Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 488 — page 8: what you’re looking at

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

4 : . a wey ates wrip is : sae ‘+ rf « ae vec . a : 8 ee ae $e a eee In a minute more Dick encountered old Jerry, also with alight in his hand. The old fellow was quivering like a leaf. | “Is it you, Mr. Richard?’ he cried, joyfully, ** vou are not killed?” ‘*No, but some one else is, The house is a haunt of ghosts. My uncle’s specter, Jerry, is behind us. Hurry, old man, to the door! To the door!” Jerry needed no further admonition, In a minute more Dick was safe out of the haunted house, with his prize still clasped in his hand. . CHAPTER VII. THE STORY OF A LIFE. “Can I trust you, Will? Right through? Square up? With my life if need be?’ ‘In anything honest,” was the answer. ‘*1’m your friend while you are your own, I fancy you’re a square man, Dick.” The two speakers were seated in a dilapidated room of a shabby old mansion, in an obscure region of the city. The furniture was old, broken and down-looking, as if every piece was mourning over its lost splendor. The plaster hung in flakes on walls and ceiling. Along the latter were open cracks, discolored with marks of dripping rains. The place had evidently seen better days in the years long past, but was now fast sinking to ruin and decay. ‘*l want a friend, my boy. And out of the dozens that I have been flinging away my money on, you are the only one that has shown an ounce of heart and conscience. I have a story to tell you, Will. But not a word till I first have your promise to stick by Dick Racket, the Scapegrace, but not the rogue.” “To the death, Dick. We have had wild times together. But nobody but ourselves is the worse for our wildness,” ‘‘There’s a mystery hanging over me. I ean’t explain how my ring got into that old man’s hand. But I can swear the crime was not mine.” ‘*T believe you. But have yon no suspicions of the real criminal? How did the ring pass from your possession?” ‘‘That I cannot tell. I have my suspicions. Yet even them I cannot in honor divulge. I am seeking for evidence. I am here in search of it to-day. It is for that I have brought you to this tumble-down old rat-trap. It is for that I have kept clear of the police.” ‘‘ Hang me if I understand you! At any rate the affair may not proveso bad. Amos Wilmot is alive yet.” ‘*Ha! Are you sure of that?” ‘*T heard it only this afternoon. He has re- covered from his swoon, they say. He can move, but his senses seem to have vanished.” ‘‘Then it was not his ghost? Not that I half- believed it was.” ‘His ghost? What do you mean?” Dick proceeded to relate the account of his visit to the library, with its crt thy termination, with which the reader is already familiar, Will whistled. ‘*Lord! It would have scared me out of a year’s growth. But you got the document?” ‘“Yes, Keep quiet still, I have another story for your ears. I have acted like a mad fool, Will. So folks say, and they are not far wrong. I have flung away my money as if it were chaff. You know that, for you he’ped me in the laudable effort. Yet I have not been quite an idiot. What’s money for but to buy pleasure? But for my tale. My father died, as you may know, when I was a mere child. The cash I have flung to the winds in the last five years was not all bis possessions, Beechecroft, and all the property which my worthy uncle now holds, belonged to my father. ‘After his death, when the will was read, only the ready cash was left directly to me. All the landed property* was left in Amos Wilmot’s care as guardian. He had the privilege of selling it, if 1 it appeared best according to his judgment. It did aypest best.” Dick’s voice had grown very sarcastic. ‘* Do you think there was fraud?” ‘‘[ know that it went for a song. I know that the man who bought it did not keep it, but that it fell into Amos Wilmot’s hands at his own price. I know that the sale was only a cleverly contrived trick.” ‘“The deuce! And the money it brought?” ‘‘T have made ducks and drakes of that.” ‘*-You had better have used it in a lawsuit against your rascally uncle. The law does not ow a trustee to sell a property for his own benefit,” ‘* He covered up his track, Will. There is no hope