Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 501 — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

i oo = hi EE ees SS “ But was it so?” ‘‘-Yes; though, with time given me, I might track the garrotings home to him, and such ac- complished desperadoes as Red O’Meara are not apt to let counter-plots grow under their feet. owever, I am in hopes that he will hesitate for a number of days, perhaps for weeks, before venturing bere again.” ‘¢ And he must feel that we are now in a meas- ure prepared to offera solid front to his de- signs.” ‘“‘There is something in that, though it may only serve to sharpen his wits.” ‘* He will come again!” said Edgar, moodily. ** No doubt of that.’ _—— CHAPTER XXII. EDGAR WILLARD’S STORY. Mr. Gray motioned his son-in-law to a seat, and then took a chair directly in front of bim, while Edna disposed of herself at ber husband’s side. “Now,” said the old detective, in his some- what magisterial way, ‘let us see just where and how we stand. The master of Willard Manse bowed his head submissively. ‘“‘T shall conceal nothing from you, sir,” he responded, in a low voce, while his wife took one of his hands with a loving and supporting gesture. ‘‘Have you really met O’Meara abroad in your exile?” demanded Mr, Gray. ‘*Never; though it is vary likely that he has been in Uruguay in search of me.” ‘‘You did not remain in that country then?’ ““Scarcely a month, It was the fear that he might seek me out that impelled me to continue my wanderings.” ** How did you avoid him?” ‘¢‘] reached Montevideo under an assumed Spanish name, and was enabled to support the character through my conversance with the Spanish tongue, In less than a month after my arrival, I joined a German scientific and emigrant pe ten Paring and penetrated with it far north into the southeastern Brazilian wilds, ‘¢The commission fixed on a site for its pro- sed colony, on the Parnahiba River near its junction with the Parana, nine hundred miles north of Montevideo, and four hundred north- west of Rio de Janeiro—beyond the pampas, almost the unbroken primeval forest, the haunt of savage beasts and deadly serpents. ‘‘ Still not feeling secure, | pushed on, almost alone, to the goldand diamond districts between the headwaters of the Rio San Francisco and the slopes of the Brazilian Andes, ‘*There I remained undisturbed, part of the time as a tutor in a wealthy planter’s family, and afterward as an overseer in the diamond washings, ‘*[ was well paid, saved my money, and mun- aged to keep myself fairly well-informed of home-affairs through occasional American newspapers, Obtained from Rio at great ex- nse, or through the kindness of new-made riends, **T at last decided to come home, and take my chanves. That is the story of my exile—my foreign experience.” ‘*Was your chief motive in returning to ob- tain possession of your grandfather’s estate?” ‘¢ Tt was not.” ‘¢ What, then?’ ‘Tt was,” with unaffected embarrassment, ‘to see once again the woman who has since become my wife.” Edna’s grasp upon ber husband’s hand tight- ened, and her eyes slowly brimmed with the eloquent tears. ‘ What!” incredulously; ‘*‘ you had continued to love Edna through those y , after baving met her but once?” / ‘‘T had, Her image in my heart had only brightened with time. And yet I had come almost to hate her, too.” ‘*Ah! you had learned of her exposing the secret she had sworn to keep inviolate, and so deemed her false?” ‘** Yes; or rather it was the hope of having her seeming trustlessness explained that brought me home at last,” presen ple ind hee dnepotae sup your prospec n disappointe with regard ‘ the estate, and you should still have found her blameless?” ‘‘T should still have persevered to make her my wife, with the intention of carrymg her back to Brazil with me. I had accumulated several thousand dollars, and could have made a happy, 4 secure, home for her down there in the tropics. 1 wish to God”—with passionate bit- terness—‘‘ it might have been so now!” ‘Don’t wish too hastily, young man! Let us see just how_we stand here in Westchester county first. Edgar Willard, were you directly or indirectly concerned in the murder of—that man whose dead body rests in peace at last in White Plains Cemetery?” Edna’s heart was on ber lips in suspense, but the answer, clear, ct and solemn, was grateful aud relieving as her own baby’s kiss, __ “Twas not, as Heaven ismy witness!” ' rss SS SSS, SD —— OC vee . - of a —_ > : Cc te > Springsteel Steve. Springsteel Steve a aie his knee with a demonstrativeness that he was not in the habit of displaying. ‘* By Jupiter!” he exclaimed; ‘‘ prove but this to my satisfaction, and all shall