Trp lop WEEKLY

“An ideal publication for thé American Youth

 

 

Issued weekly — By Subscription, $2.50 per year. Entered as Second Crass Matier at the N. Y. Post Ofice by STREET & SMITH

———

No. 235. Price, Five Cents.

 

 

 

 

RANK PERRIWEIES CAPTIVITY

Ay VENDETTA IN KENTUCKY

TR
*

FRANK MERRIWELL,

 
 
 

_ TIP TOP WEEKLY

AN IDEAL PUBLICATION FOR THE AMERICAN YOUTH

 

Tesued Fa a Subscription $2.50 per year. Entered as Second Class Matter at the N. Y. Post Office, by StREET & SMITH, 238 William
St.. N. Y, Entered According to Act of Congress,in the year 1900 in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D: a

 

No. 235.

NEW YORK, October 13, 1900,

Price Five Cents,

 

Frank Merriwell’s Captivity;

OR,

THE VENDETTA IN KENTUCKY.

By BURT L. STANDISH.

CHAPTER I.
ae MAGOUN TEMPEST.
- What do you think of the mineral
- hyarabouts, mister ??

A hulking native of the Kentucky:

Apeantain region slipped down a rock by
the side of the path, startling Merriwell
‘ aby the suddenness of his unexpected ap-
; pearance. )

‘Tt might be better, and it might be
“worse. se
: Frank did not ie ite manner in which

he native eyed him, nor his looks. ee

**T take it, suh, that you don’t keer to
express any gin’ral opinion? It’s been
give out that you’re nosin’ round hyar
lookin’ for mineral land. Been a good
many fellers spyin’ out that kind o’ land
lately, mister !??

‘‘T don’t know that it’s any of your
business !’’ was Frank’s rather curt answer.
“JT have been looking over some mineral ”
land, though.’”

‘<If the question ain’t too p’inted—who
fuh?” |

The man | had a pair of cupleaaan gra

 
  

2

  

TIP

eyes, set close together and peering from
under shaggy brows. His jaw was long
and his expression cunning,

All this Frank

and heavy,
suspicious and vindictive.
saw at a glance.

? that- ques-
that I

came up into this mountain region from

**You have no right to ask
tion; but I don’t mind telling you
Louisville to inspect some mineral land
for my father. A body of this land was
offered to him and he wanted my opinion
of it. He wanted to know, also, what I
thought of the timber.”’

**Brought comp’ny with you!’ jerking
his thumb along the dim path.

‘‘Ves, a friend came with me.’

‘*A good many fellers been lookin’ at
this hyer mineral land!’’ again said the
from

mountaineer, peering suspiciously

under his brows. _

Having slid down, from the rock, half
hidden by bushes, on which he seemed to
have been awaiting Merriwell’s approach,
he was now continuing on at Frank’s
side.

Suddenly he turned and stared Frank
full in the face.

“You

Hawkinses ?’’

don’t know nothin’ ’bout the

Merriwell showed traces of irritation.

‘“‘T haven’t had the pleasure of hearing
the name before, in this section.’’

‘‘What’s yeh pap gwine to do with the
land, when he gits it ?”’

‘We'll walk on, if you please!??

The crafty look deepened in the close-
set gray eyes.

“Sut? inly, suh! I didn’t mean to git in
- yeh way. Didn’t know but yeh pap might
be gwine to make a huntin’ ground outen
ee igen good many 0’ them Louisville big

TOP WEEKLY.

bugs been buyin’ up this hyar mounting
land and shettin’ it up, and then orderin’
we uns to keep off’n it. Lackly yeh pap
thought thar might be gold up hyar?’’
Merriwell glanced down into the bush-
filled

point he would intersect the path taken

lower land, wondering at what

by Bart Hodge, for Hodge was the ‘‘com-

pny
The native interpreted the glance, and

’? spoken of by the mountaineer.
the crafty gray eyes glittered strangely as
Frank’

‘*Veh friend’ll be long bimeby ?”’

s back was momentarily turned.

Frank knew that the man was looking

at him. He seemed to feel those gray
eyes boring holes in his back. Every

sense was alert.

‘It would be a long fall from this cliff
down to the river!’’ was his thought.
Then he turned back, calm.and cool,
and quietly asked:
‘*Who are the Hawkinses?”’
The gray eyes burned with a flare of
deadly hate.
They were walking on again together,
Metriwell and the mountaineer.
Vou didn’t meet Jeb Hawkins over at
Little Blue Lick ?”’
Those closely-set gray eyes were boring
holes in the side of Frank’s face.
“Noel?
The dim path was straying along the
brink of a cliff, high above the thready

“stream that trickled and leaped gurglingly _

among the rocks. The stream was the

Kentucky River, shining like a silver
thread far up among the hills.

Frank could hear the dashing waters ES
which he could not see. About him and ;
across the river the tangled woods. bil-

lowed and heaved, thrusting BP a fiery.

 

 

  
      
       
      
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peak where early frost had touched the
oaks and gums on the higher ground.

Merriwell knew that the man had not
waited to interrupt him in the path and
ask him those personal questions without
a reason, and he fancied he knew what
the reason was. Yet he was not afraid of

him.

**It wouldn’t be nice to fall from this
cliff into the river!’ he suggested.

The man gave a startled flounce, like a
surprised animal.

Frank smiled, feeling that he had
touched the fellow’s secret thoughts.

“‘T can’t jist say that I’m hankerin’ fer
to do that! I seen a b’ar go off’n a place
lack this one’t, and it bu’sted ’im wide
open. You didn’t see Thad Hawkins at
Little Blue, either ?’’

“I’ve never been at Little Blue Lick.”

‘And you don’t know nothin’ ’bout
the Hawkinses?”’

**No. But if I did, and i# I had met
them tliere, what is that to you?’’

**Only I heerd that you’d been to Little
Blue and had a talk with the Hawkinses!”’

Frank showed no signs of impatience.
He felt that a struggle was to come with
this man sooner or_later, and he would
have been willing for it to come at once if
the spot had been anywhere but on that
dangerous cliff. Yet, though he showed
“no -sign, his eyes wére brighter, and a
smile came to his lips as the man went on
‘trying to find if the stranger in outing
_dress was a friend and ally of the ‘‘Haw-

_kinses.”’

‘What is your name? And why are
Be you so anxious to know if I have met the
~ Hawkinses?”’

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gray eyes as Frank suddenly shot out

hese questions and turned to look at him.

BS man that has to do with them

44
he
]

Hawkinses ain’t wu’th the powder ’n
‘He ain’t

nary a friend of Magoun Tempest!’

lead teh kill him!’ he snarled.

Frank was looking forward down the
cliff, searching fora place that offered a
better fighting ground, feeling that the
inevitable conflict was coming nearer
every moment, and resolved to begin it as
soon as a suitable place was reached.

“Y’m Magoun Tempest, and I know
yeh! You’re Frank Merriwell, and you’ve
come up hyar to help the Hawkinses.
You’ll never git teh hellp ’em, and you’ll
never git out o’ these mountings alive!”’

Magoun Tempest launched himself at
Merriwell, who turned to-meet the as-
sault, striking aside the hairy muscular
hand that stretched out to take him by
the throat.

Then a wolfish cry came from the lips
of the mountaineer—a cry that echoed
startlingly along the cliff.

‘Take that, will yeh ?”’

The

Frank, striking viciously.

mountaineer lunged again at
Frank’s pounding white fist shot out;
but Tempest evaded it, and, repeating
that cry, rushed again at Merriwell.
Frank struck again, with such force
that, had the blow landed, it would have
But it beat

vainly against the air, for a piece of the

put Tempest hors de combat.

rock slipped under Frank’s foot, almost
hurling him down -and saving Tempest
from that. savage blow. ;

Before Frank could recover his footing —
Magoun was on him with another wolf-
like cry. | :

 
 

  

Frank struggled up trying to push
aside the hairy arms that gripped round

him like the tentacles of an octopus.

He felt himself being pushed back
toward the dangerous verge. With a

mighty struggle, he released his arms.
He realized that he was fighting for his
life, against a man who had the strength
of a giant and the muscular agility of an
athlete. He tried to get Tempest by the
throat.

The battle which ensued was terrifically
fierce. Inch by inch Magoun pushed him
backward.

“Over yeh go!’’ he panted, the words
gurgling in his throat. 3

He tried to lift Frank from the cliff and
hurl him into the abyss.

On the rocks not far away there sounded
a pattering of feet.

‘‘Bart !’? was Frank’s thought. ‘‘I never
needed him more!”’

But Tempest’s effort to lift Frank from
the cliff was not successful. Frank’s feet
stuck there asif glued. He pushed out his
free hand and took the mountaineer by
the throat in a grip of iron. |

“If I go over, you’ll go over with me.’;

The grip tightened as the two reeled on
the dizzy brink, swaying horribly and in
instant danger of toppling down to death.

The mountaineer was holding Merriwell
in a bear-like hug. The pressure was
something awful. It seemed to be crushing
in Frank’s chest and snapping his ribs.
His head sang and his senses seemed leav-
ing hini, but he tightened the grip of his
fingers on the hairy throat.

=

‘Then the grip of the mountaineer re-
laxed; the arms fell away, and Merriwell,

   

TIP TOP WEEKLY,

me in the path.

_ Merriwell.

staggering on the brink of the precipice,

 

flung the almost inanimate form from
him.

‘‘Bart!’’ he gasped, as his reeling mind
began to clear, turning in the direction of
the footsteps.

The answer was a stunning blow on the
head that dropped him to the rocks,

When Frank regained consciousness and
tried to at up and look about him, he
found that his hands and feet were tied.

‘Hard lines, old man!”’

It was Hodge’s voice that fell on his
ears and brought him to a full realization
of where he was.

Two or three feet away, with his back

against a rock, was Bart Hodge, with his

hatids and feet also tied. Magoun Tem-

pest was struggling up, rubbing his throat,
which held the red imprint of Merriwell’s
choking fingers. Three other men sat in
the dim trail, laughing. They were moun-
taineers, and one of them had felled Mer-
riwell with a club, beating him down into
insensibility after Frank had choked into
unconsciousness the man who had at-
tacked him.

‘‘T was coming to help you, old man!’
said Hodge. ‘‘But these hounds tripped
I saw vou from that rise
over there when the fellow was trying to

throw you into the river, and I came like

a steam engine; but-——’’ :

Hodge’s rage was so great that he could

hardiy talk.

As. soon as he could steady himself on.
his feet, Magoun ‘Tempest swayed toward _

“Over with hiin!’’ he bellowed.

“Nary time, old man!’’

mountaineers answered. ‘‘That thar ain’t

what we wants to do, site?

 

one of the =

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
   
 
    
   

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

       
   
    
       

  

Tempest slunk back.

“Tf you'd waited till he got furder
down, we’d been right with yeh when yeh
jumped him, but yer temper wouldn’t let
yeh wait, I reckon. But he’s hossed up

now!’?

CHAPTER II.
IN TEMPEST’S CABIN.

Seated in the cabin of Magoun Tem-
pest, still bound, flat on the floor, and
with a dozen feet separating them, Frank
Merriwell and Bart Hodge tried to talk
over the situation in which they found
themselves.

They
howling across the hills, breaking the long
flared

through the little square of glass in the

were quite alone. A storm was

drought, and the red lightning

cabin’s rear wall. Magoun Tempest had
gone out into the night and into this

storm a few minutes before.

It was the first time he had left them
since they had been brought to the place
late in the afternoon by the mountaineers.

Tempest had been moody and uncom-
municative, answering shortly and surlily
the questions which were asked him, but
refusing to tell the captives anything of
consequence.

Bart hitched as far toward Merriwell as
his rope would let him.
tied behind his back, and a rope about his
waist held him to the wall.

