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Vol. XIII.

David Adams.

IN MEMORIAM.

BY EBEN E. REXFORD.

 

 

Sleep and dream. beloved friend,
Nevermore of earth and sorrow.
But of rest that shall not end
Heaven for you has no tomorrow.
As its peace to—day for you,
So it shall be ages through.
Sleep! the evening‘s calm is sweet,
After noontide's heat and bustle.
So your rest. No cares shall beat
In the heart o'er which shall rustle
Leaf and grass, while day grows dim—
Voices in earth's vesper hymn.

Rest and dream of this, my friend,
Of how much I miss and love you!
Whisper to me as I bend
In my loss and love above you.
Send a message from the dead
And I shall be comforted.

Tick Tick,

THE TELEGRAPH GIRL;

on,

THE MESSENGER DETECTIVE.

BY ALBERT W. AIKEN,

AUTHOR OF “A STRANGE GIRL,” “ THE DOUBLE
DETECTIVE,” “LA MARMOSET,” “OVER-
LAND KIT,” ETC., ETC.

CHAPTER XIII.

“ ANOTHER MORE POTENT THAN THE FIRST.”

“DON‘T you dare to attempt to resist or I’ll
make it hot for you!” cried the man, working
himself into a passion and swinging the club
threateningly.

“ You jest come here and knock a chip ofi‘en
my shoulder !" howled the boy. dancing up and
down, and flourishing his arms around like a
windmill, yet taking care at the same time to
keep out of the detective’s reach.

“ Hallo, hallo, what‘s this row ?" exclaimed a
short, thick-set man in a plain, dark suit, ap-
pearing suddenly upon the scene.

“What is that to you?” demanded the man
with the club, turning upon him, fiercely.

“Don’t you talk that way to me! I’ll have
you to know that I have got a perfect right to
interfere.”

“The blazes you have! Who are you, any-
way!”

‘ I am Detective Irving, of the Central Office!”
replied the other, in a tone of authority, throw-
ing open the lapel of his coat as he spoke and
displaying his badge.

This sight had due effect upon the Western
Union man, for he immediately became civil.

“ Oh, I beg your pardon! Of course I didn’t
know who you were, for I never had the pleas—
ure of meeting you before, although you are
well known to me by reputation.”

“ Well, what is the trouble here, and who are
you?” asked the Central Office detective, in his
brisk, business-like way.

“ y name is Smith—Tim Smith; perhaps
you have heard of me? I am a detective in the
employ of the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany.

“ Never had that pleasure, but what is the
trouble between you and these parties?"

“ This girl is one of our operators and we
have discovered something crooked in her ac.
counts. We have an idea, too, that there is
quite a lot of our clerks mixed up in the mat-
ter; so the old man swore out a warrant for the
arrest of this girl and my instructions are to
carr her to his house, as he thought that when
she ound she was in a hole she might be willing
to make a clean breast and give the gang

 

 

awa .”

“ Kistead of taking her before a court?”

“Exactly, and if she ‘squeals’ on the rest,
why, we will let her off and use her as a wit—
ness.”

“ But this accusation is infamous!” exclaimed
Tick Tick, who could nOt keep quiet any longer.
“ I am as innocent as a child of any wrong-do-
in !”

“ Well, my girl, you’ve got a good face and
you don’t look as if you could be ‘ fly ’ to any di-
vision business,” the detective observed, quite
kindly. “ But you must remember that if you
were guilty it would be your game to cry out
that you were innocent as long as you could, so,
of course, in all such cases words don’t go for
anything. Is it a warrant!” he asked, turning
abruptly to the man.

“ All right and reg’lar,” the other replied,
handing it over for the detective’s inspection.

“ It is perfectly correct, miss,” after a careful
examination, “and you will have to go with
this party, but I tell you what it is, I will go
along, too and see that everything is all right,
although have not the least doubt that it is:
but, as I said before, you have got a good face
and I reckon there must be some mistake—so I
will go along and see you through if I can.”

“ All right; I am satisfied!” the representa-
tive Of the telegraph company assented. “You
will find that everything is straight, and al—
though I think we have a pretty clear case
against this young woman, yet she may be able
to explain matters so as to make everything
straight. Of course I hope she can, for it ain’t
a pleasant job for any man to get a pretty girl
like this miss here into trouble. ’ve got a
back around the corner, so we can 0 ti ht up.”

“ Say. boss, kin I go, too?” pipe VVi ly, who
did not relish the idea of being left behind.

