Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 768 — page 8: what you’re looking at

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

8 E Selina’s face grew red, ** And you?” sbe cried, suddenly covering him with her hand. ‘* Wnat will you need one of these days? Where is the man who came to Ragged Robin nearly a year ago? Where is Josbua Meeks, the stranger who was looking for his child?—the man who fell into the trap you set for him? And you stand there and tel] me that I may need a defender some day! Think of yourself; or, do you trust in the men with whom you have surrounded vourself? Is the web accounted sfrong enough to shield you against the vengeance of the future? Do you think that the other child left behind by Joshua Meeks will not fiud his trail and take vengeance ¢ Look to the web you have woven; don’t threaten me,” She was at the door again, but this time he did not stop her. He looked into the face she exhibited and saw triumph there, “You may turn Stirrup Steve over to the merciless court of Ragged Robin, but there will come a day of reckoning, for the hand of ven- geance even now hovers over you,” ‘*Do you mean that the boy up-stairs is a spy against me? Do you intimate that the young half-blood I have taken is against us, and in some one’s pay?” Selina looked back at bim, but did not speak. ‘*Do you think I am in danger by that grow- Jer Phocion?” continued Jack, ‘I can crush himin a moment. He is ready atall times to talk too much, He intimates that the boy— Eagle Ned—vanished in the depths of the Red Rattlesnake Mine, and you know what be means by that. Ican crush this talker in an instant, I say.” ‘*'Then, for your sake, crush him,” That was Selina’s last sentence; she gave Jack another look and went out, * T will if that is what she really means,” mut- tered the nabob, ‘‘Tbe web will catch this fly in red, and put him out of the way, Stirrup Steve is in the ‘oils and be sha’n’t escape to bother me in my play for the girl at the cabin. The sting of the Camp Spider is death, and if Selina gets too smart on my bands, by the eter- nal! she shall go hence never to return,” All this time crouched on the dark stairway of that house, and with ears wide open was a figure which never stirred. It seemed one of the shadows of the place, but it had a pair of blazing eyes and when Selina emerged from the room they saw her and a smile stole over the watchful face, By and by the figure moved and went up the fight, It turned into the room occupied by the half-breed boy, and there in the darkness he threw bis hands to his head and cried out: ‘* Thank Heaven, I am on the trail at last!” CHAPTER IX. PHOCION GOES DOWN A ROPE, THE big miner with the red beard, Alta’s friend under all circumstances, Phocion, the true and courageous, did not like the forced restraint put upon his tongue by the paper founc on the girl’s window sill, He did not like to silence himself when he believed that Eagle Ned had fallen into the web of the Camp Spiders at whose head he thought was Jack Jargo, ‘' The Count.” If he could only get into the tunnel and see for himself; if he could but pass beyond the door of stone which had closed on the boy, he would be satisfied, and if be did not find him there, then he would be willing to draw some of the sus- picion from the men who Were under bis ban, But bow to get into the walled-up tunne:? That was the perplexing question, In his dilemma Puocien bethought himself of Nixy, the supposed simple, if not, crazy, man of Ragged Robin, and shortly after leaving Alta’s home he ran across bim, Nixy had heard of the killing of Red Mart and of the arrest of Stirrup Steve for tbe crime, He shook his head hen Phosien asked bim if he believed the young man guilty, and that was as far as be would go. **You’ve been everywhere, Nixy,” said the red-beard, ‘' You ought to know how the earth looks underneath Ragged Robin,” ‘*T know,” grinned the one-eyed man, bis single optic glowing with delight, ‘** But you don’t know bow to get to the Devil’s Tunnel only by way of the mine,” Nixy looked at Phocion as if he thought he was being drawn into some sort of trap, but when he found that the red-beard was in earnest he came closer and lowered his voice. ‘‘T know another road toit.. L am the only living person who knows it and I have never told arg one.” Here was the very information Phocion want- ed, but would Nixy consent to give it to him? The meeting ended in the one-eyed agreeing to take Phocion to the secret trail and not long ufterward they were going toward the moun- tain, Some distance from the mouth of the mine the madman raised a large stone disclosing an open- ing in the earth and looking up into Phocion’s face he told him that by dropping fifty feet be would land on a level with the floor of the tun- nel, ‘Tl go down,” said the red-beard. ‘“ But when were you there last?” ‘Not for more than a year,” was the reply, ‘fand see, Captain Phocion, no one has come up out cf this hole for the suil hasn’t been disturbed,” Phocion bad already noticed this and bis heart for a moment sunk within him, But he repeated his resolve to go into the tunnel though he did not disclose bis motive. Nixy ran back to camp and procured a long rope which was strong enough to bear the tainer’s weight and he saw the body of Paocion go down into the gaping bole, Obeying the miner, Nixy drew’ off to watch for bis return, and with his ner¥eés! on tension, Phocion went hand over band down'thé cord and stopped at last on a stone floor, ) /'#v 96 He found himself in a tunnel' Whicl was full of foulair against which be had pri&widédbefore de- scending, and in a little time’h# @&s groping along the wall on his right, now Sha then feeling near the ground as if in search of sometbing sup- posed to be there, All at once Phocion stopped with a cry and stood still. His feet had touched sometbing, ‘* It is Eagle Ned, just as [ suspected,” he said tohimself, ‘I have found tke boy,” Filled with emotion, the red-beard leaned against the wall, nct strong enough to strike a lig!.t, and look at the object lying at his feet. At last he stooped again and put down his hand. It touched a beard as rough as bis own, “This isu’t Ned after all!” he cried, ‘*The tunnel is inhabited by a dead man,” His match showed bim the face which bad startled Eagle Ned, and holding it near