Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 908 — page 12: what you’re looking at

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

- « a a <s nae - ‘ = Ws Yea ee [4 or Y “ory : “ . * ‘ i eT ‘e ees -” Keno, but not in the West; but we'll find | him where he should be when we want him,” replied Nat. New York Nat’s Double. and when she left the table after dinner the four other boarders in the house pronounced her a delightful acquisition to their family ‘If I am not, shoot me when you catch | circle. me,” reminded Foxey. ‘* Now, boys, those two men are in on the ranch until the papers stop talking of the Schlossberg murder and robbery. ‘‘Vertner has evidently been in hiding | ‘there before, and took the ranch as a safe re- Before a week had gone by the children hiding | fairly loved ‘‘ Miss Olive,” and Mrs, Mars- den felt toward her as though she were an older daughter, All this time the Girl Detective was study- ing the household, and seeing just what she treat, there being uo railroad within forty | could ferret out of family history. miles, * « He is getting cautiousas he grows older, and tninks it will be safer to lay by until he | Marsden, One day while she was working in her room, making a painting of young Bernard the mother came in and fairly sees the result of the detectives” hunt for | started when she saw the hastily-painted Schlossberg’s murderer, and so he came here with Star Dunning to bide their time, and then get out of the country to enjoy the | boy money they robbed their victim of, and dis- pose of the diamonds, which they dare not offer for sale in this country. likeness of her son. “Ah! Miss Olive, I always thought my resembled his poor uncle, and your painting of him shows it most thoroughly, ‘Why it really resembles my poor brother as he was at twenty more than it does my ‘‘Now, I was told that the ranches are { son.” scattered far apart as we go northward, and the Van Allen ranch is twenty miles from ‘* Why do you speak of him as your poor brother, Mrs. Marsden?” asked Olive, in a the village, and there are a number of cattle | tone full of smypathy. upou it and horses. The tears came into the woman’s eyes and ‘This means that he must have a man in | she replied: charge of it, and perhaps several herders, and they will naturally fight for their em- ‘* Because he has been a poor, unfortunate man, hounded to death and accused of crimes ployer if he called upon them for aid, and | he never was guilty of,” said Mrs. Marsden, we might have two to one against us, so we must go slow.” impassionedly. ‘* Pardon me, but I meant not to cause you ‘You bet we must, Cap’n Nat, but we | sorrow.” must get there all the same,” said Keno, ‘“On, yes, we'll not know fail.” ‘‘T£ we do, it will be the first time the Un- ‘* You have not, for the sorrow is in my heart at all titnes, ‘¢ You are sympathetic and I will talk to known Ferrets have been downed,” said | you, for I have no one to talk to of him, and Foxey. ‘* Now our plan must be,” resumed New York Nat, ‘‘te goto. the ranch, ask to re- main all nigbt, and say we are going down my children do not even know the truth. “May I tell you of my brother, Miss Olive?” : ‘ Certainly, I will gladly hear all you into Texas looking for work, where We can | would say, and you have my sympathy be-. ali be employed together. ‘If Lueins Van Allen, as he is called, is short of herders, and will employ us, why well be right in line, before we have himon the way back to New | He loved wy best friend, York, with Star Dunning as his companion in irons. ‘We can play the detectives well, and when we get further East can wire Mr. Can- forehand.” ‘1 know that, I feel it, ‘‘My brother was the idol of our house- and it will not be long | hold, and grew up a splendid, noble man, Myrtle Gaynor, and won her from all rivals, avd they were pata é ‘‘ But there was one who never forgave him for winning Myrtle, and though he pre- field to meet .us, and turn the prisoners over | tended friendship afterward, he was a snuke to him, so that we will not be known in the matter to uny one, and still remain to the in the grass. ‘‘ He bided his time and plotted my bro- chief of the Secret Service the Unknown | ther’s ruin, for one day Bernard, who was a Ferrets. ‘‘Now we will push on and see if luck cushier of the bank in the town where we lived, was arrested as a murderer and a rob- comes our way, and once we get these men | ber. in the Tombs in New York, Il see to it ‘* Tt was proven, by circumstantial evidence that their victim, Bernard Gaston, is found | wholly, that he had entered the bank at and proven innocent of the charge against him, and for which he is now hiding from ‘the gallows, ‘‘But the Mascot Queen will find him, rest assured,” | Such was Nat’s plot which his two brave young allies entered into with a will, and there was no flinching when at last the lair of the two fugitives came in sight across the prairie. CHAPTER XXII. THE GIRL SHADOWER. Oxrve, the Mascot Queen, drove to the house of Mrs. Martha Marsden, as had been arranged bétween herself and New York Nat, the morning after a room had been en- gaged for her by her alleged aunt, She ecarricd a trunk with her, an easel, portfolio and several small paintings, Mrs. Marsden, a fine looking, but sad- faced lady, received her new guest with kindly manner and took her to her room, Little dreaming that her guest was a fair -dctective, a spy upon her for a special pur- pose, she was at once drawn toward her new boarder, and it was not long before the two ‘became most friendly. Mrs. Marsden’s children, a boy and girl, were also charmed with the artist Loarder, a 7 ‘ . . VAST on? © er oy Sy ay ae toe ri ee oS ‘ > Pte! Poke Mie all , _ - , t ; >» ) »~ : ; > 5, mm oe mY \ i iu pate ott te oe ong Ls ORS Pete free gyre M tee. me! dé. et a : 12 4 . ore ‘ ie x ia : 4 etn i. , , 4 bn tp Me Ah # . “Ft t ae | K; -« > .