there, But there is an opening in another “eee T=} Sn fe eet - ‘ a 2 ON ig AS Pe, / : - a direction. The will he sold under was not the latest. My father left another.” ss Aha!” ‘** He left another which is yet in existence. Iam sure of it. I caught the hint of it once from an incautious remark by my uncle, An- other man knows it, too. Phil Morton, my ras- cally cousin. He is after it as well as I. He wants it to destroy. I want it to use, [f it never turns up he will be Amos Wilmot’s heir, and [ left out in the cold. 1f it is found all the property is mine.” ‘*T see. A sweet bit of rascality.” ‘‘Tt was that drove me to my wild life. [ was reckless and revengeful. My uncle treated all my requests for justice in a way to rouse the devilin me. That is the secret of my five years’ fling. You were present when I heard the story of the accident to my uncle. I rode away like mad, hoping that the approach of death might force him to restore my stolen birthright. It did. Conscience stirred him to put me on the track of the hidden secret.” $ ao you found it in the old Shakespeare?” sé YO. ‘* What was it you found, then? You discoy- ered something.” ‘* A worthless document, Will. A vile far- rago. M y hopes are dashed to the ground. Here is the rascally concern. See if you can read its riddle.” He dashed the paper on the table. Will opened the paper thus flung to him, It was a narrow sheet, which was covered by some half-dozen lines of what at first seemed writing. But a closer inspection revealed only a series of meaningless marks, that bore some distant resemblance to. letters, but of which nothing could be made. ‘‘There’s something in it, Dick, IV go high on that. But I don’t get the hang of the con- founded enigma.” ‘* We're in the same boat, then. I am satis- fied that the secret about the will is in this pa- per. But whois to make it out?” The two men spent a good half-hour in vain efforts to get some clew to the meaning of the incomprehensible document, but in vain. Dick at length flung it down in disgust. ‘*Give itup. We'll have to wait for a happy inspiration.—Well, to goon. Tm near the end of my story. There’s only the mystery of this murderous business left. It’s my notion that Phil Morton is somehow at the bottom of it.” ‘*Phil Morton! What reason have you to think that?” ‘* Because he is the only one to be benefited by it. He knows that my uncle has made a willin his favor. It was best to put him out of the way before he could change it. He knows that the old will is in existence, and there is al- ways a chance of its discovery while the man that hid it lives. Thirdly, he thought to put the murder on me, and so get rid of a dangerous rival, by the sure method of the rope. Uow he did it I know not. That is my present business, to trace the mystery of that ring.” ‘* But that is not all. I am told tbhata gold pencil case, with your initials, was found at the top of the cliff.” ‘*The deuce! I had not heard of that. A gold case, eh?” He fell into a deep fit of musing, I think I can while a light came into his eyes. ut meon the ‘Pm glad you told me that. trace that pencil. It helps to track. Do you know why I sent for you?” sé No.” ‘‘T am safe here from the police. I have risked my safety in sending for you, for you may be followed. But I have an interview laid out, for which I want a witness, And I want a friend who will follow up the trail in case I am nabbed. I believe this house holds the clew to this mystery that surrounds me.” ** Tf you know who took the ring, why not go for him openly?” ** Suppose my suspicions are wrong? Suppose there be a man to whom I owe my life; who took a bullet that was aimed at me? Right or wrong, can I bluntly accuse that man of robbing me, and hold up my head among men of honor afterward?” ‘“No! By Jove, no!” ‘“ Well, you have the pith of ic. There’s a woman in it; there always is. Come. »This af- fair needs neat handling.” He rose and led the way from the room, fol- lowed closely by his curious friend. CHAPTER VIII. A MEETING OF OLD FRIENDS. Tae house in which the interview just de- scribed had taken place seemed alive with peo- ple. Frowsy-headed women looked out of doors. ke c <> = a | Children, ragged and begrimed, played in the passages. A smell