“Well, no, my little man; I guess we will
have to bar you out. You haven’t ot any-
thing against this youngster?” the etective
said, to the telegraph man.

“ No! I wish I had,” he replied, savagely.
“ It would do me good to put that young imp
behind the bars.”

“ You’ll never do it, lanky!” cried the boy,
in derision; “ but I’ll come and see you hung
one of these days, see if 1 don’t!”

“ I‘ll lay for you!”

“Mebbe you will, an’ mebbe you won’t! I

ain’t skeered !”

The two men accompanied the girl around
the corner to where the hack stood, Willy fol-
10wing at a safe distance in the rear.

The detectives assisted Tick Tick to enter;
then got in themselves and away the coach
went.

The boy had made up his mind to accompany
the party, even though he had been refused a
ride. 80, when the hack started, he galloped
after it, intending to perch up on the rear, but
the coach afforded no chance for a “cut-
behind,” and Willy soon saw that if he wanted
to go he must trust to Shank’s mare.

The boy was determined to make one of the
party, even if he had to run every step of the

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COPYRIGHTED IN 1882 BY BEADLE AND ADAMS.

NEW YORK, SEPTEMBER 2, 1882.

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“Well, well, this is a. nice box for a. girl like you!” he exclaimed with a. sardonic grin.

way; so dropped behind for a “ hold on.” But
the driver of the hack, a low-brewed, brutal
looking fellow, had been on the look-out, and
being provided with a stout, long~lashed whip,
he brought it around with a will and gave the
telegraph boy an awful cut on his fat legs.

This was entirely unexpected, and the pain
drew forth a yell from Willy, who immediate-
ly let go of the coach and fell to rubbing his
legs.

The driver chuckled and Whipped up his
horses until the animals trotted their best.

The boy was smart enough to perceive the
game: it was not intended that he should fol—
10w the coach.

“ But I will follow it, though, if I die for it!”

he cried, amid his sobs of mingled rage and
pain; “ and as for that beastly driver, if I don’t
whack a stone at him that will make his head
swim before I get through, I wish I ma die!”
and when his mind was once made up 6 was
just the boy to stick to a job through thick and
thin.
“They don’t want me to foller that hearse,
and if they think I am arter it, they will do
their level best to head me off,” he muttered,
as he took to the sidewalk and ran on at- a brisk
gait. “So my leetle game is to keep shady
and not let ’em know that I am arter them.”

This was not an impossible thing to do, for
the boy was a good runner and the driver soon
slackened his speed. for a coach traveling at
break—neck speed through the streets of New
York after dark would be certain to provoke
an investigation by the police.

Keeping well in the rear, Willy followed like
a sleuth hound on the track.

Up the side street into Broadway went the
back, from Broadway into Park Row, then
through Printing House Square to Chatham
street.

“ It will be a mighty Ion ' run,” the boy mur-
mured, as he passed under the elevated railroad
station and followed the coach down the Chat-
ham street hill. “ I reckon the boss lives clear
up in Fifth avenue, somewheres, mebbe as far
as Central Park, and, Lordy! I don’t believe 1
kin ever stand it to run that distance, if they
keep the hosses trotting along like this.”

But at the foot of the hill the coach made an
abrupt turn to the right and disappeared from
the boy’s sight down a narrow street.

“ Well, if that ain’t a rum go!" Willy mut-
tered, amazed. “They have gone down Roose-
velt street! What are they up to, anyway 1‘”

And when the boy reached the corner the
sound of wheels had ceased!

“ Blamed if they ain’t stopped!” he exclaimed,
halting in the shadows of the corner house and
peering cautiously down the street.

Roosevelt street is hardly more than a lane—
Darrow, dark and full of vile smells, about as
ugly an avenue as the city can show.

The lad had hardly time to peer around the
corner when again the sound of the carriage-
wheels fell upon his ears.

He was about to advance and again take up
the chase when he made a. discovery which
caused him to rapidly retrace his steps, skulk
around the corner and find concealment in a
convenient doorway.

The carriage was returning!

On it came, turned the corner, and headed
toward Broadway, going back to exactly where
it had come from!

The driver, intent upon his own thoughts,
looked neither to the right nor left, and there-
fore took no heed of the boy hiding in the door-

wa .

Aynd Willy, peeping forth, made a discovery
that filled him with astonishment—a discovery
whzch threatened to set at naught all the pains
which he had taken to pursue the hack, and
great was the rage and mortification which
stled within his breast. '

The coach was empty!

CHAPTER XIV.
THE EXAMINATION.