“He thinks that we can’t release our-
selves, or he wouldn’t have gone off and
left us in this way,’’ said Frank.

Hodge tugged at the cords which bound
. his wrists, only to sink them into the
- flesh.
bs “The scoundrels!” he snarled, desisting

His hands were >

 

TIP TOP WEEKLY., 5

from his efforts. ‘‘What do they mean to
do with us? They won’t try to keep us
this way all the time?’

‘(We're the victims of some sort of a
mistake. I was sure that Magoun Tem-
pest was resolved to pick a quarrel with
I don’t

know who the Hawkins people are, but

me, as soon as I encountered him.

he thinks that we’re mixed up with them
in some way. These mountaineers are
very suspicious of outsiders, and tley’re

very clannish.”’

“Tt will delight me to lead some officers
to this spot and arrest every one who has
had a hand in this! That is, if we ever
get away! Magoun Tempest would as
soon kill a manas not. He’d have thrown
you over that cliff, if the other fellows

had let him.’’

‘‘He isn’t troubled’ with any too much

conscience. But we’ll get away, some-

how. He won’t keep the cords on us
long, and when he removes them, we’ll

plan out something.”’

‘It makes me wish we’d stayed in
Louisville and gone back East with the
rest of the flock, Merry.
wanted to look over this land for

But, of course,
you
your-father, and I was glad to come with
you. I don’t regret that part of it, even if
If you had to be in
it, I’d rather be with you!’*

we have landed here.

Merriwell never had occasion to doubt
Bart Hodge’s friendship, though Bart’s
wisdom was not always of the best, and _
Bart’s temper often tried him.

“‘Vou’re true blue, Hodge. I’ve always
known it. What was that?”

They listened in silence. ,

A hand was heard fumbling along sr
rough door for the See.

 
 

  
    

6 iP: For

 

“Can it be some one coming to help
us?’’ Bart softly questioned, hope light-
ing up his dark face. ‘I believe your
father said he would come up through
Batren County and be at Deep Springs to-
motrow. Perhaps he has changed his
mind and hurried on here?’

‘Tt wouldn’t be possible for him to find
this cabin, in the night and storm.’’

The scraping sound ceased, the latch-
string was pulled, and the door was
pushed open. Then a form appeared—
that of a girl, or young woman, cheaply
clad, with a dark shawl round her shoul-
ders.

Hodge started up at sight of her.

- **Nell!’’ he gasped.

The girl drew back in fright, and
seerned about to bound again into the
darkness, Merriwell saw that she had a
pinched white face, and that her clothing
The fact that Bart

knew her and her name surprised him,

was dripping wet.

for Hodge had not told him he had any
acquaintances in that section.

“Nell !’’ Bart called.

The girl advanced uncertainly into the

room, pushed the wet shawl back from

’
her face, and saw the bound forms. She

looked searchingly at Hodge.
“Vou!’’ she exclaimed. ‘‘Land sakes

alive! what does this mean ?’’

“Tt means that my friend and I are tied,

up here as prisoners. I-don’t know how
you happen to be here, but we’re glad to
see you. If you’ll just get a knife and
saw through these cords, you can pay me
back for that little favor yesterday.’’

**T live hyar!” she stammered, sinking

tremblingly to a stool and looking at

 Merriwell.

*

ete, es

 

 

   

WEEKLY.

‘That’s my friend, Frank Meriwell!

Merriwell, allow me to make you ac-

’)

quainted with Miss Nell——

3art stopped, for he did not know the
girl’s name, though he fancied now that
it must-be Tempest. ‘It was an awkward
way in which to present a friend, anyway,
with both tied up in that style.

‘‘!’!m Magoun ‘Tempest’s gal,’’ she
said. 3

‘‘You couldn’t get a knife and ampu-
tate us from these cords ?”’

She still stared at Merriwell.

“T found a bully who was annoying her
yesterday,’’. Bart explained, ‘‘and I tried
to kick the fellow into ribbons. I don’t

think he will venture to trouble her again

soon, especially if he fancies that I’m

around. ’’

“That was Sam Hawkins!’’ she said,
turning to Bart.

‘*Glad to make your aquaintance,”? said
Frank, feeling as awkward as Bart had
felt, and hoping that Bart’s favor would
be reciprocated by the girl in releasing
them. ‘‘We’re in a trap here through
some blunder. Your father has the idea in
his head that we’re connected some way
with the Hawkinses, though he never
made a greater mistake, and we’re held
here in this way because of it.’’

‘If you will cut these cords we’ll be |
glad to cut out of here!’’? Bart urged, be-—

ginning to feel that the girl would not do
anything of the kind.

‘(Tl dassent!’? she protested. ‘‘Pap ’d
kill me!’

‘“‘But you could explain to him that
you knew he was mistaken about us, and |
that I helped you. yesterday. He must —

hate the Hawkinses ?”

     

 

 

 

 

     

 

 

 

 

     
    
        
    
     
 
  

 

 

   
   
 

  
  
   
  
  

 

*‘Oh, he does. He’s threatened to shoot
Jeb Hawkins fu’st time he lays his eyes
on him.’’

‘‘Who is Jeb Hawkins?’’ Merry asked.

*‘Sam’s pap. Pap b’longs to the Purdy
gang, and they’re gwine teh shoot the
Hawkinses, if the Hawkinses don’t kill
’em fu’st.”’

‘“Then there’s a vendetta between the
Hawkinses and the Purdys?”’ said Frank.
‘“Your father fancied we were friends of
your enemies, but he’s mistaken.’

**You needn’t cut the cords,’’ Bart sug-
gested. “‘If you will untie us, you can
make it seem that we did the trick our-
selves, and your father won’t know any
better.

gone before you came home.”’

You can explain that we were

But the girl shook her head.

She seemed to forget for atime that she
was dripping wet, but sat on the stool,
staring at Frank and Bart with eyes that
fairly burned in her white, thin face.

Finally she rose, crept to a little ladder
that led to a loft above, and shostly
descended in dry clothing.

**Y’ve been thinkin’!’’ she whispered.
‘*Pap’ll kill me; but I don’t keer if he
does. I’m goin’ to let you uns go!”’

Bart’s heart gave a leap.

**If you will untie us, and then ex-
plain——”’

His words were cut short.

A footstep had sounded beside the door
and another hand was fumbling for the
latch string.

The white lightning put out the feeble
glow of the candle; and inits glare they
saw her half rise, with a scared look on
her thin face, and turn toward the sound.

The thunder shook the hills and rocked
ce the cabin.

TIP TOP WEEKLY. 7

 

 

7

cy? 9799

I’m comin’!’’ she nervously whis-

pered, as she jumped toward the door.

x 199

‘I’m comin’!

CHAPTER III.
THE PLOTTER AND HIS PLOT.

When Magoun Tempest left his cabin
and its prisoners, after nightfall and in
the streaming tempest, he struck across
the hills by a dim path which one would
think even a cat could not follow in the
darkness. The flare of the lightning
showed him familiar landmarks, however,
and without hesitation he made his way
to a cabin of similar unpretentious appear-
ance nestled in the shelter of a big rock
and overhanging the river like the nest of
a bird.

In answer to his rap on the door of this
cabin a man appeared. :

‘“Ah! you’ve come ?’’ he said, stepping
back and permitting Tempest to enter.

‘“Couldn’t git

suh,’’ was Magoun’s reply, in a respectful

away much. sooner,
tone, as if addressing one whom he con-
sidered his superior.

He stepped through the open doorway,
shaking the water from his hat.

‘fAll out doors, suh, it’s wetter’n the
I thonght I shed

comin’ ’crost the hills. Ain’t anybody

river. be drownded
with yeh in hyar teh-night?”’

The door had been closed, and he stood
facing the occupant of the cabin, still
shaking his wet hat, while the water
trickled in tiny streams from his soaked
clothing.

“This is ’bout the beaten’ist all-fired
rain I ever see!’ An’ the wind shakes yeh
lack a dog. That ol’? white oak on the
bluff, whar Jeems Thomas found the big

  

    
   
  

   

8 LP FOP

wildcat come two years ago next Novem-
ber was ripped right up by the roots.
Howdy !”?

He dropped intothe rough chair, which
the man pointed out to him, and, stil
holding the wet hat, relapsed into silence.

The man had not spoken a word.

Magoun Tempest now looked curiously
at him; and, though he had seen this
stranger before, the same queer feeling
that had taken possession of him on the
‘occasion of their first meeting came over
him again.

That face once seen would never be for-
gotten. The hair was long and_ black,
with streaks of gray. But the eyes were
the most marked feature of the face—
black, piercing eyes, strange and deep,
shifting and evasive. Such eyes could be-
long to no ordinary man. Not only were
they black and piercing, with a certain
singular penetrating strength that seemed
to go to the very soul of the man at whom
they gazed, but they had, besides, the
peculiar power of dilating and contracting,
resembling in this respect the eyes of a
cat.

A sort of shiver shook the soul of Ma-
goun ‘Tempest as he looked into those
eyes. He feared them, yet was swayed and
impelled by them, and, more singular
still, was drawn even willingly toward the
possessor of the eyes.

’

Looking into those eyes, Tempest for-
_ got his soaked condition, forgot his drip-
ping hat and the awkward feeling that
had been on him when he passed through
the doorway—forgot SyRrteEs but the
man before him.

At last the stranger spoke; a stranger
to Magoun Tempest, but known to the
reader, for the man was Dion Santenel,
the hypnotist: *

‘“‘What about the prisoners ?’” he asked,
his voice sounding hollow.

 

* See Tip Top Weekly No. 234, ‘‘Frank Merri-

 

WEEKLY.

_well’s Hustlers; or, Cracking the Colgnels.” ia

  

Tempest started as if aroused from a
dream. He sat up straighter and put the
wet hat on the bare board floor.

‘“They’re all right, suh.’

“‘T don’t like the report I heard about
you this afternoon, Magoun!’’

‘‘You told me teh git the fellers, and I

done as you said,’’ Tempest evasively an-

swered.

The eyes had shifted away from his
face, and he felt easier, though still
strangely drawn by them.

*“Very true. And I shall see that you
are well, paid for it—paid for doing a
thingethat it is to your own interest to do.
But you forgot my instructions. I said
for you to make a prisoner of Merriwell.
Instead, you tried to hurl him into the
river and kill him. You would have done
it if others had not been there. I don’t
want the devil killed. Do you understand?
I don’t want him killed.”?

Tempest took up the wet hat, looked at
it, then re-deposited it in the circular wet
spot it had made on the boards.

‘“VYou said: you knew of a cave where
the fellow can be kept ?”’

‘¢ *Crost the hills, *bout two miles)?’

“And he can’t get out of there?” —

The eyes had turned back, but again
they turned away.

‘*T’ve been to see that cave,’’ was ; the
startling statement. ‘‘It’s all right for

the purpose. It will hold him! I knew of e

a place something like that in the West,
Magoun!”’ :

Santenel seemed to be speaking to him- —

self; and when the sound of the words
died away, the lips continued to move as
if in whispers.

Tempest stared at the man,
daring to breathe.

“Ves, suh!’’ he said, when the silence
became unbearable.

scarcely

_ The man was staring at the opening —
which answered for a window—staring aere
the lightning that zigzageged the sky, his
Seg e far ey and in the pase A bit-—

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    
     
 
   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   
      
   
     
 

.

had toiled for it.
_shifting-eyed enemy throughout the bor-

ie Oe

ter smile, that was full of hate and
triumph and desire for revenge, rested on
the eye-defying face.

For the time Santenel had forgotten Ma-
goun Tempest, though he had. not forgot-
ten Merriwell. The name was the most
hateful to him of all names. It was the
name of a man whom he had deeply in-
jured in the
Frank’s fatlier.

