Beadle's Pocket Novels No. 101: Redlaw, the Half-Breed

About this issue

This issue of Beadle and Adams pocket novel features "Redlaw, the Half-Breed; or, The Tangled Trail," a frontier tale by Jos. E. Badger, Jr. published in 1873. The narrative opens with a secret meeting of settlers in Kansas organizing a vigilance committee to combat counterfeiters and horse thieves plaguing the region. The meeting is disrupted by the mysterious Clay Poynter, who claims his horse and valuables were recently stolen. Poynter becomes the target of a disembodied voice—apparently a ventriloquist—that heckles him and eventually denounces him as a spy. After the group disperses, attention shifts to a well-dressed stranger with diamond rings and a gold watch-guard standing near Neil McGuire and another man nicknamed Dement. The fragment ends with someone challenging Poynter's identity, noting his sudden appearance with apparent wealth. The narrative sets up conflicts involving hidden identities, vigilante justice, and frontier criminality.