Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 363 — page 4: what you’re looking at

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

knocked you might git fri ee Her eyes were beaming softly upon him, a winning smile opened her rich, ripe, scarlet lips, disclosing the pearly teeth beneath, and with ain soft white hand she was gently stroking his ace, Crowningshield, although the husband, the master, of this marvelous beauty, was as much intoxicated by her fascinations as the drunkard is who fills himself to the lips with liquor. **About your life—why, you were a child, dear, and are not much more now.” ‘*People might say terrible things about a child,” she murmured, laying her velvet-like cheek against his own. Eta he clasped her to his heart. **1 would not allow any one to say a word against my little wife, and the man daring enough to attempt to do such a thing in defiance of my command would be risking his life, for I am certain I should take him by the throat and throttle the lie ere he could give utterance to it! **My darling!” and for about the first time in se life she imprinted a loving kiss upon his ips. Then, almost before she was conscious of what she was doing, she released herself from his em- brace and sprung nimbly to her feet. ‘*At what time do you start, dear?’ she asked, glancing at the clock upon the mantle- piece. *“ Eleven,” he replied and then looking at the a he saw that it was after ten. ‘*I must be off. He rose to his feet, approached the cradle and kissed the sleeping babe, which, seeming to know that its father was near, smiled in his slumber. ‘*Ah, Roxy, if I should lose you and this blessed babe I believe I should go crazy.” Then, with another embrace of the girl and a last lingering look at the child, he departed. ‘** With his love to back me I can defy fate,” she muttered as she sunk into a chair. CHAPTER IV. OLD LEAD PENCIL, THE girl resumed her abstracted air and for ak ten minutes she neither spoke or stirred. Then, abruptly, she lifted her head and looked around her, fixing at last her gaze upon the cradle containing the child. ‘He would go crazy if wife and child were taken from him!” she murmured, repeating the Jast words of her husband. ** Well, he will be rewarded for his faith, for now there isn’t any danger that he will lose either of us; but this afternoon though the scales trembled and the future was very uncertain.” Hardly had the words been uttered when the door suddenly opened and an old man, in a seedy suit, so badly worn that it was al- most in rags, with a long iron-gray beard and gling hair of the same hue ee from under the rim of a shockingly bad hat abruptly entered the apartment. ; ** Excuse my comin’ in without knockin’,” he said, in a husky voice, which had evidently been ruined by too much bad whisky. ‘* But you see, ma’am, I was afeard that if I ghtened, not knowin’ who it was, an mebbe not expectin’ wisitors at sich an hour as this ere, an’ go fur to lock the bloomin’ door an’ then I wouldn’t be able to get |: in at all.” ‘* What do you wish, sir?” asked the girl, in the most matter-of-fact way in the world, just as if it was an every-day occurrence to have a big, burly tramp walk into her room after ten in the evening. But the girl was too cool for the calmness to be natural, and there was a peculiar snaky glitter in her dark eyes which belied her manner. “You're jest old business, ain’t you, every time?” exclaimed the old fellow, with a grin. ** Well, ma’am, I’m on the lead-pencil lay, an’ that’s the kind o’ a frying-pan I am,” and as he spoke he drew a half-a-dozen a lead-pencils from his pocket. ‘* The boys all call me Old Lead Pencil.” **T do not wish any, sir,” the lady responded, indifferently. “Oh, you don’t? Ain’t hankerin’ after any lead-pencils this evening or some other evening; oo ; ee And the old wretch grinned at s joke. ** No, sir, Iam supplied.” “You wouldn’t give me a hundred dollars apiece for three or four of the pencils, mebbe?” ‘**You are crazy, sir!” the girl answered, con- et, **I do not wish your pencils, and you will Det. me by leaving my apartmeut. ** You are an old man, and I suppose you have been drinking more than is good for you, there- fore I would rather not call the police as I sure- ly shall do if you do not depart.’ **Oh, Roxy, you darlin’ dumplin’! you would- n’t play sich a game as that on an old acquaint- — would you?” he exclaimed, with a familiar eer. She rose from her seat and, with a resolute face, approached the casement. — “Tf you do not ee ee depart I will throw up the window and for help!” sh exclaimed. 