Distance had vanished and time had
turned and he saw again the
mine in the far Southwest which he
Charles Merriwell had owned. He recalled
the toil and the hardships, the fierce de-
sire for gold that burned in the veins of
both, the struggle for success. He remem-
bered, too, how his heart had become the
prey of covetous, murderous greed—a
greed that burned upall the finer instincts
of his soul. He saw again the mine and
the dark tunnel into which Charles Mer-
riwell had penetrated. He heard the rend-
ing shock of the dynamite, fired by }
well’s own hands, which had made the
tunnel a prison for the man he hated.

long ago—the name of

backward,
and

Metri-

‘‘He shall not escape as his father did,”
thought Santenel. ‘‘This prison shall hold
him without fail, and through the son I
shall be able to strike Charles Merriwell
again |””

Frank’s father had ced from his
prison, but not until his mind had almost
given way.

The perspiration came out on San-
tenel’s face as he thought, making it wet
as the rain-soaked forehead of Magoun
Tempest. He shook with the recollection
of the terror-filled months that lay be-
tween those days and the present. Merri-
well, enriched by the fabulous wéalth of
that mine, with his half-crazed brain

holding but one thought, had pursued this

man seeking revenge. Merriwell had
lived for revenge, had dreamed of revenge,

He had chased this

WEEKLY.

I did the mind of the father.

“But he'll never do it!’? See coe

     

9

ders of the world with that one resol ve—
revenge.

And now the enemy had his hand on
Merriwell’s son, determined to repay,
all that the elder Merri-
well had caused him of suffering.

‘‘T would have shot Tempest down like
a dog, if he had killed him! Killed him?
I don’t want him to die, I want him to
live—live
will put out the boy’s mind, as I fancied
I will im-
mure him in that cave, where he can see
the light, the birds
sing, where he can look up at the stars;
and I will hold him there till his hair
whitens like mine, till his brain reels, till
he prays and weeps for the death that will
not come.- It will be a sweet revenge; for
it will crush the father as no punishment
visited on his own head could do. I didn’t
know until the other day that there was a

through the son,

and suffer as I have done. I

where he can hear

son; now I know, and now I strike. Ah!
Magoun Tempest, if you had ‘killed

Frank Merriwell by throwing him into
the river I would have shot you down like
a dog!’’

“What is it, suh? I thought you said
something teh me?’’

Tempest’s voice roused him.
and mopped his face,
mountaineer.

‘*Did I speak ?”’

“‘T don’t know what you said, suh, but
I thought you was sayin’ somethin’ teh

He sat up
looking at the

ime. Lackly I was mistaken.”’

‘“You were mistaken! Let me see! I
was talking of that cave—or was it the
Hawkinses? You know what this young
fellow has come up into the mountains
here to do?”’

Magoun Tempest’s face, still wet from
his dripping hair, flamed back the look of
hate that still sat in the eyes of the
speaker.

‘To "rest me for killin’ Ol’ Turk, of
the Purdy gang, last winter!’ he snarled,

/

   
  

 

    

10

‘And what should be done with a man
who stands in, in that way, with those
Purdy ge onda

‘*Heshed be cut into inches and fed teh
the dawgs!’’ Tempest hissed.

‘*No; he should be held in that cave
until his hair turns white, until his mind
gives way, until he babbles like a child!
That’s what should be done with him!
Killing him would be entirely too merci-
ful. You hear me, Tempest!’’

The pupils of the eyes contracted until
they were burning pin points that seemed
to stab flame into the heart of the shiver-
ing mountaineer.

‘“That’s what you must do.
mand it!’’

‘*Sut’inly, suh!’’

Tempest could not get away from those
eyes, that searched his soul through and
through and seemed to lay bare all its
secret thoughts.

‘“‘T command you to put him in that
cave and hold him there until I tell you
to release him. You will have to hold the
other boy there, too, to make the thing
safe; for, if he should get away, he would
go to the Hawkinses with the story, the
whole country would be aroused, and
Merriwell’s father would come up here
and have you, and all of your friends,
dragged to jail in Frankfort. I know what
I am talking about. The power of that
boy’s father is something greater than you
know. - There is no safety for you but in
absolute silence and obedience. ’’

The wavering eyes had become fixed
and staring, and they took hold of the
shivering spirit of the mountaineer as if
they were hooks of steel.

‘“You will do what I command you!’’

The will of the mountaineer seemed to
become lost in that of the strange man
who sat before him. He could not remove

I com-

é his gaze, he could not lift a hand, unless

the stranger bade him.

; ee sul 2 ?

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‘You will do what I command end 2

 

The eyes wavered away, after awhile,
and T’empest aroused himself, but only to
stare at the man in an abstracted way.

“Tl will go with you to your home,
Tempest, and we’ll talk more there, per-
haps. I want to see Merriwell. I feel that
I must see him!”’

CHAPTER IV.
THE HYPOCRISY OF DION SANTENEL.

When Nell Tempest opened the door,
in answer to the fumbling against it for
the latch string, she beheld her father,
with a dripping stranger standing in the
background of the storm. Tempest and
the man with the shifting, queer black
eyes had arrived just in time to keep Nell
from releasing the prisoners. :

Nell Tempest was shaking like a leaf.
Merriwell, straining at the bonds that

held him, tried to look beyond her, but

could see only the streaming rain in the
fan of light.

The man in the background of the
storm, looking into the girl’s white face
and seeing her emotions depicted there,
read her through like an open book. He
knew that she had contemplated the re-
lease of the captives and that he had
reached the cabin just in time to prevent
her from doing so.

Magoun Tempest stepped through the —
doorway into the room and the stranger

followed him.
Both Merriwell and Hodge started up,

with the same name on their lips:

‘*Dion Santenel!’’

Santenel stopped.

‘‘Sorry to see you in this condition !’’
he declared. ‘‘Very sorry; and as soonas
this man told me who his prisoners were
I hastened over here through this infernal
storm to offer you my sympathy and aid
if I could.”’ .

He dropped into a stool.

“Is not that so, ae he asked
| pe ghee ls suh |”

 

 

 
 
 
 
 

   

 

 

 

    
    
        
  
     
   

 

 
   
    
   
  

 

   
    
  
 
    
 

TIP

 

He had been talking to Tempest on the
way across the hills.

‘“Tempest has the mistaken idea that
you are connected in some manner with
his enemies, the Hawkinses; but I have
assured him it is not so.’’

‘What brought you up into these
hills??? Merriwell demanded.

Hodge shifted uneasily. He remem-
bered only too well how Santenel’s
strange hypnotic power had possessed him
in Louisville. He feared the mysterious
influence of this man, and he hated him.

“Well, we’re not glad to see you!’ he
blurted, in his blunt way.

“T spoke to both, but I was really ad-
dressing Merriwell,’’ Santenel declared,
giving Hodge a look out of those terrible
eyes. ‘‘In answer to Merriwell’s question,
I will say that I have-some acquaintances
up here and came up, as he did, to inspect
some land. In fact, I find that I have been
looking over the same land he has. I am
willing to say that it is not worth much,
and if he wants it he is welcome to it.”’

Frank looked into the terrible eyes,
striving to read the thoughts there hid-
den. He knew now that to Dion Santenel
he was-indebted for what had befallen
him, and he was sure that Santenel would
stop at nothing which he thought would
injure Charles Merriwell. Yet Frank
showed none of this, and his tones were
smooth and even as he spoke:

*“TIf you can convince this man that he
is wrong in his ideas concerning us and
can induce him to let us go, it will cer-
tainly be a favor.”’

Santenel hitched his chair nearer and
bent on Frank those burning eyes, which,

‘in spite of his effort to hold them steady,

almost constantly wavered away from
Frank’s face.

“‘T have told Tempest that he is entirely
mistaken 1n his notion that you have
come into this region todo him and his
friends harm. But, so far, he refuses to

~ believe me. At least, he pretends that he |

d

 

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11

does not believe you are all right. What
is called the Purdy ganz is back of Tem-
pest, and perhaps for that reason he isn’t
willing to do anything. But I came, any-
way, to assure you of my friendship, and
to tell you that I shall see the Purdys to-
morrow, and I think I can bring about
your release. ‘hat is my sole reason for
this mission. You mneedn’t believe this
unless you want to; but I tell you, any-
how. Ithought it might encourage you to
know that I am in the neighborhood and
will stand by you.’’

Santenel was like a cat playing with its
victim and taking delight in its terror.
And he was, likewise, endeavoring to
hypnotize Merriwell. He had tried it be-
fore and had failed; now pride made him

“want to try it again and conquer.

This, more than anything else, was the
thing that brought him that stormy night
to the cabin of Magoun Tempest. He felt
perfectly safe in revealing himself to these
victims, feeling sure they would never be
able to escape.

‘You might secure our release by com-

plaining to the authorities,’? Frank sug-
vested.
_ He was fighting Santenel with the lat-
ter’s own weapons, meeting burning gaze
with burning gaze and monotoned sen-
tences with monotoned sentences.

‘“Which shows that you do not thor-
oughly understand the power of a Ken-
tucky mountain vendetta. Many of the
officers are in sympathy with one or the
other of these warring factions. I am told
that the sheriff belongs to the Purdy
gang. Suppose he were commanded by
some judge to make an arrest here. He
might make.a bluff at obedience, but it
would be no more than a bluff.”

‘“‘You might get word to my father?’
still meeting those strange eyes.

“T will try to do that. I will send out a
runner to-morrow. i must be going-now.
Tempest doesn’t like this talk with you.’’

He showed no sign, but his heart was

 

 

 
         
     
     
    
  

    

   

12 TIP

lashing because he realized that again he
had failed to work his power on Merriwell
—again Merriwell had been his match in
this strange kind of duel. |

Tempest was indeed looking at them
questioningly and apparently in suspicion.

‘IT must be going. If I dared, 1 would
throw off those cords; but it is something
I do not dare.”’

‘*Oh, don’t listen to his lies!’? Hodge
impatiently snarled.

Though Hodge had been so completely
under Dion Santenel’s hypnotic power
that power had been broken by Merriwell,
and Santenel seemed no longer able to
make an impression on him.

The hypnotist turned to him with those
strange black eyes, and Hodge, with a
sort. of shivering fear that the hypnotic
spell might again work, rolled over that
he might not look into them.

He heard Santenel rise from the stool
and approach the door, and when he
turned again, he saw him passing through
the doorway into the storm accompanied
by Magoun ‘Tempest.

The girl came tremblingly across the
room when the door closed behind the
men. — :

**T dassent do it now!’’ she whispered.
“T would if I could; but I dassent.”?

CHAPTER V.
THE HEART OF A GIRL.

Magoun Tempest came back after a
while, and the girl, who had crossed the

room and held no further converse with:

the prisoners, climbed the ladder to the
little garret above.

But she did not sleep.

On her poor cot, in the darkness of the
garret, with the storm lashing the hills
and shaking the cabin, with the rain
_ drifting in on her now and)then, while the
thunder shook the solid ledges and the
lightning ploughed the sky

n! a irae

 

    

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; Nell Tempest |

 

lay for long hours in restless tossing,
thinking of the youths she could not aid.

A strange feeling was tugging at her
untaught heart, and the one face that
seeined to light the gloom of the poor
place was that of Bart Hodge.

Young as she was, Nell Tempest had
learned the great lesson of love. ‘hat
love had not been awakened by Hodge,
though it seemed now about to be trans-
ferred to him. The one she had loved
with all the depth of her simple, childish
nature was lying that night in a bloody
grave.

She thought of that grave on the lonely

~ hills, with the lightning flaring over it

and the thunder raving as if in anger at
the man who had caused it to appear
there.

‘‘Seems as if Si hed come back teh
me!’’ she moaned, pressing her lips to the
apology of a pillow. ‘‘Seems lack he’s
come back !’’

