Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 380 — page 10: what you’re looking at

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

10 The Golden Serpent. ° such a scrape. matizing the woman who had drawn him into ‘* Merciful Fathers!” screamed the Honorable Mrs. Spike, fighting off her assailants tooth and ** We'll never come through it with our lives!” | nail. ** You don’t dast to touch me, you brutes! groaned the Hon. Benoni Spike, who was insuch | I’m a lady and the wife of a legislator of a state of moral and physical collapse that Hugh | the State of Californy! | for this outrage! But Mrs. Spike was too angry to yield to| spark of shame left in you, ca Cole offered him his arm, fear. ** Was there ever such a brazen creature?” she cried, flashing a look of withering scorn upon the Queen of the Road-Agents, Then turning to the sturdy fellows who obeyed her slightest beck, she threw down this scathing challenge: ‘ Are you men to allow yourselves to be led about by this trapesing hussy?” “Take it coolly, ma’am,” warned one of the | outlaws, ‘‘ or we may find it necessary to put a porous-plaster over your mouth!” ** Benoni Spike!” cried his wife, with now a | ring of hysterical rage in her voice, ‘‘am I to be insulted by these wretches? protection that | may look for from such a—” ** My dear,” groaned the Hon. Benoni, ‘‘ you have brought it all upon yourself. God knows I would never have come to this wilderness of in- iquity but that you baited me to it.” This poltroonery roused Mrs, Spike’s standing irritation against her husband, and turning to the outlaw, she cried: ‘“*See here, Mr. Robber! insolence to me, if you will cut a gad as big as It’s little | Tll forgive your | | | | your thumb, and take that shivering coward and | whale him until he bellers likea calf!” **Oh, mamma! how can you?” cried Abigail. And slipping by sweet Lispinard de Morgan’s rather flaccid offer of assistance, she sprung lightly to the ground, and running to her father threw her arms about his neck, turning her hea ‘to look at the road-agent with eyes that blended pleading with defiance. “A charming mother-in-law!” reflected the dear dude. But the ghosts of unpaid tailors’ bills rose-to haunt him; and adjuring them in the name of a certain bonanza in which the Hon, Benoni Spike held a controlling interest, he resigned himself to his fate with a sigh, feeling that he went as a sheep to the shambles! Hugh Cole’s eyes were upon Abigail. Her championship of her father set a 2 about his heart. There was another not untouched by it. The outlaw lifted his hat and said: ‘* You needn’t be skeared 0’ me, miss. There don’t nobody put upon the old man while you're by, you bet yer rocks!” : “Thank you!” said the girl, feeling that he Was a very magnanimous rascal after all. By this time Uncle Billy Hodgson had had his little joke with the outlaw who sought to “ strike him whar he lived;’ and with unabated cheer- fulness he addressed the Queen of the Road- Agents: MRS ‘I suppose, ma’am, it is now in order for us to get into line preparatory to being plucked.” er manner showed that she was unaffected _ by the little episode in which Abigail had been an actor; and equally heedless of Uncle Billy, she waved her hand ina doubtless precon- certed signal to her subordinates. It set them in motion, to the end that several led horses were brought forward. ‘““You will mount the horses that are sever- ally supplied to you,” said the Queen to the astonished travelers. ‘* Mount the horses? What for?” asked Judge Littlejohn, sourly, her eyes happening to rest upon him as she issue] the order. ‘“Because you are my prisoners, and I com- mand you to!” was the haughty response. ‘* But, my dear madam,” interposed Uncle Billy, blandly, with that repeated bowing which is intended as a mark of signal defer- ence, while he ‘‘ washed his hands with the invisible soap in imperceptible water,” ** is not this a little irregular? As for the filthy lucre, take it, and permit us to go on our ye re- joicing. There is no reason why one should be eavier of heart because lihter of purse. But to impede a servant of this great common- wealth in the performance of duty—that, mad- am, is a more serious matter.” | i } | | ‘‘Throw them into the saddle!” cried the | Queen of the Road-Agents, her dark, Spanish eyes flashing fire, while the imperious gesture of her little hand was'truly regal, Like men accustomed to instant and unques- tioning obedience, the outlaws leaped to the grount and proceeded to execute her orders iterally. Tadce Littlejohn was caught off his feet and set astride a plunging and snorting horse with a celerity that ‘‘ made his head swim.” Resigning himself hopelessly to his fate, the Hon. Benoni Spike was tossed into position like a sack of meal. ip The two brawny fellows who precipitated themselves upon Uncle Billy had more diffi- culty. With his bulbous “corporation” and his fat legs, he turned the scale at too high a figure to allow of his inertia being overcome without more deliberate effort. ‘Don’t drop me, boys!