4 . Crowningshield, the Sleuth. ‘Hold on!” cried the old man in alarm, ** don’t make a Judy of yourself! ‘** You ain’t got no call I’ve come to talk over business with you, quietly and perlitely, an’ if we can’t make a trade, why, But this blow was a stunning one, and rapidly as her mind genera'ly worked it took time for to howl for the police. | her to recover from it, although she had expec- ted an attack and was prepared to resist it, yet she had not calculated upon it descending upon Pll pull up stakes and git out, but don’t go to | her with such terrible force. yelling for the police afore you are hurt.” “Well, sir, say, but be brief, and in the beginning I warn you that you are but wasting time.” She still kept her position by the window, ready to call for aid if the necessity arose. he exclaimed, ‘‘ but for all yer cunnin I’ve got yer dead to rights this time, as you'll | soon see.” ‘*Go on, you weary me!” | ‘* Wal, if you ain’t got a cheek!” the old man exclaimed in amazement, ‘‘Say, yousaw me to-day, didn’t you?” ‘*Why should I trouble myself about such a thing as you are?” she asked in scornful con- | tempt. ‘Say, go slow! you'll be sorry *fore long for cheeking me in this ’ere way. ‘*T know you saw me to-day, for you hurried into the house, thinking that I hadn’t got sight of you. ‘*T made out as if I hadn’t, for as I had lo- cated you, Iwasmightily afeard lest you should take the alarm and give me the slip, for I’ve been arter you for nearly two years now, an’ I didn’t want you to come any eel business on yer : uncle. ‘*- You were well fixed, I could see that by the way you were rigged; you wasn’t starvin’, or slavin’, or nothing, an’ 1 reckoned you'd be good for a small stake anyway, so I jest humped my- self to find out all about you, an’ from w’ot I | heered when you an’ your busband were chin- ning together awhile ago—I was in the entry with my ear to the keyhole, and cotched every word—I reckon I know a heap sight more about | your man than you do.” A look of astonishment appeared in the girl’s eyes. ‘**T do not think that is possible,” she said. ‘Wal, it is,” the old man asserted. ‘ He’s been playin’ roots on you, for all he’s so sweet on you. ‘*T knew what your game was when you asked him if he would take any stock in bad stories *bout you. You had seen me in the neighborhood, and you were a-fixin’ to ward off the blow afore it come.” ‘* My husband would not believe any evil of me,” she remarked, quietly. “I don’t doubt it, particularly when it wouldn’t be an easy job, an’ would be apt to cost a small fortune to bring such proof as the law would demand. ‘You know durned well that a cove with my ugly record couldn’t go into that sort of thing, an’ so you reckoned, when you played yer points so mighty fine with him, that you bad spiked my guns afore I brought ’em to bear on ou.” ‘““My husband will not listen 0 any tales,” she remarked, calmly. ‘* No, but there’s other people that will, an’ mighty glad of the chance they’ll be, too. “Your husband, with all his softness, has fooled you "bout some things. ‘You married him, goin’ on the tack of any port. in a storm. He comes of an old family, one of the big-bugs, a reg’lar gen’leman, an’ no mistake; an’ | s’pose you were glad to strike an’ rest almost anywhere. ‘* But the game your husbend played on you was this: The old captain who is coming to see you to-morrow, instead of being poor, is one of the richest men in Boston, and your husband is to be his heir.” The breath of the woman came quick and hard, for this news astounded her. ‘‘Tf he is satisfied with you, all will be well; you'll go to live on Beacon street, an’ be one of the swellest of the swells; but—” And here the face of the old man took on the expression of a fiend, and malignant triumph rung in his hoarse voice. ‘* S’pose some kind friend takes the pains to go to the old captain and tell him certain things *bout the girl called Roxy Merivale, whom his beloved nephew has married? ‘* Do you s’pose that the old man won’t jump at the chance to find out whether the tale is true or not? , **Do you s’pose, if the suspicion once comes into his noddle that there is a grain of truth in the yarns, that he won’t spend money Jike water to find out all bout it?” The girl was now as pale as death; gasping for breath she leaned against the window-sill and but for the support afforded by it, she would not have been able to stand. : ‘“'That’s Old Lead Pencil’s game and it’s bound to win every time; don’t you forget it, either!” the tramp exclaimed in conclusion. There was a long pause. ; The girl, despite her delicate, fragile appear- ance, was in reality tough and strong, Fire too of a will of