In certain respects, Bart Hodge strongly
resembled Si Purdy, the young moun-

taineer, who had won the girlish love of —

Nell Tempest. A strong, impulsive, hot-
hearted soul had shone in Si Purdy’s
face, as it did in the face of Hodge.
Purdy had none of the graces of civiliza-
tion, being only a simple, untaught child
of the mountains; but his had been a

‘loyal heart. In certain details, the face

hid by the grave in the hills ‘had looked
like the face of the youth from Yale.

And the form she had loved had been

strong and robust and manly in appear-

ance, though wearing the rough garb of |

the mountaineer.

‘Seems lack Si has come back teh
me!’’ she sobbed, telling the secret of her

heart to the pillow. ‘‘But pap don’t no-

tice it. Papa don’t notice it, and he don’t
know!” . | PROS?
When all had grown silent in the room

_ below, she slipped softly from the bed,
and creeping to the square hole that had

   

>

Br

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 
 

 
      
       
    

  
 

\

  
  
 

 

 

 

  
  
  
  

 

   
 

 
 

TIP

 

admitted her to the garret, she tried to
peer down into the darkness.

Tlae storm had passed, but the light-
the horizon at in-

ning still gleamed on

tervals. The eaves were dripping, and the
tree that stood at one corner of the cabin
tubbed
over her.
She could -get no more than a glance
into the room by the lightning’s fitful
light,
oners in their old position, with Magoun

its wet branches against the roof

but that glance showed the pris-

Tempest stretched on the floor across the
line of their possible flight. The door was
closed, and presumably bolted with the
heavy wooden bar.

“Tm gwine to let em go!’’ she mur-
mured, as she rose and crept back to the
cot. ‘‘I must! I’m gwine teh do it, if
pap kills me!”’

Nell Tempest had always been loyal to
the interests and wishes of her father, but
she felt that she could not be so in this
instance,

Yet it was not merely pity for the hap-
less youths in the room below that moved
her, though she pitied them. Pity alone
would not have put that resolve into her
heart. She did not know but that the
story of her father was true, and that they

were allies of the detested Hawkinses, but

she would not think of that now, even

though it had been the hand of a Hawkins

that had sent Si Purdy, her lover, to his

untimely death.

The thing that stirred her and filled her

with that heroic sss ib was the feeling

that her lover had réturned to her in the
person of Bart Hodge.

Call it a foolish and childish feeling, if
you will, but it had strangely taken pos-
session of her. She knew that Hodge was

~ not Si Purdy, but her heart kept whisper-
ing that ‘‘it seemed lack Si had come

back to her!
She seemed. to see Si down there i in are

gloom, bound with those cruel cords,
S watched ¢ over oe her father, atid in /dan- :

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13

ger of death at the hands of the Purdy
gang. And for Si she would have given
up her life.

“Tf pap kills me the next minute, Pll
do it!’ Oh, Si! Si! It
seems lack you’ve come back! It seems
lack

Her slight form shook as she buried her
though no sounds

she sobbed.
you’ve come back!”?

face in the pillow,
came from her lips.

The patter of the drops from the rot-
ting eaves appeared to whisper, ‘‘Si has
come back!’

The scraping wet branches on the roof
whispered, ‘‘Si has come back!”’

The wind, piping round the corners,
seemed to sing it and whistle it, and by
and by Nell Tempest fell asleep, with a
heavenly smile on her pinched, thin face,
to dream that Si Purdy had returned to
her, never to go away again, and that he
had never been dead, and the bloody
grave in the hills was but a delusion.

From this happy dream she was aroused
by the voice of her father.

She awoke with a shiver. The night
and the storm had passed. The sunshine
was on the hills and a’bird was caroling
in the boughs above the rotting roof.

But the sunlight and the bird’s song
could not drive away the chill that
stabbed to her heart when she realized
that she had been only dreaming and that
the grave still existed, and Si would
never come to her again in this world.
‘She dressed hastily in answer to her
father’s call, and crept down the ladder,
with a face whiter and thinner and more
pinched than it had been before.

Magoun Tempest had started a fire in
the black yawning fireplace, and was try-
ing to get breakfast.

‘“Turn to, Nell!’ he said. ‘‘We’ll not
starve these young fellers. P’raps —-
let ’em go after a while!”’

The quick glance she gave into his —
face showed her that he did not mean —
what he said. Si :

      
       
   
        
     
     
     
  
  
 

 

  

14

 

She ventured to steal a look at Hodge
now and then as she worked, thinking all
the time of Si. Every time she looked
Hodge’s face and form appeared more like
that of her lover.

“Tl let ’°em go the fu’st chance I git!’
she whispered. ‘‘I’ll do it, if pap kills
me !"? .

Then she produced from the scanty
store of the cabin the best it afforded and
used all the skill of which she was pos-
sessed to prepare for the one who ‘‘looked
lack Si,’’? and for his friend, a breakfast
they could not fail to relish,

She observed that the cords had been
loosened on their wrists and ankles, though
the ropes which kept them from moving
away from the wall were still in place.
But the door was tightly bolted and the
tiny window barred.

Magoun spoke now and then to Merri.
well and Hodge, answering Hodge’s im-
patient questions with a wolfish snarl;
but Nell said never a word, though her
eyes often dwelt on Bart’s face whenever
they found opportunity.

When the meal was ready, the cords on
the wrists were sufficiently loosened to
permit Frank and Bart to eat; but they
were tightened when the breakfast was
finished.

‘‘Now, we’ll go!’’ said Tempest, speak-
ing to Nell as he took the bar from the
door. ‘‘We’re gwine out a spell teh see 4
friend.’

Nell dropped a fork at Bart’s side, and
as she stooped to pick it up, she whis-
pered :

“Tist keep yer courage up. I’m gwine
teh let ye go, if I’m killed fer it.’

CHAPTER VI.
IN THE CAVERN OF LOST RIVER.

When Merriwell and Hodge again saw

Nell Tempest they were in a cavern of

rAgORt RIVEE ;
Magoun Tempest had returned to the

 

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cabin, accompanied by the mountaineers
who had assisted him before, and these
men had taken the prisoners from the

cabin and conducted them far across the

hills, finally lowering them to the prison”

which now held them.

‘‘There must be some way out of this
place, or they wouldn’t keep us. tied,”
said Frank, as he and Hodge strugeled at
their bonds, when the mountaineers had
departed.

On the walk across the hills the cords
had been taken from. their ankles, but
were replaced after they were lowered
into the cavern.

Hodge looked upat the steép wall: down
The rope lad-
had enabled the outlaws to

which they had descended.
der, which
descend into the pit and then ascend from
it, had been removed.

‘*There seems to be a passageway yon-
der,’’ said Hodge, nodding his head. in
the direction.

‘‘And* I hear the sound of running
water,’’ Merriwell announced.

Both listened. The pit where they were
was dry, but the sound of running water
was plainly heard. S

Frank’s eyes brightened as they fell on
a piece of jagged rock projecting from the
wall not far away.
gested a hopeful idea.

The pit was well lighted, for it was
open at the top, and a view could be had
of the sky and of some trees which grew
on the edge of the cavity.
was, in another sense, a cavern, for the

tunnel, which Bart noticed, opened off —

from the pit into a large underground
area, |

Later they knew they were in the open-
ing of a cavern of Lost River.

This was the place spoken of by Dion —
Santenel in his talk with Magoun Tem- .
pest—the place in which he proposed to
hold Merriwell until the youth’s mind |
gave way and he became a gibberingidiot.
_ “If we could get these cords off it seems

The ragged edge sug- :

Yet the place

 

Eiht, eS itt By on

  

 

 

 

 

*

    
  
 
 
 

 
 
   
   
       
     
      
  

 

 

   
   
       
     
     
           
     
     
     
    

   

me

c

to me we could find a way out!’ Frank
suggested in his never-say-die spirit.

Straight up, for more than thirty feet,
rose the sides of the pit; sheer granite, as
smooth and unscalable as the sides of
house.

‘If you will roll yourself over here,
Bart, I can help you up to that jagged
point with my feet, and I believe you can
cut through the cords on your wrist.
That bit of rock is tooth-edged like a
saw, and if you can reach it and saw
against it I believe it will do the work.”’

Hodge’s eyes lighted.

**Sure, Merry! Just the stuff! If you
can hold me up there I can do it. And
then we’ll get out of this place somehow.
That tunnel over there must lead some-
where, and, as you say, there must be a
way out or they wouldn’t have left us
tied.”’

‘*Some of the fellows may come back,’’
Frank reflected.

““If only that girl would come!”’

Hodge was rolling over to the point in-
dicated, and Merriwell was hitching along
to be of service to him.

It took but a few moments for Hodge
to*place himself beneath the saw-like
projection.

Then, with much effort, aided by Mer-
riwell, he dragged himself to an upright
position.

The rock-saw was still above his head.

“Tf it fails, you can try your teeth on
the cords again, Merry! Do you think
you can hoist me?’’

“Tm afraid we can’t expect any help

from that girl, though she wants to help

16,7

‘The old man will keep her away ?”’

‘“That’s what I think. He probably no-
ticed that she looked kindly at you, and
he may have seen what she was up to

x when she dropped the fork and BCR to
tell you that.”’
3 epeetiieeh was now. at Hodge’s Side,

  

TOP WEEKLY. 15

and lying on his back. He put his hips
against the wall and hoisted his feet.
“*Tt will be high enough.’

The feet came down.

‘Now, if you can get enough grip of
the wall to keep from falling off my feet,
I believe I can do it!’’

**T’ll hang on like a fly, if I have to use
my teeth.”’

Merriwell hitched back a little. Then
he placed his legs once more against the
wall, bending them at the knees, feet
uppermost. Lowering his feet as far down
as he could in this position, he asked Bart
if he could climb up on them.

It was a difficult thing for Hodge to
dv, with hands and feet both tied. Three
times he tried and as many times fell
down, once with so heavy a jar that
Frank thought he had injured himself.
But Bart made another attempt, setting
his teeth hard and showing no indications
of pain. And this time he succeeded in
planting his feet on Merriwell’s, with his
back to the face of rock, and maintained
himself in this position.

Then, with herculean strength, Frank
Merriwell slowly hoisted Hodge upward,
until the latter’s wrists, bound together
at his back, touched the ragged granite.

‘ete you can hold me here just a little
while!’’ Hodge panted.

*““Go ahead; I can hold you all day!
Don’t get excited now and fall off. Just
keep cool, old man, and don’t think of
me, and saw away asif you had a week
for the job.”’ ;

Hodge began to move the cords up and
down against the teeth-like point.

*“You’re the fellow for ideas, Merry!”
he declared, almost ready to shout when
he felt the rough edges take hold of the
cords. ‘‘We’ll make it, sure! Then we’ll
find a way out of this hole and cut sticks
for a civilized country. I’d like to come —
back, though, and drag ee Tempest
to jail!”

“Not t Pmeeies Dion Santenel es

      
       
       
    
   

    

16 TIP TOP

“Merry, I’m afraid of that man!’’

Hodge said this with a shiver.

‘Vou can’t wonder at it, after the way
he did me in Louisville. I’ve always had
an idea*that a fellow must be weak-
headed, some way, to let another hypno-
tize him, anc, if that’s so, I’m the most
weak-headed chump in seventeen States,
for he was able to make me do whatever
he willed. I don’t understand it. And if
it hadn’t been for you!”’

The memory of what had occurred in
the Falls City brought the perspiration
out on Hodge’s face as he sawed away.

‘The thing’s going to work!’ he al-
most shouted, forgetting for the moment
Dion Santenel as he felt one of the strands
begin to loosen. ‘‘If you can only hold
me up! I feel your legs trembling. ”’

*‘Don’t worry about that. Just saw
away.’?

Though the strain was great, Frank felt
that his strength was equal to it.