T0 the nearest police court the wedding-
party, and the uninvited guests who bad man-
aged to interfere so materially With the cere»
mnny, proceeded. ‘

It had been Dudley's idea that the judge
could be summoned, an immediate examina—
tion granted, and then Esther could be released
on bail. .

But, as it happened, it was not possxble to
carrv out this plan. The judge could not be
reached, and Dudley, to his intense disgust,

 

found there was no way in which he could pre-
vent the young woman from being locked up
for the night.

But he put the best possible face on the mat-
ter, cheered his betrothed up all he could, and
assured her that neither time nor money would
be spared to prove her innocence.

Esther was pale and calm: she did not seem
to be in the least alarmed at the prospect be-
fore her, and took leave of her lover in a. man-
ner that puzzled him.

“By Jove! she has a wonderful nerve,” he
said to his familiar, Jackson, when they had
arrived at home.

As the reader will perceive, the man, Jack-
son, although apparently only a servant in the
household, was in reality his master’s confiden-
tial adviser.

“ Yes, she is a plucky girl: ninety-nine out of
a thousand would have broke down and whim-
pered under the circumstances.”

“But there wasn’t the sign of a tear about
her; she was as calm as though being locked
up in a prison cell with the prospect of a tri
to the State Prison was a mere everyday a -
fair.

” Well, what do you think of it? A plant,
eh l” asked Jackson, after a. brief pause.

“ Most decidedly! The old scoundrel marked
her for his prey; she told me of two or three
little things that happened during the last week
she was in his bindery which convinced me that
the old scamp was after the girl. and that was
one reason why I made up my mind to at her
to consent to be married as soon as possi lo. I
knew old Walaker had plenty of money, and
was utterly unscrupulous—a bigger rascal than
either you or I, Jackson, although, with circum—
stances favoring him, there is very little doubt
that he will go dOWn to his grave without the
world finding it out; and l was afraid that he
might be tempted to play the girl some ugly
trick—~”

“As he has.”

“ Exactly: it is quite plain that he has kept a
watch on the girl ever since she left his place,
and possibly before. This check business is a
trap that he has arranged for the express pur-
pose of catching the girl, and he so timed the
arrest as to break of! the marriage. If the
ceremony had been performed it would have
upset his schemes.”

“ Whan is the programme, now i”

“ To get the girl 011’, although I am afraid the
scheme has been so carefully planned that if we
cannot induce old Walaker to hold off his hands,
he will be apt to railroad Esther into State
Prison in spite of us.”

“ That will be ugly, won’t it?”

“ Yes, but I will have her out of that before
she has been t‘1 c a month. The rize is too
rich a one, and l ave schemed too eeply for it
to have my booty wrested from my hands after
I am fairly in possession of it.”

Jackson seemed lost in thought; the other did
n0t interrupt his reverie, for he understood that
something would come of it.

“ Captain,” he said, abruptly, “ I am afraid
we are running on a wrong trail here. DO you
know, I don‘t like this woman business, and we
ain’t exactly the sort of chaps to hunger after
a chance to get into the courts. Our characters
won’t hear investigation, and if we get this old
Walaker after us, who knows what he may be
able to smell out?”

“Jackson, you have only one fault, and that
is you are inclined to be over-cautious,” Dudley
replied, instantly. “ You forget how great the
stake is for which I play, and how easy it will
be to secure it. The game was fairly in my
hands, and but for this inopportune arrest.
would now be securely mine beyond the shadow
of a doubt. Now then, is it wise to turn back,
after all my trouble, and give up my purpose
merely because for a time the clouds lower?”

“If it was anything but a woman affair,”
Jackson persisted.

“ Bah! I am no believer in that superstition;
and as to being hunted doivn by this old scoun-
drel, let him look to himSelf, or 1 will pay him
a midnight visit one of these days that will
give him food for thought for some time! As
regards the court business, we are not obliged
to appear prominently at all. I will secure an
able criminal lawyer to defend the girl. some
well-known man who has never been mixed up
with us at all."

Jackson shook his head.

“ I am afraid, captain, it wc n’t be of any
use.”

 

“ You are in the dumps, old man; but let me
alone to pull through! ‘ From out of this nettle,
danger. we will pluck the flower, safety.’ ”

Perceiving that it was quite useless to attempt
to reason his master out of the course which he
had resolved to adopt, Jackson discreetly gave
up the effort, and the two fell to discussing the
best mode of action.

that was finally resolved upon the reader
will see anon.

On the following morning the judge who
presided over the court before which the case
Of Esther Leigh had been brought, took his seat
upon the bench promptly at nine, and hers was
the third case called.