* iS. 6 ee f ’ ots G 7 tos wi ot , night, to rob it, of course, for he had met with financial losses of late, and the watch- man surprising them, for there were others in the robbery, the poor fellow was killed. ‘“'To declare his innocence was useless, for all pointed to his guilt, and so Bernard, the rival [I referred to, and two others were tried and found guilty, my brother and his one time rivalof murder and robbery, and one other as anaccomplice, while the fourth was cleared for want of evidence, ‘¢ My brother and his rivai were sentenced to the gallows, and the third one to im- prisonment. ‘Knowing his innocence, his noble wife plotted his escape, and she was successful, while surprising to relate, the other two ¢s- caped also from prison, and since have led a life of crime, [ hear,” : ‘‘ And your brother?” asked Olive, in a low, kind tone. ‘* He is in hiding, under an assumed name, living an honorable life with his wife and two children, but alas! crushed under the cloud that is upon him. — * Flere is a letter I have just received from him, and if you will permit me I will read it to ron live showed no triumph in her face or voice as she replied: ‘*T will be glad to hear it,” and she cast a i Lz) i nl i i ae } ° PF ad ‘ 2 ° f 4 +, of : J een. - age oe - | ae - cr . » OFF > . . 7. ~ +a : «hp 4 * ee ‘ + ‘ . ; \ Br hight 7 Ot Bt a a oe a Are, iy 5 . ITS ee . es ‘ “ ~ * . % ot | ° 4 i+* = ‘ - ‘ ~~ é » er ae Ve? ‘ J Y & Sy i ——— ———— a LT TT sly glance at the envelope and the letter, as Mrs. Marsden opened it before her, While listening to the letter, too, the girl detective impressed upon her memory what was written upon the envelope: ‘‘ If not de- livered in five days, return to Miss Teresa Thurston.” The post-office address was also given, and though the envelope was addressed in a feminine hand, the letter was in a@ man’s handwriting. ee CHAPTER XXIII. THE QUEEN'S CLEVER WORK. HaAvine gotten from Mrs, Marsden just what she went to her house to secure, the address of the fugitive brother who was in hiding from the gallows, and the name under which he was hiding, or a part of it, at least, Olive began to Jook about for a means of giving up her room there. She found the house and the people very pleasant, and had really become attached to Mrs. Marsden and. her children. But her home was not there: she had ac- complished her purpose, and duty called her else where, So Olive made her plans to leave, and there were tears in Mrs. Marsden’s eyes when she showed her a telegram that read: ‘You must come home to,.your aunt at once, and her condition is such return pre- pared to remain. ‘¢ FuGENE GARTRELL, M.D.” Of course, this could only be understood | as acall from Mrs. Olivia Chandler’s phy- sician for Olive to come to her aunt at once, and so Mrs, Marsden took it, The girl detective hastily packed up, bade farewell to Ler new-found friends, and de- parted saying she would send an Express for her baggage, She had gone but a few blocks from Mrs, Marsden’s, when she was fairly startled at beholding, as she believed at first, none other than New York Nat. But a closer look revealed that he wore no pink in his button-hole, and, though carry- ing a light cane, it was not the one Nat carried. Then, too, Olive’s keen eyes soon read the difference, startling as was the resem- blance, At once she determined to shadow the youth, whom she now knew as Nat’s Dou- ble; but just then her eyes fell upon a messenger boy on the other side of the street. “It is Flip, and he is shadowing, so I will leave it to him,” she decided, and cross- ing the street she halted Flip with the words! word to me at the same hutel, where I wi registeras Mrs, Olivia Chandler,” She had held her face partly away, and her handkerchief up to her mouth, so with her spectacles and gray hair Flip had not been able to more than get a glance at her before she was gone. It was the first time he had ever seen the Mascot Queen without a disguise; but, then, he had not seen enough to identify a single feature. ’ Going to a hack-stand, Olive sent a driver after her baggage, telling him to take it to the hotel where she had before stopped as - Mrs. Chandler. Then she took the Elevated train for her home, and disguising herself once more as Mrs. Olivia Chandler, she. went to the hotel and secured the same rooms she had before, her baggage having already been delivered under her assumed name, 6 She had not been long in the room when a bell-boy knocked and said: ‘A messenger to see you, ma’m.” It was Flip, and he entered and said. quickly: ’ , “He is stopping in the house, Queen, but may be off at any minute.” Sn "| = if a “ARO ye ‘ oe LAY ¥ - vn, ry re 7 = rt: e ‘ a> com “Tsee you are after him, Flip, so Dying ir Se #«& We + fe | ~ ° baa 8 Py ar ah * * TIS rae es = - a) . 4 > ey = KA a _ , we % . > =") - e _->* ret . at ‘2 a. " = ys, hm oe Oot , ~ ‘a ae 4 a he pont Toh ~~ a Po r — 7 — 7. or a ~ se ~, ICDOOKS.CcCOm