Bart sawed laboriously and painfully
against the granite saw, and a few min-
utes later uttered a shout. The rock teeth

had cut through the cords, and he had

been able to free his hands. °*

He jumped down with a cry of joy,
and, stooping, began to untie his ankles.
But he found his fingers so numb, becatfse
of the long confinement of the wrists, that
he could hardly use them.

Merriwell had rolled over and was now
resting, with his back against the wall.

Having stripped aside his own bonds,
Bart Hodge began on Frank’s wrists.

“‘Nell!’’ Frank suddenly exclaimed, as
he looked toward the dark tunnel.

Hodge glanced in the same direction,
and saw Nell Tempest, who had made her
way into the pit in some manner and was
walking toward them.

CHAPTER VIL
IN THE POWER OF THE HYPNOTIST. .
Nell stopped some distance away, neat

v

  

WEEKLY.

out Merryt

. the mouth of the tunnel, glanced appre-

 

  

hensively behind her, and beckoned to

Hodge.

‘‘Something is wrong,’’ said Frank.

She beckoned again, and Hodge jumped
toward her, stumbling and limping, for
his feet and legs felt strangely lame and
were full of prickles.

“‘T’ll be with you in a minute!’’ Frank
called, beginning to untie his ankles.

He saw Neli turn into the tunnel, still
beckoning, and saw Hodge follow her.

‘‘What can be up?’ was his thought,
as he labored with the hard knots. ‘‘If I
had a knife!’

Everything in the shape of a cutting
instrument or weapon had been taken
from the prisoners by their captors.

‘‘Whatis it?’?’ Hodgeasked, as he came
up with the girl in the tunnel.

“Right on through thar!’’ she panted.

‘Quick! Run!’’

Her manner was nervous and strange,
and, though the tunnel grew darker and
darker, Hodge followed her unquestion-
ingly, sure that her intentions were
friendly.

Suddenly, finding that the tunnel was
growing dark as night, he stopped hesi-
tatingly.

‘‘Where are you going and what do
you want?’’ he demanded.

‘‘Right on thar!’’ she gasped, sounding
the ‘thar’? in a way he had not noticed
before. ‘‘Hurry.!’’ .

**‘T don’t think I’) go any further with-
mr
You’ve come to show us the way out?’?
‘*Ves,’’ she answered. ‘‘But I want you
to go with me fu’st! I ain’t gwine fur!”’
He went on with her again, guided by
her voice and the sound of her light feet,

but not withouta feeling that he ought to

turn back and refuse to go farther.
However, he soon stopped again.

“I refuse to go another step!’’ was his —
positive declaration. “‘I’m going back to
the light. If you want to help'us, go with

ell me what the trouble is.

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3 leave her and try to find the tunnel him-

me back there, and then show us the way

out of this infernal place.’’

‘*Pap’s fell down and hurt hisself!’’
His suspicions were aroused. The voice

of the girl sounded more strange and un

natural than before.
“We'll get Merriwell, and then we’ll
all go together. Show me the way back!’
‘*Jist as you say!’’ was her meek an-
swer.

Then she turned round and began to:

walk backward along the tunnel.

‘*Darker than pitch!’’ Hodge growled,
putting up his hands and feeling for the
wall. |

To his dismay, he found that there was
no wall. They were no longer in the
tunnel.

He stopped again.

‘‘Are you taking me back to Merri-
well ?”’

‘*f’'m tryin’ to,’’ she faltered.

““Trying to! Don’t you
way ?”’

‘‘l—think I do. Let me take yeh by
the hand!’’

know the

She clasped one of Bart’s hands and
started on. Hodge felt the hand tremble
in his, and for the first time had a strange
feeling that this girl of the mountains
loved him.

**VYou uns wtis about to git away ?’’ she
asked.

‘Yes. That is, we were about- to make
a try of it. I thought you came to help us

-—to show us a way out?’’

“T am showin’ yeh a way out now!’
she declared.

Yet Hodge felt that there was unicer-
tainty in her voice.

‘‘Show me the way into that tunnel
again,’’? he urged. ‘‘I want to go back to
Merriwell.”’ :

“Right this. yeh way!’ slie insisted.
**TIt?s right this yeh way !”’ /

_/Hodge wavered. He was tempted to

TIP TOP WEEKLY.

   

Bf

self. But at that moment a gleam of light
pierced the darkness.

‘‘Right yondeh!’’ she declared, point-
ing to the light.

With a dizzy feeling that she must be

right, and that he had been mentally
turned round and lost as to direction,

Hodge now followed Nell Tempest toward
the light, brighter and
brighter.

But as they proceeded, he could see that
they were not in a tunnel, such as they
This was
sandstone wall on one side and a high
sandstone roof above. Nevertheless, there
seemed to be nothing to do but to go on,
and he followed, hurriedly and feverishly,
anxious to learn if the light he beheld
was shining into the pit where he had
left Merriwell.

When they gained the light, he groaned
with disappointment. The place was en-
tirely different. A ragged opening above
let in the light.

which grew

had entered. a cavern, with a

He turned to rebuke the girl, who, he
for his heart was
look in her eyes and
her.manner was a revelation. He saw that
Nell Tempest had come under the hyp-
notic power of Dion Santenel, and that
she was not following her own will, but
the will of the hypnotist. |

felt, had deceived him,
hot and angry. The

Hodge trembled in every fiber of his
being as he made that discovery. He
feared to think what it meant for him and
for Merriwell.

Nell stopped and dropped back against
a bit of sandstone.

“‘VYou are my friend, Nell!’’ he asked.

““Ves!’’? she answered, in a wavering
way.

‘‘And you want to help me?’’

‘‘Ves,’? she answered, slowly, as if de-
bating the question.

“Then take me back to my friend.”

She made no reply.

He stood before her and looked into Re

   
 

18

her gray eyes and pinched face. The eyes
and the face were impenetrable.

He remembered how Merriwell had re-
lieved him of the hypnotic power of San-
tenel, and feeling almost that the life of
himself and his friend were at stake, he
endeavored to exert all the will power he
possessed to break the spell that held the
mind of the girl. He continued to look
into her eyes as if he would read her very
soul, and after a few moments began to
talk to her.

| The face of the girl brightened.

“T would do anything fur you, Si!”’
she said, in a.pathetic tone. ‘‘I would die

fur you, Si!”’

Hodge was quick to catch the idea that
she was clothing him with the personal-
ity of another, perhaps her lover.

‘“Then show me the way out of here!’’

As he said it, he looked her steadily in
the eyes, and again tried to exert his will
to the utmost against hers—or rather
against the will that held hers in subjec-
tion.

The color came into the pale cheek and
the eyes seemed to regain something of
their former appearance.

‘Show me the way out of here, Nell!”
he begged.

‘‘Ves,’’? she~said, and rising walked
across the lighted space.

Hodge thrilled with the thought that
he was about to triumph, and he followed
close at her lieels.

“Vou are going to show me the way
out?’’ he queried.

(Ves 1?

A small bush grew against the rock,
twining its roots in the crevices, and be-
hind this bush was a flat stone that looked
to be a part-of the cliff itself.

By the exertion of almost superhuman
strength, Nell Tempest rolled this stone
aside, revealing a lighted opening:

“Through there!’’ she whispered.

   

| ae ‘Hodge stooped down, crawling behind

   

TIP TOP WEEBKLY.

the bush, and passed through the open-
ing. Nell was close at his heels. |

As he stretched himself up outside and
discovered that he was in the bright sun-

dight and the outer world, he heard the

(¢ )

stone ‘‘chug’’ into place.

Turning, he found Nell beside him, her
face shining with pleasure.

‘*T have showed you the way out,”’ she
whispered. ‘‘That is because I love you,
Sif

“Out of the cavern!’’? he demanded.
“But I—I wanted you to show me the
way to Merriwell. This is not what I
wanted.’’

In his deep disappointment, Hodge mo-

‘ mentarily forgot that he, at least was free.

 

He thought only of Frank.

‘“‘T want to go back into the cave and.
have you show me to the point from
which we started !’’ he urged. ;

She shook her head.

‘The stone is in place. It can’t be
moved frum this yeh side.’’

‘’Phen can you take me to the pit into
which we were lowered ?”’

Her eyes wavered away from his face.

‘T dassent!”?

“Why ?’
**T dassent!”?
“Did the man who was with your

father last night tell you that you must
not help us to get away ?”’

She did not answer.

He repeated the question.
not answer.

Seeing that he could do nothing further
with her, he went back and tried to re-
move the stone. But he might as well
have tugged at the mountain itself.

Then he again tried to induce her to

show him the pit, using as before his will
power to overcome the will power of |

Dion Santenel. 3
She promised to lead him to the spot. —

But when they had scrambled for halfa
‘mile over the ledges he became convinced —
that she was not doing what he desired. _

 

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He even began to think that she was
leading him farther and farther.from the
place.

If it had not been for the knowledge of
how he had been himself hypnotized he
would have become wildly angry at the
that
lenient. Besides, he saw that abuse and

knowledge made him
wrath could avail nothing.

All the morning they scrambled over
the hills and ledges, Bart earnestly mak-
ing a search for the pit, and the girl fol->
lowing him, seeming to be drawn along
by him against her will.

From time to. time she called him Si.
H he had not had his suspicions aroused
he would not have believed that she was
the victim of Dion
hypnotic powers, for she seemed rational,

Santenel’s diabolic

and she appeared to want to help him, but
was strangely prevented from doing so.

More than once she started along a path
as if with the intention of assisting him,
but her will seemed to waver and Bart
soon found himself wandering along the
ledges, without any chance of coming near
the spot he sought.

He groaned in anguish, thinking of
Mertiwell. He feared Frank would be-
come Jost in the dark tunneis and caves
and wander there until death found him.
It was a horrible experience for Hodge.
Noon came and went, and still he pur-
sued his mad search, followed everywhere
by the girl but never assisted by her.

The sun began to drop down the west-
ern sky and Hodge kept up the work,
though he was worn almost to the point
of exhaustion.

Rounding a point, they came to a
stream that roared through an opening in
the rock and then tumbled downward in
a waterfall. The water was yellow and

‘muddy, showing the effect of the late
_ rain.

Hodge recalled the water he had heard

_ ‘Ts this Lost River?’ he asked.

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‘“This is Sandy River,’’ she answered.
“Yost River goes in tel the groun’, yeh
know, and never comes out ag’in.”’

Something in her manner and voice
caused Bart to give her a quick, sharp
She had changed in some way.
She had

come out from under the influence of the

look.

Then he saw what had occurred.

hypnotist. She was again Nell Tempest—
the Nell ‘'empest he had first known.

Santenel had felt that he did not want
to influence her for more than a few
hours, as Tempest had promised to remove
her from the country that day and so
beyond the power to work harm to his
plans.

As Bart made the astonishing discov-
ery that the girl was no longer hypnotized,
he heard a shout and turned to look down
the stream.

Scrambling over the rocks toward them
was Frank Merriwell’s father—Charles

Merriwell.

CHAPTER VIII.

INDOMITABLE MERRIWELL,.

Frank was more than astonished when
Nell Tempest and Bart did not return.

He had untied the cords that held his
ankles, and walked to the opening into
the tunnel.

‘*Bart!’’ he called, softiy.

He did not like the tunnel’s dark and
forbidding look, yet, when no reply came
to this call, he started into it.

‘Bart!’ he called again.

He began to feel that both his friend
and the girl had fallen into some sort of
trap, laid for them perhaps by their ene-

mies; or that they had tumbled into some

hole.

His feet were pricking and tingling and ,
his legs were weak, and for a few mo-
ments he sat flat down on the sandy floor

to rest them and wait.
‘He sent out a

See.
, ; é

   

19°

low call now and then, “4

         
  
 
 
 
 
   
   
   
  
 
 
 
 
    
  
        
       
     
     
     
       
       
       
       
     
     
   

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20 TIP TOP

which was flung back in a stifled way by
the black hole before him.

