slip out unbeknowns. I s’pose you've got a hid- ing- lace laid out?’ ‘ Yes,” answered Bob quietly. “Where?” “i Here.”’ Beau stretched his lank figure to its utmost hight, and looked down in utter astonishment on his strange visitor. “* Here?” “Yes. I guess you can make it comfortable for me.” ** But goodness gracious, man, are you goin’ clean daft?) Why you mought as well take up your quarters in the police court at once.” “'Phat’s a good idea, Beau. Perhaps I will next,” answered Bob, as he stretched bimself out in his chair, thrust his hands deeply into his pean and looked quizzically at his astounded Os © But the idear of your bunkin’ here. Why they'll nab you afore you could say Jack Rob. ison.” “You old fool,” Bob curtly answered; ‘“haven’t you wit enough to see that this is just the best hiding place in the whole city of New York? Do you generally get in front of a man’s track to escape him, or bebind it?” ‘* Behind it.” “Well, that is just what I am doing. The lice have been a here. They will not come , this way. Do you imagine that I am idiot enough to put myself in front of them again? I don’t calculate that they will double back on their trail, so I guess 1 will bunk with you for a while.” Beau groaned as he gazed at his visitor. He was not altogether pleased with this idea. “But I am as hungry as a wolf, my boy. Can’t you get me up a trifle of dinner?” *T ain’t got nothing in the house,” muttered Beau. ‘ Jist you hang on here, and [ll go out and scure up something.” *““Come back here, you blunder-headed old rogue! None of that!” roared Bob. ‘‘I like * ts too well to lose sight of you. There’s a boy saw on the fleor below who looked as if he might be a sharp young rat for anerrand. Sup- pose — just whistle him up.” Utterly defeated Beau proceeded to obey orders, Bob keeping a keen eye upon his every movement. CHAPTER V. AN UNEXPECTED MOURNER. AT a rural cemetery, a few miles north of the city of New York, a grave had been opened in a neglected corner of the grounds, and the grave- digger and his assistant were waiting in stolid aallaence for the coming of the expected occu- pant of this humble sepulcher. The old man sat on the corner of a broad marble slab, which recounted the virtues of some long dead individual who lay below. His hands grasped the hand!e of his spade, on the eee <n ; Shadowed: or, Bob Rockett's Fight for Life. top of which rested bis cain, while his bleared eyes were fixed with curious interest on the face of his companion. The latter, a much younger man, leaned against a tall tombstone, bis lips busily mum- bling over the tobacco which he had plunged within his cavernous jaws. He rubbed his partly-bald poll with a slow movement as he talked in a } 2c al a tone. ‘* Poor gal! I knowed her parients as well as I knowed my own,” remarked the old man, in a wheezy voice. ‘‘She were a prime good gal, too; but everybody said, when she married that good - for-naught, as she’d jist flung herself away.” ‘*That’s how they’re a-burying of her out hereaway then?’ ‘**’*Zackly, ’zackly. She b’longs in these yere diggin’s. As fur that Mike Crapper, I knowed it. I allers said it, as my old woman can tell ye. He wasa sort o’ fresh-lookin’, spry feller in them days; but any fool could see that he had bad born in him.’ . ‘*‘We’re allers so good in seein’ that, arter a man’s brung to the gallows,” mumbled the other. ‘* But you goon, Toby. I didn’t want to in- terrupt you. So the poor critter was found with her head smashed in, eh?’ ‘*Clean smashed,” answered Toby, with a sigh. ‘* You see it were this-a-way. Rastiy Mike hed many and many a scrimmage with his wife, so the nebbors say, in the which he’d cuss away like a water-wheel in full blast, an’ she scurse say her life were herown. Well, this day he’d been a-cussin’ like a fifty hoss runaway ingine, and Sal got her dander up and gi’n him as good as he sent. They could bear it over the whole house, an’ some o’ the folks would ha’ put the’r oar in, on’y he was sich a rascally ugly divil to deal with. So they kept mum.’ ‘* Wish Id a-bin there,” mumbled the old man, over his spade, ‘*S’pose you had, you old jockey; what’d you ha’ done?” asked Toby, satiricaliy. ‘‘ The idea of a rotten old log o’ wood like you meddlin’ with sich a rough as Rusty Mike. Well, ther comes a heavy tumble, and then a hollow groan, and then all was still. Some of the folks did run down then, but there stood Mike outside his door, a-glowerin’ on ’em, and askin’ what the blazes they wanted meddlin’ atween a man and his wife? They say that ther was pale rings round his eyes, but he looked so black and stormy - like that they all backed off, arter some on ’em had gi’n hima piece o’ the’r minds.” ‘*And was she a-layin’ there murdered all that time?’ asked the old man, with trembling interest. ‘‘?’'m comin’ to that. Ain’t a-goin’ to shove on the story too rapid, fer fear it won’t hang out. Anyways ther weren’t any more noise, and folks went about the’r own bizness, ’specting that it didn’t come to nothin’. In them diggin’s, ye know, it weren’t a very onusual matter to silence a woman’s tongue by a tap alongside the head.” ‘* Jist so,” muttered the old man. ‘ There’s times they need it. Id tried iton my own old ‘oman more an onst, on’y she’s ginerally too spry, and gi’ns me the tap fust. She’s arantan- kerous critter, is that old oman o’ mine.” ** Anyhow, an hour arter,” continued Toby, ‘*some of the nebbors see’d Mike streakin’ away from the house, like ahang-dog