Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 4 — page 22: what you’re looking at

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

-_—— —_— = -— ——— ~—--- - <—~— —— ~— we ee — ee i -- tears, her voice choked with a throng of emo- tions, While the mother’s fierce defiance broke un- | sar der the burden of. despair, the child was speech- | such matters; but I believe that m less. if she heard, she did not heed the rene- gade’s incisive sarcasm. She had eyes, ears and thoughts but for the mother from whom she had | and turning addressed a single word inghe Del- been torn, and whom she now once more clasped | aware tongue to one of the iInaians. | in her arms. When she found voice, her heart burst forth: ‘Oh, mamma! mamma! mamma! you here! —and surrounded by such awful dangers! My darling mamma!” ‘‘Hush! hush, my child! We are in God’s hands.” ‘‘Under my supervision, as the divine vice-ge- | touch, Jerusha Swanton’s harsh voice broke the rent!” sneered the renegade, with another pro- found bow. ‘‘My dear, we are overjoyed at your restoration. You threw us into quite a panic of anxiety. You should not ramble so tar from camp as ty lose your way.” The pride of the girl flamed into her eyes, or soveinS over her shoulder at him, she re- plied: “Thank you for your solicitude. may not be far distant when you will need it ali for yourself.” | ‘*Oh, Vil risk that,” laughed Swanton. * With a slight advantage in point of numbers and unexampled good luck—a better frien than Providence, my dear, if we aie judge by the hard lines of the virtuous—with luck anl nambers in my favor, don’t you think the game is pretty wéll in my hands?” . ‘Meanwhile, Helen,” he added, “Sif you care to walk toward the camp—” He coneluded the sentence with a bow anda wave of the hand. ‘‘ Mamma, how dare he address you so famil- iarly?” exclaimed Blanche, her indignation ‘struggling with a vague dread. te e are in his the mother submissively. ‘“But who is he? Do you know him? And what grudge does he hold against papa? lis hatred dates back twenty years.” The dread was deepening in her eyes. She spoke in an ‘ndistinct marmuring tone which could not be intelligible to Swanton as taey preceded him. “We knew him years ago as Tom Tracy,” began Mrs. Burbank. ** Yos: but why does he hate papa? What is it all about?” A pained expression came into the lady’s face. She did not reply directly. While she was de- liberating they entered the glade where Jerusha Swanton hal talked herself weary over her in- attentive auditor, and finally left him in disgust. Blanche’s quick eye detected the prisoner, as he lay with his back toward, her. very arti- cle of his dress was long since familiar to her loving eye. She recognized him at a glance, The mother felt her start violentiy within her encircling arms, with a short, sharpcry, The next pnseal he ee Fe else forgotten in con- templation of his danger—the girl tore herself free and flew to him. ‘Oh, Walter! you are not hurt?” she cried the pain in her heart, that agonized. fear that she was to lose him, breaking down all conven- tionalities. It. was like a flash—her sudden appearance kneeling beside him; her tremulous touch on his shoulder: her eyes reading his face with a soli- citude which could haye but one meaning; her voice vibrant with loving fear and gliding into liquid cadences over his name, An instant his face glowed with a look that seemed almost luminous, as his eyes devoured her; then a spasm of pain and a look of terror came like the siidden interposition of a mask, and he tried to start erect. ‘Great Heaven! are you again in his power?” ‘‘ What.is it?’ asked the girl, shrinking closer to him and looking back at Swanton with a new fear in her eyes. There seemed to be some deeper meaning in the emphasis of her lover’s words, The renegade’s manner was not reassuring. He stood with folded arms, caressing his mus- en and regarding the pair with a cruel smile. But she felt the loved form sink under her hand, and, turning again, saw that he lay as white as death. ; * “ Oh, you are hurt!” she exclaimed. ‘Where is your wound?” 3 Vith a gushing cry she detected the blood on the breast. of jerkin, andthe perforation made by the bullet. Her lips were white and set with an awful dread, and her fingers flew over the fastenings of his jerkin. ‘‘Tt is nothing!” he gasped, as she bared his breast, With a frightened. sob she pressed her hand- kerchief over the wound. “Oh, menage | help.me!” she. cried, as, Mrs. Burbank knelt on the other side of, the prostrate man; aad in the look and tone of that, supplica- tion the heart of the one woman was an open Ot book to the pereeption. of the other. If Mrs. covery, her humanity was so far in the ascend- anev asieffectually to hide it. She manifested only anxiety akin to her danghfer’s. The time | lacerated his side. | You don’t think it is, mamma power, darling,” murmured | ; } Burbank felt. any shock at this dis- | pretty deprecation: ' with water in a broad leaf folded like a filtering | | : The New York Library. Vol. I. ee a eee ee a eae we tee | ‘Major Swanton,” she said, haughtily, ‘will | ‘* Yes, mamma,” whispered. the girl, kissing you place at my command the appliances neces- | her on the cheek. ‘I never have any secrets for this man’s care? 1 know little about | from you. And, oh, mamma! mamma!’ good-will | She quivered with an ecstasy of love, hiding will serve him better than your grudging skill.” | her face with niaiden shamo yet longing to ‘No doubt, madam,” sneered the renegade, | show her heart and win that sweet sympathy which had never failed her. The savage disappeared, but soon came back | CHAPTER XXXII EXIT JERUSHA. As he held it for her to dip her hand- Mrs; BuRBANK was s0 long silent that her aper. erchief into it, Blanche thanked him in Eng- | lish.. Her sweet look must have been intelligi- | daughter began to feel vagucly apprehensive. ble to him, though her words were not. | * Blanche,” she said at last, ‘has he spoken While she bathed the wound with a loving | to your” j ‘*Not in words. But, o4, you cannot know silence. his reverent delicacy. And, mamma, I love ‘Wal, I swan to man!” she exclaimed, with a | him so!—with my whole heart and soul!” chuckle, “if Jim hain’t clean cut eout his dad- Again the lady was silent, until Blanche rais- dy! He! he! he!” ed her head, and seeing the look of pain, aslxed, Blanche glanced up at her as the discordant | all in a panic: voice broke upon her ear; but she was too bus ‘‘Mamma, what is the matter? Is he not wor- with her mission of love to pay further heed. | thy? You cannot— Mamma!” ‘See, mamma!” she cried. ‘‘ The bullet has ‘** Hush! hush! my child!” It did not strike fairly so The lady sought to avert her face from the as to penetrate his breast. It must have glanced | searching look of her child. on the rib. Oh! if it is only not dangerous! “What are you thinking about, mamma? ¢”? What pains you?” petaisted the girl. ‘‘His parents—such parents!” exclaimed the lady, desperately, with a shudder of disgust. A look of pain darted across the girl’s face. Already she was aglow with hope. ‘““T think the bone is not broken,” said Mrs. Burbank. ‘It is only a flesh wound and a se- vere shock, being so close over the heart.” ‘¢' You would not be so unjust as to blamie him “Oh! you shall find us famous nurses—Mr. | for what he cannot help!” she said. ‘“! He has Weston!” cried the girl, in her relief at the | nothing in common with them. Heis as grand knowledge that his life was not in jeopardy | as they are ignoble. That is his misfortune. from his wound, forgetting, for the moment, | And, mamma, I love him all the more tenderly, the grave dangers which hung over them all. | knowing what he must suffer.” She blushed as she faltered over his name, recol- ‘‘ And your relations with Harry Bearsley?” lecting that in her unguarded moment her Instantly the girl bristled with resistance. tongue had found the one which lay nearest her ‘‘Mamma, that is a mistake which must be heart. | set right at once. J know papa will not ask me His eyes told her that her touch was more | to sacrifice my happiness to fulfill an arrange- tent for healing than the rarest lotions; and | ment entered into by him and Mr. Pearsléy be- indeed the magic contact so thrilled him that it | fore 1 was born. I never could be happy with banished the look of pain from his face; but the | Harry; andif he has seemed to acquiesce in the words that trembled on his lips were doomed to | ee as I have, from the force of habit, I know harsh interruption. . tr | he does not’ love me as aman should love his Jerusha had aimed a malicious little thrust at | wife. her husband in saying that “Jim had cutout | ‘*And, mamma, weren’t you always prepos- his daddy ;” but the renegade had read Blanche’s | sessed by—Walter, himself? secret for himself. Frowning darkly, he,‘had She returns to him with such coy tenderness, muttered beneath his breath: and looks for her answer so hungrily, yet so ‘“‘So! But of course she could not love that | confidently, that the mother can hesitate only a wolf’s cub. Curse him! he’s too much like his | moment, and then smiling indulgently in thie father not to inspire an intuitive repugnance in | winsome face, says, honestiy: _ so sensitive a nature as hers.” | “Ves!” Turning to his wife he said rapidly: | Her reward is a little storm of grateful ca- “Tf you want to do me a favor and enjoy | resses and endearing epithets: and for the mo- yourself at the same time, give them a