*‘} don’t understand’ this,”’

he mut-
tered, rising with the intention of push-
ing on, though he still believed in the
sincerity of Nell Tempest.
where this tunnel leads? There may be

‘“T wonder

any number of similar ones down here, as
in most of these mountain caverns, and
they may have taken the
trying to get back. I wonder what she
wanted, anyway, when she beckoned to
him ?”?

He moved on very cautiously, feeling
his way with hands and feet and taking
the precaution to remain near one of the
tunnel walls.

The mystery of the disappearance of
Hodge and the girl baffled and disturbed
him.

A fear that, in spite of the honest ap-
pearance of the girl, some sort of treachery
had been planned and carried out began
to oppress him. He had a feeling that he
might touch Hodge’s insensible or dead
body at any moment with his feet, or that
he might come suddenly upon some pit
that had swallowed both Hodge and Nell.

wrong one in

By and by he began to.call in Jouder and

still louder tones, at last making the
underground spaces ring with his shouts.

But Hodge was out of the cavern by
this time.

Then Mecciwelt saw a glimmer of light,
and he hastened toward it, eagerly hoping
it would lead him to Hodge and to liberty.
As he drew near it he caught the sound of
rushing water, and had a dizzy feeling
that in following the tunnel he had gone
in a circle and was again near the pit.

When he came out into the light, he
saw a swollen and yellow stream dashing
across an open space and disappearing in

atunnel-like opening. It was one arm of.

Lost River, or the river itself, as he felt
sure.
He knew something ge the character of

Sg these lost rivers of the Central West and

 

WEEKLY.

South, for he had more than once read of
the famous Lost River of Southern In-
diana, and of the Wonderful Wyandotte
Cave, in the same region, which in many
respects rivals the world-famous Mam-
moth Cave of Kentucky.

Looking upward, Merriwell saw that he
was beneath a high, dome-shaped roof,
with a chimney-like opening which let
in the yellow light.

‘No one could get to that opening un-.

less he had a balloon or the wings of a
bird, ’’
Bart was not in the

was his conclusion.

cave beneath the
high dome, nor could Frank discover any
traces of his footsteps or of the girl’s
along the shore of the underground stream.

He was sure that they had not crossed
the stream, for the danger of being borne
away by it and carried into the yawning
opening into which the water vanished,
would have deterred any one from taking
sucha risk.

Seeing that no advantage was to be
gained by lingering in this spot; Frank
turned back and again made his way into
the darkness, calling for Bart.

Certain- that he could make his way
back.to the pit by following the wall,
Frank ventured from it now and then,
feeling out in the gloom with his feet,
anxious to discover if there was any pit
into which Bart could have tumbled. But
he feared to go too far, and crept back to
the wall.

Again he ventured as much as fifty

yards straight out into the darkness and

touched another wall, which he fancied

was the farther limit of the cavern at that

point.
When he crossed back he went on, as
he thought, toward the pit. By and by

he beheld the glimmer of a light, and —
pushed ahead more rapidly; and came .
out in the cave through which the stream _
rushed, and which had above it thedomed _

roof and the chimney-like opening.

Frank fairly reeled when he made this

 

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discovery, for he had confidently expected
to come out in the lighted pit.

‘*Bart is lost!’’ he groaned, more anx-
ious for Bart’s safety than for his own.
‘*Both of them have That
girl was honest and I know it, and she
would not- willingly lead him into danger;
but the darkness has fooled her. Why did
she call him back into the tunnel ?”’

He could not answer the question. He
wondered if the girl had not been forced
to lead Bart into a trap.

become lost.

But any answer
he could advance seemed irrational; for
he could not get away from the undeni-
able fact that both he and Bart had been
at the mercy of the mountaineers, and
that no stratagems were! needed to put
them. more so. There was absolutely no
reason, so far as he could see, why Tem-
pest or the girl should want to play Bart
any trick.

So he was driven back, after all his
wild conjectures, to the belief, which al-
most became a certainty, that Bart and
the girl had fallen into some pit and been
killed or seriously injured. Why the girl
had beckoned Bart back into the tunnel
he could not even guess.

**T’ll get out of this place, and I’ll have
it searched with torches from end to end

until I know for a certainty what has be-

come of poor Hodge; and if wrong has
been done him in any way I’ll see that
~ the miscreants are jae see if I have to
give my life to the work.’

Having reached the conclusion that

_ further searching was useless, Merriwell
‘ now began to plan and work to get out of

the cave.
But though he spent hours he cand.

_ find now way of escape.
_ After proving to himself that it was a»
mere waste of time to try to escape by
S scaling the walls of the pit, he ventured
‘through the tunnel, and began a more

elaborate and systematic search for Hodge

and some way of getting out.

In spite ot ad ‘dreadful loot, =

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2]

crossed and recrossed the space between
the two walls of the cavern many times,
and at last returned along the wall to the
point where: the buried stream dashed
through the lighted cavern.

He felt that hours had passed, though
he had no way of measuring time. Yet
thoughts of Hodge and of his own condi-
tion drove away all desire for hunger“ He
however, and drank from the
stream, somewhat
refreshed, sat down on a rock to ponder
over the situation.

It was not Merriwell’s nature to be

stooped,

muddy and feeling

. There was never a sunnier or
more hapcted disposition. He was always
able to see the bright side of every situa-
tion, if there was a bright side. He tried
to find that bright side now; tried to
assure himself that all would yet come

But the gloom of the depths he
had been searching, the mysterious dis-
appearance of Hodge and his own unayail-
ing efforts to find a way of escape, now
weighed on him.

Yet even then he did not despair. He
would not despair.

‘‘T must get out of here and I must find
Hodge! I will not believe that anything
terrible has happened to him until Iam
forced to do so.”’

Then his thoughts flew to far-off Yale
college. |

The opening of Yale was just at hand.
There had been only time for him to
make this trip into the mountains in the
interest of his father, and hasten quickly
back to the railroad in order to reach New
Haven in time for the college opening.

He thought of the friends who would
"be awaiting his coming at Yale—awaiting
him at first eagerly, then anxiously, then.
despairingly, perhaps. In fancy he saw
Jack Ready, Greg Carker, Berlin Carson,
Jim Hooker, and big, brave Bruce Brown-
ing, with many other friends. a
would be expecting him. :

| oe will be ped a exelaimed,

depressed

out well.

 

 
      
    
  

 

22 TIP TOP WEEKLY.

the words aloud, and they
the wall and seemed to

He spoke
thundered along
tise echo-like to the opening above.
thought. He
If persons

The sound gave him a

began to shout at the opening.
it seemed that they

were walking near,

must hear his calls. But, though he
shouted himself hoarse, no answer came.

stream. There
No doubt the
extended in that direction,

He glanced across the

was blackness beyond it.

cavern no one
could say how far.

But the streain seemed impassable. It
was very swift, and it sucked into the hole
in the wall in an alarming way.

He looked at the granite wall above the
There were
irregularities in this wall, and it occurred
to him that it. might be possible to cross
to the other side of the stream by crawl-
ing along the wall, holding to these pro-
jections and settling his feet in the
niches.

‘‘T will get out!’ he declared, the old
fire and determination, which had made
him such «a winning force in all that he
had undertaken, again filling his heart.

point where it vanished.

He arose from the’rock, mounted to the
wall, and began the effort to cross the
stream by climbing along the dangerous
wall.

““There is only one way,’’ thought
Frank. ‘‘I might wander about these
eaves for months and find no escape.
Now, this muddy torrent dashes away
into the darkness. It may be a subterra-
-nean river and it may come out into the
daylight somewhere. I have one chance in
ten of saving myself. I am going to throw
myself. into the stream and let it take me
where it will—to safety and sunlight or
to lasting darkness underground. It is the
only possible way !”’

Swinging himself over the ledge, he
lowered himself into the roaring torrent
and was instantly swirled away into the
a darkness. i

  
 

CHAPTER IX.

THE RESCUE OF MERRIWELL,.

‘‘Where is Frank ?’’? Charles Merriwell
cried, as he
toward Bart Hodge and Nell Tempest.

Before Bart could answer the question

scrambled over

or ask one of the number that rushed into
his mind when he beheld Frank’s father,
the girl uttered a startled cry and catch-
ing him by the arm pointed into the
muddy stream at the foot of the falls.

The girl’s cry was echoed by Bart.

Floating round in the eddy just below
the falls was a form that looked strangely
like Frank’s. |

Hodge could not that it was
Frank’s, but he leaped the bank
with great strides to the water’s edge,
followed by Nell Tempest and Frank’s
father.

The form,
been thrown up by the water that boiled
from under the falls, and now it was
being sucked down.

Without a moment’s hesitation,

believe
down

body, alive or dead, even though the fact
seemed so improbable, Bart plunged into
the stream, and half wading and half
swimming, plunged toward the spot where

the form had now vanished.

The whirlpool looked deep and danger-
ous, but Bart sprang almost head-first into’

it with his customary recklessness.

His hands touched clothing, and this
he clutched tightly, as the water sucked
him down,

the stream.

The girl was on the bank, not gate .
what to do, but uttering frantic and_

frightened cries.

With a grip that could not be Siaicu
Bart clung to the clothing. as he was flung —
to the surface, He made a great effort to
oi swim,

    
  

and then | pep Sent the clutching hand

    

 

the rocks

whether dead or alive, had

and ~
with a feeling that this must be Frank’s

down, then hurled him up,
“up, to the surface. ee
Charles Merriwell had also leaped into |

    

 

 

 
 

 

 

  
  
   

   
  
   
  
   
   
    
      

 
ae

  

of Charles Merriwell, which drew him out
of the sucking whirlpool.
As Bart came out, the form was drawn
upward into the light by his strong hand.
“My God? It’s Frank !’’ Charles -Merri-
well cried, and with a strength that was
little short of miraculous he dragged both

a Bart and Frank from the stream and up
amy

z on the rocks.

ae at

ex: Hodge was soaked, but not injured;

and he immediately turned his attentions
to Frank, though with the feeling that he

Be must be in a dream and that the thing
) —_ could not be true and real.

4 ‘Vet it was Frank Merriwell. Not dead;
| ___ but seemingly so, and wholly unconscious.

a The stream into which he plunged in

1. the cavern but a few moments before was
~~ a diverted arm of Lost River, which came
out beneath the falls of the Sandy. It had

sucked Frank into the darkness, had

drawn him through the underground
cavernous tunnel, and had then hurled
him out into the eddy beneath the falls,
more dead than alive. ‘

Hodge had fancied that he and Nell
_-were at least a mile from the cavern of
4 Lost River, but they were really not
__ twenty yards from the point where Frank
had tumbled into the stream.

**Tt’s Merry, but 1’m afraid he is dead !”?
he gasped, and then, without further
words, he set to work, using all the
knowledge gained in his adventurous ex-
perience and at Yale to resuscitate the
almost drowned youth.

_ Charles Merriwell assisted him, and his
- experience had been even greater than
that of Hodge.

_ Neither talked much as they worked,
for they félt that they were working for
Frank’s life.

‘He will live!’ said Merriwell, his hace
ghting with joy. ‘‘My son will live!’’

- Hodge could have shouted for pure
a pene No greater cota 4 than the

 

 

  

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23

lovingly and loyally acknowledged to be
the truest and best friend he had ever
known.

But Merriwell was not to die, as Hodge
felt sure now, and his cup of delight was
full.

Yet a long time elapsed before Frank
recovered sufficiently to talk, and a*still
greater time before he was able to walk.

Hodge had forgotten the girl in his
anxiety for Merriwell, and now, when
Frank was safe and Hodge turned to look
for her, she was gone.

‘‘She is a mountain girl,’’ said Frank’s
father, ‘‘and she will tell her people what
she has seen. This is a dangerous section.
We must get Frank away from here.’’