yet go well with you and yours, my boy. Now for the story of your connection with the Bleak Hollow Mys- tery.” ‘*T shall give it in as few words as are in my power,” said Willard. ‘‘ You have doubtless heard of my miserly grandfather’s unnatural cruelty and injustice to my father, Martin Wil- lard, who was his only son. “f was but three years old when my poor father carried me into the hard old man’s pres- ence for the first and last time in my life, and et the scene bas remained fixed on my mind indelibly. ‘‘It was a hard winter night. We bad left my mother slowly dying of hardship and insuf- ficient nourishment in our miserable, fireless attic home amid the slutras of New York. ‘““My father, an incapable but persevering man, had been out of employment for weeks, Our last crust and our last ounce of fuel had been consumed. He told me afterward that he had obtained the wherewithal to pay our fares to White Plains by begging, with some discrimi- nation, on the streets, ‘* This final appeal to my grandfather was our last hope, and it was without avail. ‘¢ The devilish old man Grove us out of doors, nniless, crustless, and with revilings. Even then he had become the miserly recluse that he remained. The woman, Raw, was the sole out- side witness of her relative’s mercilessness and eur shame, ‘‘ Let me say that the one thing | remember or know, to her credit, is that she tried, and tried well, to intercede for us with the inhuman old wretch, even to the extent of receiving a blow from his fist for her pains. ‘‘ We dragged our way back to New York on foot and through deep snow, my father weg me in his arms for the greater part of the wear way—eighteen milesto Harlem Bridge, six miles further to our home. ‘‘ My mother was already dying; in a brief period she was dead. Of pleurisy and prostra- tion they called it; but penliy of starvation and a broken heart—the victim of my inhuman, money-glutted grandfather’s cruelty, as much as if he had murdered her with his own hand. ‘* Soon after this, by a sort of irony of fortune, father ebtained employment. ‘It was a poorly paid clerkship, but it was respectable, and it was enough for our humble needs, ‘*T was enabled to receive a fair common- school education, at the end of which, when I was sixteen, my father died. ‘‘ We were boarding at the time with a kindly Cuban family, who took a tender interest in e. ‘‘ But I repaid them badly. A situation had been obtained for me in a wholesale drug-honse, where, being naturally not dull, and an ex- quisite penman, I might speedily have made my m a . ** But I fell among evil associates and by twenty was a confirmed gambler and billiard expert. At the latter game I was enabled to make a sort of livelihood, after losing my busi- ness situation and being discarded by my Cuban friends by reason of my irregularities, though I do not think that my heart was ever thoroughly corrupted. ‘* However, I went from bad to worse. In an evil hour, after I had, for some freak, changed my name to Frank Harper, I fell in with the adventurer O'Meara. ‘‘He soon acquired great influence over me, though never to the extent of my making bim my full confidant. — ‘ However, he led me into many dishonest practices, though hardly one that would have made me distinetly amenable to the laws, and I was rapidly becoming hardened and desperate. “One day he out aloud to me a news- paper paragraph in regard to my grandfather, whose reputed great wealth, together with his miserlv habits, had already made him notorious, if not absolutely infamous, outside his imme- diate neighborhood, “T think it compared him to a certain Duke of Brunswick, who had kept money and jewels to a vast amount on his premises, and under his constant personal wateb, And it also referred to his mania for treasure-seeking, which would take him away from home periodically. ‘““¢The miser would be a good job for a bold cracksman,” suggested O’Meara, cautiously. “ One would only have to choose a time, when he is off on one of bis secret treasure-hunts, to go through his old manse, as he calls it, and take all the swag worth having. _ “T gave him no encouragement, and the sub- ject was dropped by him, so far as I was con- cern “But the paragraph had set me ponderin and my thoughts continued busy. ft CHAPTER XXII EDGAR’S STORY CONCLUDED. ‘“*T HAD come to hate my grandfather’s very name, and the knowledge of the wrong he had LS tC a > ai “a f “ if : es * 4 © . . >* ' > » +. ~ Aw te oA ~> ms ‘>! . a PAC Se Oe OED ae ee My Tee a ae els = elit ae See de es * as * F ole a +4 "an — ea ar done my parents had never ceased to rankle in my moody nature. ‘*At last, persuading myself that I