Beadle's Dime Library No. 392 — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

wy se ae Via The ost Bonanza. 13 She did not want to be seen by Ruby Rob, or i left. ‘‘We expected ter run across you at Gold-dust James. Tartarus Gulch, but we bappened ter find you Fortune seemed to favor the camp Cleopatra | on this Side.” for she reached a certain long cabin somewhat! ‘‘ What does it all mean? lower than the others and with the looks of a} me an inkling of it?” stable. | “That’s ag’in’ orders, too, but you'll know ‘‘ [ will take Blackwings. He gave the horse | soon enough.” to me a year ago and I will only be taking my ‘“Was it necessary to shoot my companion?” own,” she murmured. ‘The horse is the best! And the eyes of the speaker suddenly flash. in Satanscrown, and by morning I will have; ‘‘Was that the command, too? You did not eee ( to the door, which she secured against intru- 1 sion by means of aniron bolt. Then she came back to the little table and went to work. ‘* What fortune is this that brings me face to face with a cipher which I have seen before?” she suddenly exclaimed, after a few minutes’ work. ‘‘Is this cipher connected with the iden- tity of the heiress of the Golden Gate? And is it really the one taken by Colonel Tarantula rte Spar Won’t you give a ee a ee , $ ee ee ee from the corpse of the Silent Hound?” lor some time longer Nugget Nell worked on the cipher, and on a piece of paper under her right hand she wrote word after word until the work grew into intelligible sentences. It was evident that her excitement was in- creasing as she toiled. Not once did she look up; the door was barred, and nobody could in- trude. lf she had looked up she might have seen a face at the little window beside the door. It was a smooth face, with the most piercing eyes, and these were riveted upon her while she worked away at the cipher. All at once Nugget Nell sprung up with a cry that seemed wrung from her heart. ‘¢ This is the work of a veritable fiend!” she cried, staring at the cipher document, which looked innocent enough in the lamplight. ‘* When am I to be free from that man?—free from that merciless threat of his? I will go back tomy work, I will write out the whole paper, but I will destroy the translation. Ruby Rob shall be met with a deliberate falsehood when he comes back. He shall be told that for once a cipher has failed me. My very life depends on a lie of this kind!” She went back to the table with the glitter- ing eyes at the window, but her face now had no color and her hands shook as she wrote. **] wouldn’t show him this for the world,” she exclaimed at last. ‘‘This paper was intended forme. He knew that I could master this cipher. Oh, the infamous monster!” She clutched her translation, and was about to tear it up when a light noise startled her. In a second she whirled toward the door. All at once she saw the eyes at the window. The face was laughing now. ‘* You back here!” she cried, springing toward the window; but suddenly she drew back and stared at the face like a person frightened to the bounds of reason. There was no reply. “If you will come in I will fight you with re- volver or knife!” she went on, ** You wrote this cipher message for me. You knew that it would be brought to me for translation. I hate you now as I loved you once! Comein if you dare!” There was yet no reply: the face at the win- dow was certainly Colonel Tarantula’s, the eyes also were his. All at once the apparition vanished. and Nug- got Nell reeled toward the table as if the sudden disappearance had unnerved her. The translation of the cipher was clutched in her hand. She sunk upon the little couch with a wail of despair. ‘Why let him play this game of threat and mystery over me?” she said, ‘‘He certainly knows the secret I have tried to keep. He is liable to whisper itin Ruby Rob’s ears, What does he say in the message?—‘I am tempted to make your last conquest a tiger who will take your blood,’ What does that mean? That he is ready to tell the secret to Captain Rob! My God! Iam expected to read my translation of the message to Ruby Rob when ke comes! I would not do this for a solid globe of gold! I am going away.” She went to the window and looked out. The moon hung like a rounded shield in the heavens, and here and there the ground looked like a rough silver pavement. Shesaw nobody. The face that had frightened her with its diabolic grin had disappeared. The gold-camp seemed asleep, although it was not very late. They can finish this hunt for the Golden Gate heiress alone,” she said when she came back to the table. ‘I have longed to share in the - vy but I will never touch a dollar of it now. his man stands between me and my ambition. If he were dead, and I’d want to see him buried before I would