iron, and a heart as indomitable as that which ever beat in the breast of a warrior chief born to lead his fellows on to vic- will listen to what you have to | | ** Aha! you’re all the mother from top to toe!” ! and grit | old chap w’ot has had a tough fight with tke css tt A A EL - Finally she recovered sufficiently to say: ** What is it you wish?” ‘t Money of course!” he answered, roughly. ‘Don’t think a stout, healthy old chap lilo me kin live on wind, do ye? ‘You kin get plenty, soI want you to ste!] out a few of yer ducats to help along a peor world. ‘‘Tain’t got long to live, mebbe; I drink too much for the good of my health, but it’s got so that it is like mother’s milk to me and Ilcan’t git: along without it. ‘ve jist been on the hunt for years for te find some kind, charitable soul w’ot would be willing to soothe my declining years, and fix me so I would slide down easy to my last kick. ‘* Tain’ta-going torob you of the money either, that ain’t the kind of a chap I am. ‘‘T’m no feller w’ot goes ’round fixing myself so that the law kin get a holdonme. I’m an honest man w’ot makes a decent livin’ a-sellin” lead-pencils, but when I trade with a gal like yourself I want the profit which you kin afferd to pay. ** These here pencils stand me in a cent apiece at let you have ’em at a hundred dollars @ lick, ‘* A hundred dollars!” exclaimed the girl, con- temptuously, for by this time she had in a grcat: measure recovered her calmness, ‘Heaven help me! I haven’t a hundred cents.” “Tl take w’ot you’ve got,” he replied with a grin. ‘‘ A gentleman of my kidney never stands upon trifles. “T ain’t a-goin’ to be hard on yer. I didn’t calculate that you were well heeled now. But fer all that Pll take what little loose chauge you have handy.” And then he grinned again as if he thought he had ‘ got off” a splendid joke. ‘‘*Tain’t the present, my gal, that I’m specu- latin’ upon butthe future. O I’m along-headed old cuss, I tell yer! ‘*T’m a-lookin’ forward to the time when you won't be squeezed up in such a dog’s hole as this ere,” and he glanced around at the modest, snug apartment in the most contemptuous way. ‘‘T'm a-lookin’ forward to the time when yer will be dressed in silk an’ satins, with dia- monds as big as chestnuts a-sparkling all over er. ‘* When yer kin go to the old coon of a cap’n, an’ strike him fora thousand chocks, ’cos yer want-a new dress, or some thingumbob for to rig yerself up in. ‘Oh, you'll have him dead to rights in less’n a month arter yer git a chance ter git yer fine work in, Then you kin pay me dollars easier than you kin cents now. ‘“You see, Roxy, dear, I’m a-gittin’ old, an” this ’ere trampin’ ’round a-selling lead-pencils ain’t w’ot it’s cracked up to be. ‘‘ A reg’lar allowance would suit me to a dot. I won’t be hard on yer, yer know; I won't go for to rob you; I’m no sich kind of a man. ‘Bout fifty dollars a week, two hundred a month yer know, twelve hundred a year, would be the proper caper.” The girl drew a long breath and her eyes di- lated, a look coming into them that resembled the glare toa shoots from the eyes of the hunted wild beast, when he finds that he can go no further and turns to give battle to the hunter who has run him down, The old tramp though was so busy enjoyin the bright vision which his words had conjure up in his mind that he never noticed the danger- ous expression in the eyes of the girl. ** Yes, yes, that’s the figger!” he continued. ‘* Fifty dollars a week will keep me in rum an’ things an’ then I kin skip out of these rags an’ be a gentleman ag’in. ‘“*T don’t want it paid tome ina lump, yer know,” he exclaimed. ‘Tf I collared it all in a hunk, I would be apt for ‘al go on a spree an’ blow all the ducats to one’t. ‘* Pll fix it with some feller, a third pa er know, that yer kin pay the money ye cuss w’ot won’t squeal, an’ then he kin pay me weekly, so there won’t be ary danger of yer git- tin’ intoany trouble. Oh, Ill fix the thing right up to the handle, yer kin depend upon that.” ‘Why not say a certain sum and have done with it?’ she asked. ‘* Now, yer see that’s where my squar’ness as a. man comes in!” the old fellow exclaimed with an air of great dignity, ‘* I scorn for to take any advantage of yer. “Pm a scholar, I am, an’ my principal study ever since I was a knee-kigh Kid has been my- self. I knows my weaknesses. “If yer were for to stake me with ten thov- sand ducats on condition that I should clear cut an’ never bother yer ag’in, the chances are a hundred to one that ee me back inside of a year, for that’s the kind of a beat I am, ‘No, no, no Jump sum, ’cos I ain’t sure for to | Ss ed Eomicbooks (E(0) iui