would only be appropriating what was in some mea- sure my own by right, I resolved to take ad- vantage of O'’Meara’s suggestion, but selely in my own interest. ‘IT slipped up to Purchase, engaged transient board at a convenient country tavern at Ken- sico, discovered that my grandfather was off on one of his periodical mysterious absences, and made nightly observations of the premises. ‘* Miss Raw, I discovered, did not sleep in the manse during its master’s absence, but made two daily visits thither, morning and afternoon, robably to make sure that nothing had been isturbed. ‘* While making my observations, I kept my- self for the greater part of the time secluded, under the pretense that I was a student engaged in some abtruse study requiring my most undi- vided attention for a few days; and, as I had brought no baggage with me, and paid my board daily in advance, the tavern people could not, or did not, suspect my character or inten- tion. . ‘* At last came the night on which 1 bad de- cided to make my lonely burglarigus attempt. ‘‘ Late in the afternoon I paid for the extras I had had at the tavern, bade the landlord good- by, and hurried away with the declared inten- tion of catching a certain New York train. ‘“Dusk was beginning to fall when I found myself at the rear, or kitchen, door of the manse. at which point I had decided to break in- to the place. ‘‘Though inexperienced as a cracksman, | had, much to my satisfaction, no difficulty in effecting an entrance. ** As [ have said before, what I had observed on my one former visit to the house, when but a child, bad remained faithfully photographed on my memory. ‘“My father and I had, strangely enough, been first admitted to the crnel old man’s pres- ence in bis bedchamber, and it was thence after our vain appeal to his charity, that he had driven us, with a tirade of abuse, down the | stairs, and out into the storm. | ‘* | was enabled to reach this room by a back- stair, and, in the lingering light that remained, looked around me curiously. ‘* But I had scarcely set foot in the chamber before I started back in mingled horror and amazement, ‘‘ My grandfather, it seemed, had not been away from home. There on the bed he lay, murdered, already lifeless, though not yet cold, and with blood on bis white “eard, trom a deep _ knife-wound in the throat, i ‘‘T was bending, horrifi | when I was suddenly pounce a and overpowered, : ‘Then there was a yy and one of my as- sailants raised his mask, disclosing the features of my evil genius, O’Meara, ‘** Oho, but you’re a sly dog, Harper!’ he ex- claimed. ‘ What, you not only took my sugges- tion to heart, but here you sre beforehand with — us, and with a murder en your bands!’ “a ‘““T protested, but he “ly shrugged bis shonl- ders, laughed again, ani pointed to the stron box and the safe in the wall, on both of whi the men had evidently begun operating when | the noise of my approach from below and the rear (they having previously entered by the front door) had caused a momentary cessation — of their labcrs, ‘“ The coincidence was so startling that I was” well-nigh paralyzed, though I confess to no pity for the murdered furm on the bed—of my own © , over the co upon from be ai ad me? 7 3 and blood though it had been when in | 1 e, ee y ‘“¢Come, what shall it be? demanded © O’Meara, after a sinister pause. ‘Sball you — make a fourth of our number in the job, share — and share alike, or shall you funk." ays ide Suppose I refuse? I inquired, ; om ' “¢VYouwll do that at your peril! he replied. — ‘We have only to fill our pockets, and then — band you over to justice as having been sur- prised, red-handed, by us in this murder.’ ri ‘‘T was half-beside myself with borror,orI — might bave reflected upon the absurdity of bis — threat, M ‘Moreover, though armed, I saw that the trio would be too much for me in an encounter; — and, as I have said, 1 felt no particle of regret for the fate that had overtaken the soulless _ miser. ‘, \s “To make a long oat short, [consented to _ cast in my lot with the criminals. “There were nine thousand dollars in cash y, the proceeds of the crime. An equal division was made. O’Meara’s assistants were men of — the neighborhood, uncle and nephew, calling themselves Swart and Timmons for the occa- — sion, but whose real names were B and Simmons. we >. ‘*O’Meara had been haunting the neighbor- bood for a fortnight. He had manipulated — these ignorant men, one a farmer, the other a sailor, to his ends, and it wasathis snggestion =| that they adopted the precaution of addressing | each otber by the assumed names. x. ao ‘They were more or less familiar with every — . ’ - } ! Lt << a —