Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 527 — page 5: what you’re looking at

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

« “Do not fear them, my dear,” said her father, reassuringly. ‘* They shall not harm you. But it will be necessary to evade them by once more assuming a disguise, for the last time in your life.” ‘*And you can find some use for me?” cried the Jack of Hearts. ‘* Yes, you cau serve us materially.” “Command me. I[ am yours without re- serve,” ‘* We shall pass the night at Fiddler’s Ford, and will arrange everything there,” At the Ford Salomans entered his daughter’s room, with a plethoric pair of saddle-bags thrown over his shoulder, ‘* This is your disguise,” he said, throwing the saddle-bags on the ed, and proceeding to open one of them, ‘I left it here, knowing the im- ossibility of setting out on our flight from addy’s Flat. I have horses, too, in readiness. Everything has been carefully arranged.” As he drew forth several gaudily decorated garments, the girl exclaimed in surprise: ‘* A Mexican costume!” ‘* Yes; we will attract less attention in that than any other.” ‘* But this is—this is—” She stammered and looked confused. ‘¢ A boy’s dress,” supplied her father, with a smile. ‘It will throw our enemies the more effectually off our track.” ‘Oh, but I cannot wear such a dress!” She was rosy red with startled greeny Never was a prettier picture than her shrinking maiden shame. : “Tt is necessary, dear,” urged her father. ** And no one who sees you in this will know you, or guess the truth, or ever see you again, Am I not your father, and can you not trust yourself to my guidance?” He was her father. She had been taught un- questioning obedience. Any other course seemed impossible to her. **T made it myself,” he explained. ‘‘ When I was a boy I was apprenticed toa tailor, I had to make it from a general owns, tas of you. I was told that you were about so high, and slight in build. Now you must try it on, to let me see what alterations are to be made, so that it may fit you properly.” He told her the use and mode of adjustment of each garment, all of which were strange to her, and then left her to don the dress, In a few minutes he was timidly summoned back into the room. Never was anything so exquisite as this shy little maiden, with her slender figure revealed by the picturesque costume of a little Spanish grandee, in a pose of shrinking embarrassment. ‘She is a picture for the gods!” thought Sal- omans. ‘*She would make her fortune on the stage, if she could preserve thut grace after nature had ceased to lead her to assume it un- consciously. But her modesty is too extreme. It will betray her real sex, and spoil all.” To her he said: **My dear, you make a charming i No one in the world will guess the truth, when we bave got that great mass of hair out of sight.” ‘* Ah!” she breathed, ‘‘ you will have to cut it off!” She turned very white, and tears Sprung to her eyes. Her beautiful hair was her one little vanity— a harmless one, since it sprung entirely from her love. Harry had admired it, and one day had said that he would not sacrifice one strand of it for all the gold in the Sierras. ‘Cut it off?’ cried Salomans, ‘ Well, I guess not! Do you know the value of such a suit of hair? There are women in New York—for that matter, in any great city--who would give ten thousand—ay, a bundred thousand dollars, for it, if it could be made to grow upon their own heads.” no ‘‘ But no boy’s hair is ever so long. Anybody will know.” ‘‘ We'll see about that. I am not an expert at hair-dressing; but I think I can remedy the dif- ficulty. Sit down, and I will show you what can be done.” Combing her hair from the nape of the neck upward and forward over her head, he braided it carefully, and then coiled it in amass direct] on the top of her head, He next bound about a gay silk handkerchief, so as to entirely hide her hair; and crowned the whole with a heavily- bullioned Mexican sombrero. The crown of the hat was entirely filled with her hair; but there was no trace of it visible to ‘the eye. ‘* There!” he cried, looking at her with satis- ‘faction. ‘‘Thatisatriumph. You are a per- fect little Mexican dandy.” ‘ 7 : *<"o% ‘* > b), \< “sa otc 1 The Jolly Pards to the Rescue, He took from the saddle-bagsa toilet mirror, adding, gayly: ‘‘T am almost afraid to intrust you with it, lest, like Narcissus, you should fall to flirting with yourself.” She looked at her reflection, with a wondering curiosity pretty to see, and blushed rosier than ever. ‘** But, how strange!” she murinured. ‘*‘ Ever a will notice that my hair is so carefully hid- en,” ‘* Why,” exclaimed her father, “have you never seen a Mexican with his head bound in a *kerchief?” ‘*I have seen so little,” she pleaded, shyly. ‘* And there were no Mexicans at Paddy’s Flat, I think.” ‘** Poor child!” cried her father. ‘* Well, we’ll make up for that. You are to live in one of the gayest cities in the world. How shall you like to see people from almost every spot on the earth, with all their strange costumes, and all their queer ways—not as you see them on the stage, but as they are in every-day life?” iriam looked at him in wondering bewilder- ment, all her uneventful life, ‘* the stage ” meant. ** It will be very nice,” she said, in a way that showed that she comprehended it not at all. “Tt is all right to have your hair hidden,” pursued her father. ‘*‘ To-morrow I shall be al- most your counterpart in everything. In that respect there will be no difference.” ** You shall wear a dress like this?” ** Certainly. We shall appear to be a Spanish Don, and his son and heir, on our travels. The girl looked relieved. This gave her more confidence, ‘*T shall not be so much afraid,” she said, say ; *' We ure in luck,” pursued her father. ‘‘ Your dress could not fit you better, if it had been made to measure. That scoundrel was faithful in one—” But here be came to a dead halt. ‘* In the fiend’s name!” he muttered to himself, But Miriam was not on the alert to perceive that he had so nearly betrayed himself. ‘**We must have our friend, Jack, in to see you,” he went on, hurriedly. 