asheis. He hed with him another ee as the popers thinks is a coon =) call Bob Rockett. Them two were twigged leavin’ the door o’ the house together. Well, mebbe an hour, mebbe two hours arter, when a good woman oO’ the ’stablishment was a- comin’ a pi the entry, what should she see but a little red line that looked like blood, a-runnin’ from under Mike’s door.” ‘* The oe Lord guide us!” exclaimed the old man, holding up his hands in horror. ‘*You kin bet ther was a time,” resumed Toby. ‘‘ That woman lets out a yell that brung the hull house down in the shake of a cow’s ear. The door was locked, but locks weren’t nowhere afore that crowd. They jist bu’sted it in quicker’n lightnin’. An’ sich a sight as there were afore them! Nobody never see’d the like.” Toby fell into gloomy silence, and commenced to bite at a bunch of grass, which he had pulled up from the grave mound. The old man’s hands shook with excitement as he let fall the spade. Hesprung up and caught Toby by the shoulder, shaking him violently. **'That’s jist like you, Toby Blake. What was it they seen? Tell me now, or Vl brain you witb the spade.” Toby laughed at the assault of his veteran comrade. But he resumed his story. —— ‘‘There laid the cold corpse of poor Sally Crapper. Stone dead, and with a hole in her head you could ha’ put yer fist in. The woman had bin hit with a heavy bludgeon, with a knob on the end as big as a cocoanut. Well, it smashed in her skull, that’s all. Mike hed lifted her onto the bed, but ther was a poo! o’ blood on the floor, that come tricklin’, tricklin’ along, till it crept out under the door, jist like—” ‘‘ Jist like the finger of God pointing out the murderer!” broke in the old man excitedly. “The bloody cut throat!” continued Toby. “Ther weren’t never no good in him, But there were a pair of ’em, fur that mattcr. They found this Bob Rockett’s coat a-hangiw over a cheer-back in the room, with his han’kercher and his tobacco box in the pockets. lf they both don’t git the’r necks stretched then ther’s no justice in the land, and a couple o’ bloody villains ’ll go scot free.” ‘That’s what you thinksof it, you bald-head- ed fool!” came a hoarse voice behind them, causing them to spring up and turn around with startling haste. There stood a tall, burly fellow, dressed in rough frieze, his coat buttoned to his chin, his bony, erabrowned, ferocious face covered with a stubby beard of a week’s growth, while the matted hair that hung over his eyes was filled with bits of hay, revealing the nature of his lodgings of the previous night. r The grave-diggers gazed at this Supe MON, which had emerged from behind a tall grave- stone, with starting eyes, while they showed an inclination to back away from such a dan- gerous neighborhood. ‘* Mike Crapper!” ejaculated the old man. ** Rusty Mike!” exclaimed Toby, his sinewy fingers knotting themselves around the handle of his spade. ‘‘None of that now,” came in fierce tones from Mike, ‘ lve gota little bit of a persuader yere in my pocket, and I’d like the pair o’ ye to bear in mind that foolin’ won’t pay round these diggin’s.” He drew from his pocket a huge, old-fash- ioned revolver, which he cocked witha click like that of a musket. “It ain’t rone o’ yer funny nic-nacs,” he sourly remarked. ‘‘ but don’t you go foolin’, that’s all.” ‘* What brings you here?” cried Toby. ‘**Tain’t out o’ the way fur a man to tend his wife’s funeral, I calkerlate,” growled Mike, fero- elena ye “Why didn’t you think of that afore you murdered her?” asked the old man, with sturdy indignation. ‘**’Cos 1 never murdered her,” answered Mike, stolidly. ‘‘ Why, Sally Crapper was the only critter I loved in the world. lt was Bob Rock- ett snagged her, blast him, and now they’re a-tryin’ to lay the whole thing on me. ‘Spect they’ll hang me fur it too, if they nab me. See here, boys, yer ain’t got no ‘jection to a poor feller takin’ a last look on his wife?” There was a sort of pathos in Mike’s tone. The two men looked at each other for a moment, and then answered. ‘‘Tt’s human, I s’pose, and I wouldn’t be a Christian to stand ag’in’ that,” was the old grave-digger’s comment. ‘‘And hang me if I’d stand in the way ofa dog, in sich a case as that,” exclaimed Toby energetically. ‘‘ See here, Mike. We'll gi’nye time for a look, and then let ye git outside the grave-yard wall. But arter that it’s pull Dick, pull devil. Ye’ve got to trust to yer own legs arterwards.”’ | yee well,” answered Mike. ‘ That’s all I ask. Certainly the few days which had elapsed since the murder had made a marked change in his appearance. The bold and somewhat brutal ferocity of his ordinary bearing had given way to a hang-dog look, and something of the furtive expression of a cornered fox, who feels himself almost in the power of enemies hungering for his life. There might have been also, some glimmer cf remorse in the look that dwelt upon Mike’s face, if such a soul as his was capable of that feeling. At this moment he gave a start as if a knife had been plunged deep into his flesh, while an unearthly pallor spread over bis countenance, He had indeed been struck; but in his soul, not in his flesh. It was the single, thrilling, loud- vibrating tone of a bell which had struck the murderer to the heart, the first peal of the church-bell tolling over the corpse of his slain wife. Again came that thrilling peal. Mike, witha face working with some deep feeling, pressed his hands firmly over his ears, and backed step OOo) eGoim G Ss (E (0)