the eyes he gazed at the strangely preserved face of the victim of a crime, ‘* Whar bave I seen a face like this one?” said Phocion. ‘* There is something familiar about it. Ho! itis the face of the man who drifted into Eagle Buttes when I was there, nearly a year ago. He said he was looking for a missing child and I remember how they laughed at bim and gave bim shelter, believing him a man some- what out of his head, This is the same face—l know it is,” Phocicn inspected the whole length of the tunnel and wound up in front of the stone wall which the hands of some one unknown to him had built, ‘‘ The mine is out yonder,” said he, ‘ This is the door the trowels of the Camp Spiders made, This is a mystery, sure enough. Eagle Ned «lid not have a rope when be came to the mine with The Count, but he isn’t bere and the mouth of the tunnel is walled up.” The more Phocion tried to sulve the mystery the deeper it grew and he at last gave it up in despair. By and by be went back to the man lying in the dark and once more looked down into bis face. He looked into his pockets, but found nothing. He bad not seen the stranger in camp and did not know before that in his wanderings he bad come to Ragged Robin. When he dis- covered the dagger wound in the neck he felt that the hand which bad killed Lazarus and Red Mort also finished this person, Phocion went up the rope by the help of the wall and appeared suddenly to Nixy on the watch, The one-eyed man bad seen DO one and the coast being clear they returned to camp, Whev Nixy asked Phocion how he liked the Devil’s Tunnel, the latter shook his bead but said nothing, Tbe mystery of the dead man whose grave was the tunnel itself was as deep as ever and when Phocion went back to bis cabin he sat down and thought over his adventure, : = last be put out the light, but did not go to ed, ‘*T can’t get the dead man in the tunnel out of my head,” he muttered. ‘‘ He was killed for something. When | saw him in Eagle Buttes he was as poor as Lazarus, though he said he was richer than they supposed; but we thought that meant nothing,” There came toward the shanty from the street a figure that bad the gliding motions of a panther, It was, however, the figure of a man, and as it neared the shanty, it crept along the ground unseen as yet by Phocion, who was seat- ed in the dark trying to solve what to him was av impenetrable puzzle, Nearer and nearer to the door glided the figure, In one band, firmly clutched, and lying along the sleeve of a dark coat, lay a knife, the blade of which was so well hidden that it reflected no light from the stars, It was dftawn back asif for a blow, and when the other band of the man touched the latch of Phocion’s door, he wound his fingers about the hilt of the blade with more firmness than before. Just then the red-beard heard a sound, the first one telling bim that some One was outside, He rose and crossed the floor, but the next moment there was aloud report and something fell against the door, and seemed to sink to the ground beneath it. Startled by the shot, Phocion ran to the por- tal and opened it. In the starlight lay the figure of a man, a man with a mask over bis face, and Phocion, stand- ing there and looking down at the form, felt that his life had been saved, No ove came forward to acknowledge the shot, no person ran up to see how true it bad been, and though Phocion looked and listened, nothing rewarded him, He bent over the man and lifted the mask, Then be saw the knife gripped by bands that would never wield it again, and looking up be silently thanked bis unknown friend, ‘It is Durango Dave,” said Phocion, ‘* He came hither with evil intent. They want my blood and—” He looked across the Plaza, and saw three men running toward the shanty. They seemed to have emerged from Black Burt’s, and he saw that they were men attached to Jack Jargo and his fortunes, ‘‘ What is this?—a dead man at your door, Phocion?” they cried, balting before the red- beard, who looked at them with an expression of amazement, ‘You see bim as I found bim just now, It is Durango Dave. Some one shot bim, and be fell where he lies, with the knife in bis band.” The three looked at one another astonished, and then at the man so quiet on the ground, ‘“Are you sure you don’t know who shot him?” one of them asked, ; ‘‘T don’t know. I was inside when | beard the shot, and when I came out I saw no one.” ‘“That’s a queer story, don’t ycu know, Pho- cion ?” ‘Tt is the truth,” The lips of the speaker shut bard and em- phatically bebiod bis words, The three turned and went back toward the saloon, leaving Phocion alone with the dead, The miner seemed to know what tbat silent re turn meant. They would come again, and there would be more of them, They were Durango Dave’s friends; they hated bim (Phocion), and they would not let any one believe, not it they could help it, the story be bad told of the shoot- ing at bis door. Vbat should he do? He might flee,to the mountains and escape the cbarge and arraign- ment which he felt would surely come, but that would be tbe act of a coward, and Alta would be left alone, When Phocion looked again toward Black Burt’s, be saw fully twenty men advancing across the Square, He eyed them without a quiver; not 4 muscle moved in fear, When they came up and looked at the man at his feet, their leader said: ‘ Wearrest you for the murder of Durango Dave.” —. a! CHAPTER X, THE TRAP THAT CAUGHT—NOTHING, PAGGED Rosin laughed at the defense Pho- cion made, The Count who heard of the arrest soon after it had been effected, came out of ube palace and looked at the prisoner who bad been es-orted to the bar-room and arraigned for instant trial. Stirrup Steve was not forgotten in the new events, and when the Spiders of Ragged Robin surged into the saloon and looked at the calm Pbocion standivg against the bar covered by half a dczen revolvers, they were not long de- manning bis life. Presently there appeared at the open door a face which was seen by half a dozen miners at ence, It was the face of Alta and when she saw Phocion environed by the toughs and realized that with bim she “ould lose a firm friend, she almost sunk to the ground, ‘‘ Beeort the girl back,” whispered Jack, to his nearest neighbor who went forward, but Alta “a . . e fu “ s -DOOKS.CO v's * i ; Pr e et 2), at a he to 4, of mM ; 7 =). ;