call him that, I could stay here and help Ruby Rob play his game out; but with Colonel Tarantula alive and in — of my one secret, I cannot stay. It drives me from Satanscrown, it makes a fugitive out of me, and I can never turn my face toward San Fran- cisco!” She took her translation of the cipher message and held it over the flame of the lamp until it fell charred and worthless from her hand, The cipher itself still lay on the table, and it seemed as if she dared not touch that. It was Ruby Rob’s property and she knew him too well to lay a destroying hand upon it. _** He can never decipher it,” she said. ‘‘ I be- lieve there are but two living persons equal to the task, Colonel Tarantula and myself.” Five minutes later Nugget Nell opened the enbin door and went out. There was deter- mination in her eyes; she had resolved on some- thing desperate. She kept in the shade of the cabins and walk- ed stealthily toward the eastern end of the strag- gling camp. Her footsteps sent forth no sound, SS many miles between me and this vee Nugget Nell opened the door of the long build- ing and went fearlessly in. The interior was dark, but she knew where to go, for she found a horse that greeted her with a low neigh of recog- nition. It took but a little while for her to sad- dle the animal, and then she led him out and down the road which soon lost itself, as it were, among the mountains. Glancing back once she saw an open door and a bright light beyond. It was Cuban Con’s lace. ‘*T told Captain Rob that I wanted two hours on the cipher and he acquiesced,” she said to her- self. ‘* An hour still remains, and I shall be far away at the end of that time.” A short distance beyond the lost cabin Nug- get Nell stopped the horse and mounted. The road there was yielding, grassy in some places and dusty in others. It was soft enough to prevent the hoofs of a horse from sending forth any sound, and the beautiful fugitive from Satanscrown rode noiselessly away. “TT will give the camp a new sensation,” she laughed. ‘There will be no one to call the roll of the Jewels hereafter. Captain Rob will won- der what took me off. I wouldn’t have him know for all the gold at stake in the e he mare Colonel Tarantula, imp and fiend, would to heaven you had never crossed my path! Should we meet again my arm will prove strong enough to remove from earth forever the sharer of my secret.” The Cleopatra of Satanscrown went over the road at a smart gallop. She heard no follower at her horse’s heels, she looked back and saw sean every semblance of a gold-camp had van- ished. She was alone among the mountains; she was a fugitive after a long life among the roughs of Colorado; she had turned her Rack upon the man who had fetched her to Satanscrown, the man whom she actually loved with a tiger’s pas- sion. A week previous she would have laughed at the thought of deserting Ruby Rob. A mile was between her and Satanscrown; the road was narrow and there were high walls on either hand. Here and there the shadows of rocks and trees fell across the trail ghostlike an fearful, but the well-trained horse did not shy. All at once something touched the woman. The animal seemed to have been touched at the same time, for he turned his head. Nugget Nell looked to the left and saw a man riding at her side! It was apparent that this person had just come up, and that the narrowness of the trail at that spot had caused him to touch her. The discovery sent a chill to the woman’s heart; she recoiled from the man, and her hand went toward the revolver with which she had provided herself; but at that moment the unin- vited companion leaned forward and his fingers closed on her arm. ‘* You read the message, and are going away, eh?” he laughed, showing her a pair of glittering eyes. ‘* Why don’t you ride toward Frisco, my California Borgia?” Nugget Nell uttered a cry and tried to break from his grasp. ‘‘For Heaven’s sake, let me go on!” wailed from her heart. ‘* Let you go? Not yet! I want you in Satans- crown for a while yet. Come! you will go back with me.” ‘* With you ?” | ‘With the man whose blood you could drink —with Colonel Tarantula!” And Nugget Nell, almost in a swoon, saw her horse’s head turned toward Satanscrown. CHAPTER XV. IN THE EAGLE’S TALONS, THREE persons on a Wild road, but not near Satanscrown., ' Two are men past thirty-five, rough-lookin fellows, with big hats and dark faces. wit long mustaches and with spurs on their boots; the other is young and handsome, with soft < be vanes a grayish hat, and hair like threads of silk, The big men watch this third person as the eagle watches the dove in its power, Their eyes glitter with victory and every now and then they exchange glances that can have but one meaning. ‘You don’t like to talk, eh?’ suddenly