—I’m tender!” he chuckled, as he put an arm about the neck of either, while they staggered beneath his weight. | somerset. I'll have you hanged | You, ma’am, if you have a off your wretches! ‘** BENONI!” That shrill appeal to her husband, which marked the moment when she was ‘“‘sailing | through the air,” was the woman’s involuntary recognition of him as her natural head, when it came to physical vivlence, though she had bul- lied him for years. Meanwhile the sweet dude came in for his share of discomfiture. ‘*Oh, Tsay! Really, now!” he protested. But his persecutors thought themselves in es- pecial good luck, getting so fair a subject as a butt of indignity. ‘ ‘*Give him the grand bounce, Tom!” cried | one of them, ‘‘One! two! three! and away he goes!” His eye-glass flew in one direction, his heels in another, as they tossed him a peanpvate | Feeling as if he had been struck by a Western tornado, he found himself astride a beast that wouldv’t stand still, clinging to its mane for dear life, his hat gone, and his coat turned over his head. Her father actually assaulted, Abigail shrunk back in terror. to feel a not over-gentle hand laid on her own shoulder. But Hugh Cole sprung before her; she saw | his arm shoot out straight from the shoulder, heard the dull thud of his clinched knuckles rap-’ ping a rather hard head, and was free! ‘Hands off, my man!” rung out his manly baritone, in a cadence of command about which there could be no mistake. ‘ This is my office, if a2 please!” nd quickly catching Abigail in his arms, he placed hap in the saddle so deftly and so gently that her horse was not startled, but for the prancing of his fellows. Her arm clung about his neck, her eyes sought his appealingly, as she said, in a low, | agitated voice: “Oh, Hugh! don’t let them harm papa!” | He started. This was the first real glimpse | into her heart he had ever had. | How often she must have repeated his name to herself, to be thus totally unaware that she had uttered it aloud! But there was no time just then for even so much as a quick pressure of the arm that encir- | cled her, to recall her to self-consciousness, and | tc tell her by love’s telegraphy that he knew | and was glad. In springing to her rescue, he had eluded the outlaws who sought to seize him, and his light- ning blow had won their admiration, so that _ they stopped and stared, their faces on a broad | grin of appreciative surprise. | i > m! gents, he’s been thar before!” cried one of their number. : ‘‘Fur a swipe as is a swipe, he’s jest greased | lightnin’!” ‘But Black Barnaby! An’ he fotched him the fu’st pass.” ** He'll swaller ’im!” ‘Don’t you resk nothin’ on that thar proposi- | tion. Thar never was a good man but he found | his better.” The burly ruffian whom Hugh had felled to the ground rose again to his feet with the look | and roar of an enraged bull, except that his roar added blasphemy to sound. ‘““Swing open the door down below!” he bel- lowed; ‘“‘fur hyar’s a pilgrim bound for sheol, hot-foot!” And as he struggled to his knees, he snatch- ed a huge revolver from its holster at his back, and brorght it round to the front. CHAPTER XIII. HUGH “DOTS AN I.” | Wirs a light spring and a deft kick, Hugh | al the weapon spinning from the ruffian’s | and. Abigail, who had been paralyzed into silence by the sight of his peril, put her hand to her | heart and swayed in her saddle; but the percep- | tion that he was not yet safe kept her from | fainting. Black Barnaby, who owed his sobriquet to his mop of raven hair and beard, and to the devil- ish malignity of his frown when enraged, leaped | to his feet, shrinking back and crouching like — a wild beast preparing fora spring, while he lared with brutish astonishment and murderous | te at the man who had twice thwarted him, A moment thus, and then, with a harsh hissing sound which was more terrible, more deadly than his louder demonstration of anger, plucked | a bowie from his hip, and hurled himse ba | his enemy, with a downward chopping blow that seemed as if it might cleave him to the waist. | Hugh planted himself firmly upon his feet, and | met the rush without saa ei ; He arrested the descending bowie by mnigies the wrist of the murderer in his left hand; an | seizing his belt with the other, he executed