of no very agreeable odor came from open rooms, It seemed a tenement- house inhabited by the poorest of the poor. In one room, in the upper region of the house, sat a man young in years, yet seemingly old in vice and misery. His face was bloated as from hahitual intoxication, his eyes red and bleared, his hand trembled as in a nervous delirium. On the dilapidated table before him was a bottle, on which his eyes were fixed with a look of disdainful scorn. ‘** Blast your ugly pictur’! he muttered, in tipsy accents. ore made to hold a quart, shoot ye, and [ ain’t had a drap more than a pint out 0’ your corporation. Them’s the sort o’ glass-blowers we have nowadays.” He turned the bottle upside down, with the hope that some drops might remain within its cavernous depths. But in vain. It was as dry as its tipsy owner. He flung it angrily across the room, ‘*Take that, drat ye! I never see’d such a blazin’ humbug. There comes that blasted Moll. I’ve a notion to wring her neck fur the way she done me out 0’ that—” He stopped suddenly, and retreated tipsily to- ward his chair, It was not thé expected wo- man that had entered the room, but two men, at sight of whom the old drunkard was seized with a fit of trembling. ‘* Dick!” he cried in a maundering tone, ‘ Is it old Dick I see afore me? Guv’ us your hand, old boy. It’s a plaster for sore eyes to see ye, blast me!” Recovering from his first show of consterna- tion he came staggering forward, with a look of drunken welcome in his bloated face. ** That’s all right Joe,” answered Dick, cheer- fully, a a the old fellow’s hand. ‘‘ Come, sit down, I want to talk with you. Help your- self to a chair, Will. Let me introduce you, rentlemen. Mr. William West, Mr. Joseph iroggery.” ‘*It does me proud to know the gentleman,” answered Joe, with great enthusiasm. ‘ Take a cheer, sir. Take a cheer. Won’t ye take some refreshment, gentlemen? It’s a dry day.” ‘* Not now,” rejoined Dick, seating himself with a look of perfect gravity and respect. ‘*You don’t come to see me, Joe, so I come to call on you. You haven’t been at my house since— Let me see.” ‘* Since last summer,” exclaimed Joe, hastily, and with an odd look of affright in his bleared eyes. ‘Spankin’ old time we had. You got boozy, you poly coon. Had to take you home, blast me if [ hadn’t!” He laughed in acroaking and strained tone. ‘* You forget, Joe. You were there one night last week. You went away again without see- ing me, old man.” oe swayed to and fro with his hands on the table. His head trembled like that of a manikin. ‘*Tt’s a blazin’ lie!” he eagerly declared. ‘‘ And the chap that told you is a blazin’ liar! It’sa feller that’s playin’ off for me. Ive heered tell on him. Wants to ’herit my fortune, he does!” There was a steel-blue glimmer in Dick’s eyes as the drunkard said this, in par ero eager- ness. He made a hasty step, as if with intent to take Joe by the shoulders and shake the truth out of him. But he restrained bimself, with a forced laugh. ‘All alone here, old chap? Where’s Moll? Ain’t gone back on you, eh?” ‘* Like to wring her neck,” declared Joe, ina sudden fury. Hate her like rank p’isen!” ‘*Hillo! How’s this? I thought you were as sweet as honey-bee and rosebud. ‘*She’s a blamed beat, dang her pictur’! She’s—” He checked himself suddenly, while a cunning look came into his red eyes. ‘* Dunno, Moll’s prime arter all. ’Tain’t fur me torun down a gal that loves me like a brick loves wa- ter. You know what she is, Dick.” ‘* Yes, [reckon I do,” answered Dick, witha meaning shrug. ‘‘ But, see here, Joe, is this the way totreat an old friend? In my house there’s always a full bottle on the table, and a lunch on the sideboard. Why, you stingy old beggar, are you going to leave me and my friend go away dry?” ‘* No, nary time!” exclaimed Joe, witha burst of enthusiasm, ‘ Ain’t forgotas I was a gentle- man once. *Scuse me:a minute, folks. | He rammed his hat fiercely on his head, and stirted for the door, with both hands thrust deeply into his pockets, as if on a tour of investi- gation. He wasout of the room scarce a minute, however, when he returned with a downcast look on his boosy countenance. ‘Blame me if I didn’t forget,” he declared. | «Tom Sparkler’s shut down on my tick, and £