4 ec drove every other thought out of her ead. **Oh, no! no! no!” she cried, looking as if she contemplated flight. ‘*My dear, remember that he is a very old friend of mine, and will be as good a friend of yours,” ‘*But I cannot let him see me looking like this! Indeed! indeed !—”" ' “Tt is that you may get alittle used to paving people see you in an unfamiliar dress, that wish it. morrow,” She offered no further objections in words; but she was red and white by turns, trembling hke a leaf; and her eyes looked into those of her father with the piteous, troubled appeal of a dumb animal that dreads some cruel] blow from a hand it has learned to love and trust. **Courage! courage!” said her father, her on the cheek, She did not know what @ must see you, in any event, to- tting “I want to be proud of my little girl’s self-possession, as well as of every- thing else that pertains to her.” | He explained to Jack the part he was to play, and then took him into the room. The heart of the gambler rose into his throat. He had never seen anything that so charmed him. In that first moment his face would in- evitably have betrayed him, but the girl was so much abashed that she could not lift her eyes from the floor, There was a pause before he could control bis voice; but then he spoke with admirable quict- ness. ‘*T should never have suspected you, Miss Miriam,” he said, ‘* No one can possibly guess. It is wonderful, the change a difference of dress will make,” She lifted her eyes timidly to his face. There she did not encounter the bold stare of admira- tion she had dreaded. He looked at, her with no change in the quiet respect he had shown her | from the first. She sighed involuntarily, and murmured: ‘*-You are very kind.” In the morning, Salomans went through a sham sale of one of his horses to the Jack of Hearts, and a real sale of the other to a resident of Fiddler’s Kord, explaining that he had pre- pared to take his little girl on horseback, but found that she was too much prostrated to make the SOreey in that way without prejudice | to her health. # ‘ " pi? ‘i. t, ert pale > . + J oh. a J / y) To Jack he said in confidence: “We are going through a farce which I ex- pected to play without assistance. You have only to go to a neighboring camp, with the sad- dle and bridle over your shoulder; give out that you got lost, and that your horse fell ina treacherous path and broke his leg, so that you had to shoot him; purchase another; and bring the two to the Crossing. The saddles that we are really to use are hidden at band.” So the Jack of Hearts rode away, and a little later Miriam and her father resumed their places in the stage-coach. Some miles out of Fiddler’s Ford, they came to a crossing with another stage road, running southward. Here they were set down, ostensi- bly to wait for the southern stage; and the coach from the Ford went on its way. ‘* This is where our trail will be lost!” declared Salomans. When the coach in which they had come was out of sight and hearing, he hurried Miriam down the southern road a little way, and then leaving it, plunged into the trackless mountain waste She had never been inside a theater in | Close at hand, however, they came upon a secluded spot, where they found the Jack of Hearts in waiting for them, with the horses, ‘*T wish you every success until we meet again,” was his leave-taking. ‘‘ Hark! there comes the down stage. It’s a close shave, [f it had put in an ap ance a little sooner, it would have balked our combination. But I must be in time to take it. Good-by, and God bless you!” He pressed their hands, and hurried away. So it was he who took the southern stage, and shortly after, a rao Mexicon senor and a dainty little Don rode to the north. Miriam’s heart hung in her bosom like a stone. A faint sigh between her pale lips, and the thought that went out with it showed the hope to which she clung till now, ‘** He will never know what has become of me! I shall never see him again!” CHAPTER V. LIFTING THE BLIND. LATE that afternoon, two horsemen rode into a mining-camp which, in characteristic Western style, had been called ‘* Blind Hoss,” One of them was of large frame, with the look of a man who overrode with brute violence every obstacle that appeared in his path. The other was a stocky little rascal, who pee up in low cunning what he lacked in orce. It was almost needless to introduce them, the former as Cale Burchard, the latter as Bow- legged Banty, and to add that they were the same precious pair who had visited Paddy’s Flat in disguise, Both of them looked jubilant and expectant. ‘*What’ll we say?” asked Cale, ‘* Will we jest order him to fork over the girl an’ the rocks, an’ git?” “Waal, you air a blasted fool!” declared Banty, contemptuously, ‘* What’s the reason I am?’ demanded Cale, Wi pose he'd f **What do you su ed say, ef we come down on him in any euch style as that?” ‘* It don’t make a thunderin’ bit o’ difference what he’d say!” ‘*' Waal, I ‘low it jest does,” ‘* What would he say?” ‘‘He’d put it short an’ sweet. deuce !” ‘‘Ain’t we the bosses o’ this hyar game, I want to know?” ‘“Not ina camp whar he kin git backin’ fur the askin’.” ‘* How air we goin’ fur to run it, then?” ‘Why, we've got to play our cards with com- mon decency. We've got to stand in with him tell we git him whar we kin drop him out o’ sight on the quiet.” ‘I’m about sick o’ this soft-sawder biz, It jest turns my stummick, an’ that’sa fact. Hyar we've kep’ it up fur a month o’ Sundays, Now I want to break loose, an’ tear somethin’!” ‘You jest keep yer shirt on! Ef you’d had yous swing, you'd ’a’ knocked Bes in the ead time an’ ag’in, before you the pins balf sot up.” ‘* You're mighty fond o’ runnin’ the game, I notice!” , ‘‘When I git through with this hyar, I'll be hanged ef I don’t cut loose from you fur a blasted fool, an’ leave you to ran yer own ma- chine to yer own satisfaction!” ‘*Hold on, Banty! You're as touchy this mornin’ as gun-cotton. You know I hain’t got no head fur layin’ out work, but Pve got the Go to the ww 4 . ag > | 4 , é "4 F e : ‘ ‘ ] ’ “2 s | 7 x NICDOOKS. ’ —— aon Wie ‘ —