laughs one of the men addressing the person between them. ** Why should I? I have said all that I can pr: I have pleaded with you, but you will not n rs It’s agin’ orders; we war sent ter do a sar- tain thing an’ we hev done it, eh, Onyx Oll?” ‘**'Yes,” nods the desperado’ on the youth's give him a chance to tell you who we were. You came upon us suddenly; you lay in am- bush for us like road-agents, and with the command to throw up our bands, one of you fired and my friend, Idaho Ivan, cree from bis saddle. We were on our way to lar- tarus Gulch; perhaps we did not intend to stop there, but this has nothing to do with this ease. Almost before. my triend tcuched the ound, I was your prisoner. You seemed to be on the lookout for me. I am Mountain Moss and a young girl, but for all this there may come a day of retribution for the shot that killed Idaho Ivan.” “We'll risk that, my mountain beauty,” laughed Jasper John, ‘‘Ef it warn’t ag’in’ orders, we’d answer al] yer questions, but, as it is, we can’t. Ef you'll hev a little patience you'll know every thing soon enough.” ‘‘ Am I going back to Trigger Bar?” ** Not just now.” | Mountain Moss who was the person between _ the two ruffians made no reply. a She had been found by a part of the gold- ~~ gang, and the flight from Trigger Bar with the young miner Idaho Ivan had terminated dis- astrously. Now she was going, she knew not where, only it was certain that the two roughs did not intend to escort her back to the Bar where she had a friend and a champion in the person of Pious Phil. Pt She knew, too, that the two men were nob ~— traveling the same road by which she had left mountain camp. The path traveled seemedlittle better than a trail; it was not straight, but wound in and out like a serpent. Mountain ~— Moss was on a trail entirely new to her, which was not strange, since she bad never seen the place called Tartarus Gulch. : What had become of the three men whose sud- den appearance at Trigger Bar had caused Idaho Ivan to conduct her from it? Had they left and were her captors two of them? She did not think that Onyx Oll and Jasper John were an- other branch of the gang that had hunted for — years for a clew to a mystery worth more than a million dollars. re The two sports took delight in watching their _ captive. They could have told her that they — were conducting her to Ruby Rob at Satans- crown, that she was in all probability the — famous heiress of Golden Gate, and that she was _ worth more to them than the biggest gcold-mine — in the rich Northwest. Ba But as Onyx Ol] had several times repeated, it was “ag’in’ orders,” and the mystified girl saw © that she was only wasting words on the twomen — into whose ret she bad fallen. med And so she rode along between the twosports, — wondering what was to be the outcome of ber capture, and sighing audibly at times when she thought of the heartless shot that had tum- — bled Idaho Ivan headlong from his saddle, ees Suddenly there rung out the sharp report ofa rifle, and the robust figure of Jasper Jchn rose suddenly in his stirrups, and with a wild cry © pitched forward over his horse’s ears! Ne Mountain Moss raised her head at the shot, — and her eyes suddenly kindled with hcpe. Onyx Oll darted at her, and his bronze hand closed on her arm as with the disengaged fingers he drew — and cocked a heavy revolver, ' 2 ee “Try that ag’in an’ I kill the person by me!” he shouted to the person whose shothed tumbled J John. ‘I bold my revolver at thet per- son’s head, an’ my finger isatthelightesttrigger in Colorado!” Ce Mountain Moss looked into the speaker’s face. He was leaning toward her almost out of the © eS saddle, and his hand was pressing the revolver | against her head. There was “‘skoot” in the —— desperado’s eyes and death in the words he sent toward the person who bad fired the shot. THe a so \ two horses were walking slowly over the trailat — that moment lying in moonlight; behind them stood Jasper John’s horse with his nostrils against the stalwart figure lying across the trail - with a splotch of crimson on the gray shirt front, ; ee The second shot did not come, which told Mountain Moss that the slayer saw her periland — would not shoot. » ‘* Don’t lift vour hend! utter nocry,” admon- _ ished Onyx Oll. ‘* The person who firedthat shot killed the wrong man. You are going to the captain either dead cralive. Thisisagame — for big money, girl, and we are prepared to play i anv hand for it.” v3) The horses kept on, and the revolver never left the girl’s temple. ee, “That bullet came from above,” Onyx Ol] _ suddenly went on. ‘‘ There isa trail abgve us, an’ the person intended to follow it up'witha second one, but I was tco quick for him, ar? you recognize the crack of that rifle?” ee com be ’ > Gomicbooks