“But he can’t walk any distance!”’
Hodge objected.

Frank smiled. He had been overjoyed
to see his father again, and more than
overjoyed to know that he was safely out
of the pit and the cavern and once more
safe and sound with Bart Hodge.

‘‘T can walk farther than you think.”’

‘‘We must get to some place where we
can talk,’’ said Charles Merriwell. ‘“‘I
know of your danger here. I was told about
it in Deep Springs, and I came on here as
fast as I could.’ There is a little abandoned
cabin just across yonder where I remained
last night. I have been looking for you
since yesterday afternoon. We’ll try to
get Frank to that.”’

The cabin was more than a mile dis-
tant, but with the aid of his father and
Bart, Merriwell was able to make the
journey by easy stages.

There, in that cabin, as night came
down, Charles Merriwell told of the friend
in Deep Springs who had heard of the
plot of Brandon Drood, alias Dion San-
tenel, his old enemy of the Southwest, to
entrap and hold Frank in the mountains.

“I came as fast as a horse could carry
me, my son; and I thank God that I

teached that spot in time to assist in sav-
; ing ocr life. The men. a eo ame. tried to oe

      

     
      
     
         
       
   
       
     
     
     
       
     
   
 
     
   
   

  
 
 
  
 
  
    
 

   
     
     
     
     
     
   

Ot TIP ‘TOY

hold you for Santenel will be aroused as
soon as they know you are out of the
cavern and they will be hunting the
mountains over. We will rest here until
your strength has somewhat returned, and
then we will push on. My horse, down
there in the valley just below, you can
ride. To-morrow morning we can be well
out of this section.”’

CHAD. paw a.
RUSHING TOWARD YALE.

Frank Merriwell and Bart Hodge, ac-
companied by Charles Merriwell, hurried
into’ the Grand Central Station at the cor-
ner of Third street and Central avenue,
in Cincinnati, and after asking a question
of a blue-coated official, mounted to the
rooms of the general passenger agent of
the Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern.

They had escaped from the mountains
of Eastern Kentucky and from the hands
of the men who had sought to imprison
and hold Merriwell; but they had been
much delayed by the swollen condition of
the streams, and had, therefore, reached
the railway a day later than they antici-
pated.

From Kentucky they had hurried to
Cincinnati over the Cincinnati Southern,
or Queen and Crescent route.

Frank looked at a station clock as they
mounted toward the rooms of the genéral
passenger agent.

His manner was hutried. The Queen
and Crescent train had been late, and the
train which they had expected to take for
New York had departed Heand Bart were
anxious to reach New Haven the day be-

fore the opening of college, but it began _

to seem that they would not be able to do
so, for Yale opens on the last Thursday
in September, and this was the night of
the last Tuesday. The time from Cincin-
nati to New York is twenty-three hours,
* and. two hours more from New York to

New Haven, and the nig

 
 

* t

    

  

WEEKLY.

ht trains were all

  

  

gone. If they waited, therefore, for the
morning trains out of Cincinnati it was
clear that they could not reach New
Haven before Thursday morning, and
they were wildly anxious to be there on
Wednesday night.

.“T guess we’re in the soup, Merry!”’
Hodge dolefully commented. ‘‘I wouldn’t
have missed that train for a hundred
dollars.’

Hodge had been in a stew all through
the railway trip to Cincinnati, feeling
that the lateness of the train from the
South would bring about this very thing.

‘““The papers reported a wreck at Par-
kersburg,’? said Frank. ‘‘Perhaps there
will be something. sent out from here on
that account, which will help us. Any-
way, it won’t do any harm to have a talk
with Hattuck about it. If we can’t go, I
propose to go to the hotel and get a good
night’s sleep. ’’

‘“‘Oh, you never stew about anything!”’
; 5 Soy

Hodge growled. ‘“You’re as cold-blooded
as a fish!’

Merriweli only laughed and rapped on

the door of the room to which they had
mounted.

‘“‘Hattuck won’t be in so late as this!”’
Bart protested. .

But Hattuck was in, as Frank had

hoped would be the case; and he was

more than pleased to see Frank, and also

to meet Bart Hodge again, and to make

the acquaintance of Frank’s father.
Hattuck had become acquainted with
Frank in St. Louis not long before, and
had induced him to take his Athletic
Team to .Seymour, Indiana, to play
against the ‘‘Indiana Invincibles,’’ during
the time of the Seymour Street Fair. The
Athletic Team had won, as Hattuck had
felt it would, in spite of the fact that the
umpire was unfair in his decisions, and

they had thus been compelled to ‘‘play Ps

against ten men.”’

Hattuck began to talk of this ball game —

introductions were over, to

¥

as soon as the

»

  
      

 

   

 

 
       
  

the surprise of the clerks and officials in
ee: the room, who had wondered when he so
ae royally and cordially welcomed Merriwell.
| But Frank insisted on telling his story.
~ Hattuck’s face brightened.
7 ‘Well, now, it’s dead lucky that you
caine up here, for I can fix you fellows all
right, and I’ll be only too happy to do it.

 

i I’ve just had an urgent call to come East,
7? _ and I start in less than an hour fot New
; - __-York in my private car. If you’ll go with
. me, you will be more than welcome as my
- | guests. It’s really the only way to over-

come the difficulty.
on time!”’

We'll get you through

 

 

ae Frank saw that in making this state-
: a; ment Hattuck meant to declare that he
a would ‘speed the special, if necessary, to
. , 3 accomplish this end.
| 4 a Bart was ready to shout.

a ‘We'll run on the time of the regular

Ea which we will overtake at Parkersburg,’’
i said Hattuck. ‘‘Then we will have our
car attached to it there, and so sail right
sia on into New York.’’
a Less than an hour later Merriwell, with
his father and Hodge, was in the hand-
some special car, ‘‘Belpre,’’ leaving Cin-
cinnati behind.
“T’ve never seen a Yale opening,’’ said
‘Charles Merriwell, looking proudly at his

 
 
 
  
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  

son, ‘‘but I’m determined to see it this
time!’’ ae
He laid his hand affectionately on

   

Frank’s shoulder, and the happy youth,
who had been so long in a sense father-
less, felt a strange new glow in his heart.
_ **Father,’’ he whispered, ‘‘no one will
be more glad than I to have you there.”’

 
 
 
 
 

7 _— ny ‘

CHAPTER XI.

AGAINST TIME.

 
  
 

RACING

 
 

Knowing, from what Bruce Browning

 

   
  
  
  

ville, that Browning would be in New

 
 
 

had said when they separated in Louis-.

Haven at least two days before the open-_
m. Of Yale college, Merriwell _ wrote ay

 

TIP TOP WEEKLY. ® 5

message, as he was whirled along in Hat-
tuck’s private car. This message told
Bruce that Frank and Bart were now
speeding eastward and would, without
doubt, be in New Haven Wednesday even-
ing.

and Bart left the car fora
at Chillicothe and sent this

Merriwell
short time
message.

‘‘Of course he doesn’t know what a
time we’ve had,’’ said Frank, as he and
Bart turned back to the Belpre, ‘‘but it
will do him good to know that we’re on
our way.”’

As they re-entered the. handsomely
furnished private car they were met by
Hattuck, who had his hands full of tele-
grams relating to railway and other mat-
ters, which he had shortly before received.

“T thought that wreck at Parkersburg
would be cleared away before this,’’ he
said, ‘‘but it hasn’t been, though a lot of
men are at work on it. One freight
smashed into another, and they are piled
up on the track, making a bad mess of it.
But perhaps the track will be all clear
before we get there.’’

The track was not clear, however, when
the special reached Parkersburg.

The wreck had occurred at the western
limit of the town. ‘The regular train had
been able to get no further, though the
passengers had been conveyed on into the
little city.

‘‘T don’t like the looks of things,’’ said
Hodge, after. he and Frank had walked
round the wreck. ‘‘That business will
hold us here all night, I’m afraid.”’

The prospect was not pleasant, but as
Hattuck assured them that the special
would proceed as soon as possible; and
nothing more could be done, Merriwell
retired into the berth that. had been as-

signed him, and Hodge, after some further at

stewing and fretting, concluded that this

was so good an example that he followed |

 

 
 

       
        
        
       
     
      
         
 

 

26 TIP

  

Some time in the night they were
aroused by the motion of the car.
“<Weve lost five hours, but we’ll do
what we can to make it up,’’ Frank
heard Hattuck saying to some one.

Hodge tumbled out of his berth and
began to dress.

‘“We can’t hurry the thing by getting
up,’’ Frank drawled. ‘‘Go to bed, Hodge;
and take things easy.’’

“T can’t, Merry!’ Hodge declared:

**We’re five hours late!’’

“We might have been more than that.’’

“Tf there was no possibility of getting
‘to New Haven to-morrow evening I could
be resigned, but there is still a fighting
chance, and it excites me. Get up and
let’s talk it over.”’

Hattuck heard them and came through
the car.

They were then crossing the Ohio
River on the great bridge, a mile and a
third long.

‘‘T have put the special ahead of the
regular,’’ he stated. ‘‘We will run on the
time of the regular, and try to make up
what has been lost, or what we can
of it.”’

‘Will we get to New York in time to

take the nine o’clock train to-morrow
night out of New York for New Haven?’’

“Well, that’s a question that I can’t
answer. But I’m going to put the special
through, for I am urgently needed in New
York to-morrow night to attend a meet-
ing of railroad officials, and I want to be
there if it’s possible. So you may rest
assured I shall do what I can.”’

Hodge went back to bed at this, and
o t )

slept soundly until morning.

When he awoke he found that the spe-
‘cial had made up one of the five hours,
and that the regular was not far behind
them. oe

Another hour was ‘gained by the time

~ Grafton was reached, where the Parkers-

“burg division enters on the main line of
the Baltimore and Ohio Road.

TOP WEEKLY.

From that time on the special ‘seemed
fairly to fly.

On and on it sped, stopping only at the -

principal stations. Meals were served in
the car.

There was a constant consultation of
watches and time tables, as the special
flew through the beautiful and picturesque
motntain region and across the Alle-
ghenies and down toward the valley of
the Potomac and Harper’s Ferry.

Before Harper’s Ferry was gained other
hours had heen recovered, and when Bal-
timore was reached, only one of the five
hours needed to be made up remained to
be annihilated. by the space-devouring
special,

And behind them thundered the regu-

lar train, though never in sight.
There was a vexatious delay near Balti-

more; but at last the special was trans-

ferred across the river by ferryboat, as is
done in the case of through trains from
the West.

The distance from Baltimore to New
York, by the Baltimore and Ohio and the

Bound Brook route, is one hundred and -

eighty-six miles; and in this run the
special had to gain an hour to put Bart
and Frank in New York in the time they
desired:

Merriwell became anxious as the train
whérled on. A telegram had been received

from Browning which made Frank very —

desirous to reach the famous college city
that night.

At Philadelphia
another telegraphic message.

‘(Will meet you at the depot in Jersey — |

City. © JACK READy.”?

Frank passed the dispatch over to

Hodge.

‘Wonder how Jack knew we were Coie

ing on this train ?’’ Hodge questioned.

“T don’t know; but I know that Me
will nut be able to reach New York in
time. ee ee me that there art

 

Hattuck pin oc ;

   

 

  
 
  
 
         
         
    
  

  

  
     
 

i.

trains out. of this city for
York every day. Unless he side-
- of those trains for his special,

over twenty
New
tracks some
we can’t make it.’’

**And he won’t do that!’’

‘(No 3?

‘‘And we won’t get to New Haven for
the festivities to-night ?”’

**T don’t know.

But Hattuck again had his special put
ahead of
time, and nearly all of the remainder of

I’m still hoping so.’’

regular train, running on its
the lost time was made up on the run to
New York.