little of | ment she allows her daughter's happiness to lift your peculiar style of eloquence. But mind | the cloud from her heart. hat you keep a bridle on your tongue; for if But in the very midst of her happiness the ou insult either of the ladies grossly, I'll have | te me suddenly breaks into frightened sobs, it out of your hide!” | explained by her whispered words. The wifely duty of obedience lying in the di- ‘* But, mamma, he. is a prisoner! What will rect line of her own inclinations, Jerusha ad- | become of him?” vanced, nothing loath, and, while the lovers | ‘The mother soothes her, and, to divert her were ali atremble with timid outreachings to- | thought from this most painful theme, enga ward each other, and the mind of Mrs, Burbank | her in a narration of thé events of her life since wen ges perplexed over the discovery she had | her severance from her home. The narrative made, said; ‘‘T reckon it’s my place to ’tend Jim. I’ve | is made the central figure, and his tenderness a | nation, replies: “IT believe -he was for the mést part intent But see! who is miss, you ain’t puttin’ that bandage right.” She dispossessed the loving hands with so per- | ae ee setae Hae A cago bing with | asp looking out for himself! pain, while the girl shru ck in dismay. | this prisoner?’ : Only an instant, and then she extended her | It-was Bantam, looking very anxiously about hand again. to see if Walter had been captured. He was led ** Mrs. re re A rotest,” she began. in: by Sidney and ‘his body-guard of savaves, But Jertsha whirled upon her with the de- | now reduced to four in ntmber. Wounded as mand: . | he was, the sturdy hunter had sold his liberty at ‘Ts this Jim, or ain’t it? Air you his mother, or ain’t ye?” the price of two lives. A settled frown darkened , Sidney’s face, and his eyes had a hungry look. A look of ,eratification flashed into the face of | He sat Cown on a Lowlder, with drooping shoul- the renegade. Instantly he stepped forward. a’ “Tadies,” he said, “there is but one escape ders and hanging head, ** Well, boy, they’ve got us both, for sartain,” from Mrs. Swanton’s pleasantries. Allow me “Dm to lead you.awa said Bantam, as he approached his friend. th mighty sorry they got their hooks onto you. [ Blanche wouit have demurred; but he took her arm with a look that was a command, and set almost as much store by you as by Shang— she was forced to submit. an’ that’s a good deal.” ‘Thank you, Bantam,” said Walter. “These beauties will ¢ you, while you | donot care so much for mye The lady whose enjoy each other’s society,” he said, when he | trail you came upon has fallen into their hands. had taken them Be eA Sey with a few rapid | Bantam, it’s a slim chance; but if you ever cet words he indica their duty to, the savages, free ‘and can rescue’ her, you will do that for and left them. ° which I would thank you more than if I had a “Why did she call him Jim, mamma?” asked | thousand lives, and ‘you saved them all. Under- Blanche. wonderingly, the moment. they were | stand that she is nota fae to me.” alone. “Poor young woman!” said the scout, lookin “Because it is his name, I presume,” replied | oyer at the ladies. ‘ Boy, T'll remember this. the mother somewhat coldly, though, as you say, it’s'a mighty slim chance.” ‘Why, no! It is Walter—Weston.” By Swanton’s direction, food was now placed The Christian name was uttered witha bright- | before the prisonérs, out of the evening meal ening countenance, the surname being added after a momentary yause, in which the search- ing look of tae mother brought a tremulous flush to Blanche’s cheek. Reaching to clasp her parent about the neck, the girl murmured with ef, Blanche found very grateful, after her asting of twenty-four hours. When they were done, the sun hung upon the western horizon. | In portance of the renegade’s orders, Walter and Bantam were placed in the midst ofa part of savages, and marched off through the forest, When Blanche found that she was to be sep- arated from her lover, without so much as a ‘* Mammn!” “ Siy. Caneel ter p said the lady gravely, fold- | ing the treinbling form close to her heart, j Beet ww yews ee ee oe tie ee — - * coddled him when he was sick an’ trounced him | and gallantry are dwelt upon with glowing fer- when he was sassy, from the time he was knee- | vor. Mrs. Burbank notices that Hal is almost ’ high to a grasshopper; an’ I hain’t goin’ to be | wholly left out cf the story, and asks: shamed to my face now, by havin’ strangers **What was Harry doing all this time?” take the care 0’ him out o’ my hands. See here, | The girl flushes,.and with something of indig- “Putt prepared by the savages, which, in spite of her a progresses until the advent of Walter, when he _——_ EOMIGCHOOKS-com