The judge happened to be a personal friend
of the book-binder’s, and he nodded to him in
the most familiar manner when the case came

p.

The charge was made: the prisoner, when
questioned, quietly replied that she was “not
guilty,” and the judge, who prided himself upon
his judicial shrewdness, immediately mistook
her calm innocence for the hardened efl’rontery
of an old offender, and instantly concluded that
the quicker she was “sent up the river” the
better it would be for the community at large.

Walaker gave his evidence: then the treas-
urer of the bindery, whose duty it was to draw
the checks, testified distinctly that he had filled
out the check payable to the order of Esther
Leigh for the sum of six dollars, had taken that
check, with a number of others, to Mr. Wala-
ker for his signature, and then, after it had
been signed, he had placed it in an envelope
upon which he had inscribed the girl’s name,
securely sealed it and placed it with the rest of
the envelopes, wherein the wages of the em-
ployés were inclosed.

The testimony of this gentleman was plain
and straightforward, and all within the court-
room were impressed with the idea that he had
sworn to nothing but the truth.

Over the faces of the eminent criminal law-
yers who had been employed to defend the girl
came a grave look as they listened to this tes-
timony, and, shrewd and able as they were,
they didn’t for the life of them see how they
were going to upset or weaken the statement.

Then the prosecuting lawyer had a confer-
ence with his associate counsel and Mr. VVala-
ker. When this was finished he addressed the
judge and asked for a postponement as some
important witnesses, whose evidence was most
material to the case, had not arrived.

The counsel for the defense were uite will-
ing to 8 rec to this; for the present t ey were
utterly In a fog: the evidence seemed so strong
and complete against their client that they
could not see their way to a defense.

In obedience to a whispered suggestion from
Dudley, who sat near at hand, one of the law-
yers asked that their client be admitted to bail,
but to this the opposite side immediately Ob-
jected—they had been warned by the old book-
binder in regard to this—unless indeed the bail
was fixed at such a sum as would be certain to
secure the presence of the prisoner for trial, as
the lawyer stated it was the belief of the prose-
cution that the prisoner at the bar was but the
tool of more experienced hands. and if a light
bail was fixed. she would never appear, being
only too glad to forfeit the recognizance, and
so escape conviction.

At this declaration the eyes of Dudley and
his man, Jackson. met, and each one mentally
put the same question:

“ Was this done for effect, or had the lawyers
really got hold of the tail of a rat?”

“ I do not wish to be hailed,” the girl said to
her lawyers in a low, but resolute voice.

“ But, my dear, consider!” exclaimed both of
the legal lights in a breath, amazed at the an-
nouncement.

“ I have considered everything: there is a
stain upon my name, and until it is wiped away
I am not fit to go at large among honest people.
A jail is the proper place for a girl accused of
such a crime as I am, until her innocence is
made manifest to all the world!”

The lawyers shrugged their shoulders; here
was an oddity with a ven eance, but when the
'udge announced that he s ould require at the
!least five thousand dollars’ bail, they thought it
was as well the girl was content to remain in
durance.

The case was set for that dav two weeks.
Esther shook hands with her friends and de-
parted for the prison with a mien as calm and
dignified as a queen proceeding to her throne.

0n oopy,lounonth.s, Cl.

0 00
no copy, one year, . . . 8.00
woooplos, one you, . . 5.00

No. 651

CHAPTER XV.
A PECULIAR OFFER.

EVEN the prison officials, with all their ex—
perience, were puzzled by the behavior of the
‘ young woman, and knew not what to make of
t it.

She was calm, and seemed to take every—
thing as a matter of course, never making the
least complaint, and it only took a short time
to impress the keepers with the conviction that
she was an altogether different being from the
mortals who usually came under their care; at
the same time they Were all prone to believe,
with the prosecuting lawyer, that if she was
not an old hand at the checkraising business,
she was the tool of those who were, and that
her calm unconc rn arose from the belief that,
no matter how great the peril threatening her,
the parties whom she served bad influence and
money enough to secure an acquittal.

“She’s a lady, anyhow! you can bet your
boots on that, no matter whether she did the
trick or not,” the head keeper Observed, confi-
dentially, to one of his intimates, after the ac-
cused had been in his care for a few days.

After a little while one of the lawyers who
had undertaken the defense called upon her,
with the idea of picking up a few points. Dud-
ley had declared to him his belief that the
whole thing was a cunningly-contrived plan on
the part of old Walaker to et the girl into his
power; but in this idea the awyer did not take
much stock, for it seemed wildly improbable to
him that a man like the old book binder should
be fool enough to commit a crime just because
he had become infatuated by the pretty face of
a friendless work- girl.