a quick spring and twist, used in shoulder-and- 4 that of the bully so that the latter lay fairly _ their fate was to be, this act 0 elbow wrestling, which brought his body under across his back. In this position it required no great exertion of his muscles to toss his antago- nist into the air, turning him over and landing him on his back with a crash that knocked the breath out of his body. A dexterous wrench at the same time caused the bowie to drop from his nerveless grasp. Hugh caught it up, and presenting it hilt- foremost to the Queen of the Road-Agents, said nia a courtly and altogether self-possessed ow: ‘*Madam, if you have a better man, fetch him on.” The woman’s eyes widened and brightened with admiration as she received the weapon. ‘* Thave no better man,” she said, ‘* And if I had, you should not be exposed to so unfair an attack again, after so gallant a defense,” ‘*Oh, that’s nothing!” said Hugh, with a care- less wave of the hand. ‘‘ Every school-boy ought to be up in those little tricks.” ‘*The which deuced few school-boys be, or I’m a liar!’ muttered one of the outlaws with en- thusiasm. ; ‘* Are you unarmed?” asked the Queen of the - Road- Agents. ‘*Hardly!” replied Hugh, with a smile. ‘* ’m not so thoroughly unfledged a tenderfoot as to come into a country like this without the means of defending myself.” ‘Yet, with your life menaced—” ‘* By such a fellow? He’s not so dangerous as he looks, my dear madam.” ‘* He is the most powerful man I have in all my force.” ‘But not the quickest, I’ll venture to say.” And Hugh cast a smiling glance around on the men which put them all in excellent humor with him. Each flattered himself that he had _ been singled out by ‘' the boss” as Black Barna- by’s superior in quickness: if not in strength, and all rejoiced see overthrown the bully whom all feared. Meanwhile Black Barnaby had been gather- ing his scattered wits and getting on his pins again. He rose with the ugly look of a buffalo bull, downed, but not done for. It was plain that he was one of those hard-headed fellows who never know when they are whipped. ‘‘ At all events, he doesn’t seem to have had enough,” said Hugh, standing gracefully at ease. ‘** For his own sake, T should prefer that he would not force any more dirty work upon me.” ‘‘ He shall not!” cried the Queen of the Road- Agents. ‘‘Halt where you are! Another step toward this gentleman, and I will pierce you to the heart!” She transferred the bowie to her left hand; and plucking a glittering stiletto from her girdle, threw back her hand eeny to hurl the steatily, toy at her subordinate if he dared to mutiny against her will. e stopped at once, and stood with hanging head, casting a single glare of bate under his beetling brows at his nonchalant conqueror. ‘* Don’t play the hog Barny!” muttered one of his companions, ‘ ‘A man ought to know when he’s got his belly full.” “To horse!” cried the Queen of the Road- Agents. And all bounded into the saddle. ** Forward!” commanded the Outlaw Queen, herself leading the Ba With a great whisking of tails, a flying of heels, and a seattering of gravel, the whole cavalcade swung into a spanking gallop. It was evident to the p hat, whatever rigandage had been carefully planned, since side-saddles had been provided for both of the ladies, _ They, both being used to equestrian travel, rode without discomfort. But, alas, for ‘‘the dude, the dandy dude!” He had trotted ‘‘ on the boulevard,” beating his sides with his elbows like a bantam gettin ready to crow; but when it came to the wild, free gallop of this country in which everything accommodates itself to the immensity of ‘ el- bow-room,” his hair fairly rose on end. With bowed back, be clung to his horse’s mane, at every bound whaling the poor beast’s sides with his legs as if they were flails, The Hon. Benoni Spike could manage a horse better than he could a woman; so in that re- ae nothing was added to his mental distur- nce, Judge Littlejohn rode with set teeth, the vocabulary of even Western execration inade- quate to express his sentiments toward the wo- -man who had got him into this scrape. Uncle Bill odgson laughed as he panted: “This will be the death of me, if I don’t break the back of this unfortunate beast before long!” ta Hugh Cole was gallantly attentive to Mrs, Spike. He knew that Abigail could take care of herself, and that she was content to ride at her father’s side. Standing in the middle of the road with his hands in his pockets, and looking after his de- parting passengers and then at his empty coach, the driver said, with great coolness, things considered: ‘Tally one fur a sweep!” ae IGOMIGDOOKS I. Pr ee ae cor