And one of the chief reasons why the law-
yer called upon the maiden was to ascertain
what she thought about the matter.

This man of the law was an old practitioner,
not to be easily deceived. He distrusted Dud-
ley from the beginning, although he knew
nothing about him; he felt that Dudley was
keeping something back and suspected that,
despite the apparent respectability of that gen-
tleman, he was the party in the background
who had put the young woman up to altering
the check.

“I can’t get a client of! as a general rule
without knowing exactly how he stands,” he
assured her keepers. “ f I don’t know the
particulars of the case I am liable to have a
trap sprung upon me by the prosecuting attor-
ney at any time.” So the counsel, who was a
portly, well-preserved man of fifty, with a dig-
nified aspect and a fatherly way, was admitted
to the cell occupied by Esther.

It was a small apartment, about eight by
ten, containing only an iron bedstead and a
single stool.

A small window, high up in the wall at the
end of the apartment, securely protected by
stout iron bars, admitted light, and in the iron
door was a smaller window, also guarded by a
grating, which looked out upon the corridor.

“Counselor Hare to see you, Miss Leigh,”
announced the keeper, unlocking the door and
admitting the lawyer.

Esther, who was reclining upon the edge of
the little bed with her head resting upon her
clasped hands, her eyes fixed upon the ceiling,
apparently day-dreaming, rose to receive the
lawyer and shook hands with him, as perfectly
at her case as though she was greeting him in
the arlor of her own mansion.

“ hat is this?” the lawyer thought, as he
accepted the stool which she brought him and
sat down, “conscious innocence or unlimited
impudence?"

“Rather close quarters here, Miss Leigh,”
the gentleman remarked, after he was seated,
wilth a glance at the narrow confines of the
ce 1.

“ Yes, sir, it is not a large apartment.”

“ But you seem comfortable and contented—
that is, I judge such is the case, for you don‘t
seem to fret much.”

“ What would be the use? Is it not better to
be contented with our lot, no matter how hard
or how humble it is, than to wear out our life
by vain endeavors to escape, beating against
the manacles of destiny like the poor, im-
prisoned wild bird against the bars of his
cage?”

“ Why,‘you are quite a philosopher!”

“ No, I am only patient,” she replied, with a

gh.

“ You have taken matters so coolly as to lead
every one, who knows anything about your
case, to believe that you do not think you are
in any particular danger.”

The girl looked surprised.

“Isn’t that a correct idea?” he asked, notic-
ing her amazement.

‘Oh no, sir! not at all! I fully realize the
danger which threatens me, and understand
that, unless somethin very like a miracle in—
terposes in my behal , I shall be convicted of
this infamous crime, which my very soul ab-
hors, and sent to prison. My calmness does
not come, sir, because I think there is any
chance of my escaping the im ending doom,
but because I utterly despair of ghtin against
the evil destiny which pursues me. I elieve I
must have been born under some unlucky star,
for nothing but misfortune seems to follow my
footsteps wherever I 0.”

But this old man 0 the law, still suspicio
asked himself if this wasn’t all put on te “ pul
the wool over his eyes.”

“You have led a somewhat checkered life,"
he remarked.

The girl sighed and looked down at the floor,
but made no other reply.

“Perhaps it will aid me in the task I have
undertaken—your defense—if you will make a
confidant of me and give me a sketch of your
past life,” vailing the artful suggestion under
an appearance of great frankness.

Esther shook her head.

“ You don’t agree with me, eh?”

“No, sir; my past life has nothing at all to
do with my present position; there isn’t any-
thing in it that would be of any service for you
to know, and I have good and sufficient rea-
sons for not wishing to speak of it.”

“Of course I presume you know best in re-
gard to that, but the better course in all mat-
ters of this sort, my dear young lady, is not to
conceal anything from your legal adviser. Lit-
tle thingS—trifles, apparently, to you—some-
times are so important that a life may depend
upon them,” remarked the old lawyer, earn-
est! .

“)As I have told you, there is nothing in my
life before I came to New York which has any-
thing to do with my present peril, therefore
you must pardon my silence; really, there is
nothing to tell which would be of the least in-
terest to you: mv life has been a plain and un-
eventful one until this calamity befell me.”

“Well, how about your life since you ar-
rived in the city 3” asked the counsel.

“There is very little to tell. I came to the