**We'll have to jump, if we make it!’
said Frank, hurrying out of the special
with his father and Bart, after thanking
Hattuck, when Jersey City was reached.
**But there is still a fighting chance.”’

‘Here you are! Right side up. with
care. I’ve been weeping great salt tears
ever since I learned that your train was
late.’

Jack Ready grabbed Merriwell’s grip
with one
hand to grasp Hodge’s warm palm.

‘*How did you know we were coming ?”’
Hodge asked, pleased to again behold the
smiling face and red-apple cheeks.

_“*Message from No time to
talk now. I’m holding up the whole of

Browning.

‘the New York, New Haven and Hartford:

Railroad for you in the Grand Central
_ Station. I told the high muckainucks whio
tun that celestial delightful road
through the City of Elms that the great
-and only Merriwell was coming, hours

and

late, and that they must hold a train in

readiness for him; and they’re holding
her. No time to talk.’?:

He was hustling along, chattering like

a magpie, even though declaring there
‘was no time for words. :
But Frank took time to stop and intro-
duce him to Charles Merriwell, after
which all hurried to the po that was to

hand and reached out the other -

TOP WEEKLY. 27

After that came a hot race for the
Grand Central Station.

Jack Ready looked at his watch as the
station loomed before them.
a thousand dollars

‘It’s costing me

minute to hold

Y
that train, but pe I

can stand another minute of. it! Her
are! If I’ve been disobeyed in the matter
I'll have the officials beheaded by Vale
sophomores. ’

The train was still in the station,
vas moving when Merriwell’s little
sighted it.
which put
them aboard, and Hodge dropped into a
seat, with a satisfied smile and a very red
face.

Then there was a mad rush,

‘*New
flying,

‘‘Great time!’’? panted Ready.
Flags

landlords smiling!’
New York to

Haven is all decorated!
bunting twining,

““You didn’t come to
meet us??? Frank asked.

‘*T had to come to New York this after-
noon. tele-
grain, and 1 told him I’d lay for you in
Jersey City. And—— Well, you know

the rest.”’

Browning showed. me your

CHAPTER XII.
BACK AT YALE,

Jack Ready insisted on again wiring
Bruce Browning that Merry and Bart were
coming. He had no time in Jersey City
or New York to do this after meeting
Merriwell’s party, so he hopped off at the
first station and sent the message.

When he re-entered the car, coming
through several others on his way back,
he brought with him a surprise in the
person of the handsome young Virginian,
Jack Diamond.

‘“Merry! Glad to see you! This is in-
deed a treat!’’ Diamond declared. .

He put out his hand to Hodge, and
Hodge took it, though there was never

the best of feeling ‘sewrcee the two. But 4

both felt that this was not a time for the : ‘

 
 

28 ee ee

revival of old animosities, and in the

heart of each was a desire to bury those .

things, if it could be done.

““T’m glad to see you!’’ said Diamond,
as he held Bart’s hand.

Hodge answered heartily:

‘‘And the same to you.”’

Perhaps there never was a happier man
than was Charles Merriwell on that run
from New York to the famous college
city. The fact that his son had gained
‘distinction in Yale and out of Yale had
been indelibly impressed on him; first by
the attitude of Hattuck, and now by
what he heard of Frank’s life, adventures
and victories from the lips of these enthu-
siastic friends. But not that alone would
have made him proud and happy. He
could see, from every word and gesture,
from the glance of the speaking eye and
the smile of the fine face, that Frank
Merriwell was a son of whom any father
might be proud.

And Frank was hastening back to Yale
to enter on his senior year!

As Charles Merriwell sat there and lis-
tened to the talk of Frank and his friends
he began to build plans for Frank’s fu-
ture, and to mentally estimate what that
future might hold in store for him.

“‘T have wealth,’’ he reflected.

Then he stopped.

“Wealth? Yes, I have it in abundance.
But wealth alone never yet made a man!
It has spoiled thousands. Frank has more

than I have, with all my money. He has

youth! And what a clean, noble youth it
is! May he never grow a year older in
heart than he is now!’

Diamond was going back to New
Haven to meet again some of the friends
-~who had there been dear to him,

‘‘After that, I don’t know,’’ he said,
with a smile. ‘‘I almost wish I had not
graduated last year!”

Ready looked at his watch and ee ue
ea. finger. , :

ze

 

  

WEEKLY.

return to the,

      

S Eee

The whistle of the locomotive cut the
air. |

‘‘Dost stir thy blood ?’’

‘“New Haven!’’ exclaimed Hodge) also
looking at his watch.

‘*Ves,’’ saidx Frank:- “‘It seems less
than an hour since we left New York.”’

‘(When auld acquaintance meet, cempus
fugits,’ chirped Ready. ‘‘Here we are!”

The brakeman was calling ‘‘N’aven!”’

When the train stopped, Ready took
Frank’s arm and conducted him down the
steps to the platform of the station.

A half dozen strong young fellows came
diving through the crowd, with others at
their heels. Foremost among them was
Browning.

“Hurrah for Merriwell!’? shouted Ber-
lin Carson, who was close at Browning’s
back.

Dunstan Kirk, who had been captain of
the Yale nine the previous year, was
there, with Cliff Cutler, who had been

manager, and they were as wild to seé

Merriwell and to give him a roval gyreet-
ing as were those nearer and dearer
friends, Browning, Carson, Carker, Hooker
and others who could rightfully claim to
be members of the ‘‘flock.’’

.Jack Diamond came in for a full share.

of attention, as did Bart Hodge.
Cutler and Kirk began to talk of the
victorious record of the Athletic ‘Team,

as all walked to the carriages that had.

‘been provided for Merriwell’s party, for
Browning had resolved that Frank should

transportation in the street cars.
When the carriage which bore Frank
turned from Church street into Chapel,

and behind the winking Street Jamas s
Frank saw the dim outline of the beauti- ~

ful green with its three churches ina row,

back of which dimly loomed the fine old”
‘ivy-covered college buildings, his heart —
‘ Mase with ie and ee it was

 

  

 

campus and to Yale in z |
greater state than could be afforded by

 
  
  
  
   
 
 
 
   
  
  
    
  
  
  
  
  
     
    
 
      
     
     
     
     
   
   
 

TIP

like coming home after a long sojourn—
home to dearold Yale, for at. least another
college year with all its joys and pleas-
ures, all its friendships and aspirations,
all of its ambitions and all of its toil as
well. Back to Yale!

**Tsn’t it fine, Merry!’’ said Hodge. ‘‘I
feel as if I want to get out and kiss the
very grass.’

. .

That night, as the time verged on mid-
night, in Frank’s new rooms in Vander-
bilt, there was a merry reunion. All of
the old friends who were still in Yale or
in New Haven were see with many
new ones, together with Kirk and Cutler,
and Frank’s father, who was as jolly as
one of the boys.

Jack Ready had invaded the rooms be-
tore Frank’s return, and with the help of
the colored man who is always to be
found knocking about the campus and the
buildings straightening things up, he had
decorated the rooms according to the
demands of his own lively fancy and
exuberant taste.

There were flowers and flags, with Yale
banners in such profusion that the place
looked blue, though Jack Ready declared
that it really was not ‘‘blue’’ in the least.

There was something good to eat, too
— in fact, such an abundance of the things
that delight the palate and the ‘‘inner
man’’ that Frank feared dyspepsia and
headaches for all who were there.

The eatables and the drinkables were
duly attacked and compelled to surrender ;
after which there were speechies.

Always, when young men or old men
get together for a good time, there must
be speeches from those who are supposed
to be possessed of the oratorical gift.

All, -or nearly all in Frank’s rooms
were orators that night—the night before
the opening of old Yale

Berlin Carson recounted some of the
incidents of the visit of Merriwell’s Ath-
letic Team to Denver. Greg Carker told
of the trip to Badger’s ranch. Browning

~ recounted and wove into the loom of nar-

ative the threads of history concerning
- the visits to ‘I'oledo and Chicago. Ready
- expatiated on the delights of the Great
— North Woods and Niagara. ‘And ' Bart
told, in his straightforward way, the his-

tory of the happenings in Louisville and

TOP WEEKLY,

29

the Kentucky mountains, with the rail-
road race against time to New Haven.

Charles Merriwell beamed and smiled
through it all, as happy as the happiest.

When the speeches had ended, after
hearty cheers from the hearers, Dunstant
Kirk rose to his feet.

‘“‘New Haven and Yale have heard of
Merriwell. The whole country has heard
of him. We are proud of him. Are words
necessary to twine any laurels round this
toast? It means more than volumes could
speak—just the name, MERRIWELL!”’

Perhaps Kirk tangled his figure of
speech, but the cheer with which this was
received, and the beaming delight with
which the toast was drunk could not have
been more satisfactory if the tongue of
Demosthenes had ‘‘twined the ‘laurel
round the toast.’ fe

Merriwell had scarcely ceased speaking
in sesponse, when Diamond, in his fine
tenor voice, broke out in the familiar
song:

‘Here to good old Yale! Drink her
down, drink her down!

Here’s to good old Yale! Drink her down,
drink her down!

Here’s to good old Yale, she’s so hearty
and so hale—

Drink her down, drink
her down, down,

drink

her down,
down!’?

.

‘‘Back in Yale!’ thought Frank, as he
sat by his window looking out at the trees
and the quiet sky, after the merry-
makers had departed. ‘‘Yes, there is
pleasure elsewhere, but I am glad to be
back in Yale! I wonder what new friends
I shall make here this year? I hope shall
make no enemies!’’

Then, with a heart of glowing thank-
fulness for the friends who had gathered
round him that night, and a sigh for those
other friends who were with him in
thought though not in person, he drew
back from the window and went to bed,
to dream of the joys ie the friendships
of dear old Yale.

THE END.

The next number will contain ‘Frank
Merriwell’s New Protegé; or, The Star of —
the Freshman Class.’ sie

 
30

[lip TorWEEKLY.

AN IDEAL PUBLICATION FOR THI” AMERICAN YOUTH ”

 

 

 

 

NEW

“OGLOBER 18, 1900.

YORK,

Terms to Tip Top Weekly Mail Subscribers.
(Posraack FRER.)
Single Copies or Back Numbers, 5c. Each.

@ months - - - - + + + 65c. --
4 months ~ «© « « + = « §ac, 2 copies one year -
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How ‘vo SEND Mon wy.—By post oftice or express money order,
registered letter, bank check or draft, at our risk. At yourown
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letter. $

RecKkiprs.— Receipt of your rentltance is acknowledged by proper
shange of nuntberon your label. Ifnotcorreet you have not been
properly credited,cud should let us now at once.

STREET & SMITH’S TIP TOP WEEKLY
238 William St., New York Citys

/One year -

APPLAUSE.

As secretaty of the Tip Top Yale Club I am writ- .

and let you
weekly and

ing to tell you about our fine society,
know what we think of our beloved
what things we like best in the stories. It happens
that fifteen members of the senior class in the
Chicago Latin and Scientific School are preparing
to enter Yale a year from this fall, and we thought,
therefore, it would be an excellent plan
Yale society, which would unite our interests more
closely and continue to bind us in friendship even
after we have entered the university. Our club is
really a secret society. We have our secret grip
and hold meetings every Wednesday night in the
club. rooms, behind closed doors. We propose to
have the club perpetuate itself, and at the end of
every year the graduating members will elect those
from the incoming senior class who intend to go
to Yale. Every boy in this school knows about
Yale because every one of us reads the Tip Top
Tip Top was the motto of our champion football
team last year. Tip Top is the model of our ath-
letes. Tip Top decided us upon which college to
attend, and has made this a Yale school. For these
reasons we called our society the Tip Top Yale
Club. Although every Tip Top delights us more
than anything else, we are particularly fond of the
college stories. We like to hear about Frank’s
football games, the track games and baseball, the
secret societies and all the things that happen on the
campus. We are always ready to cheer for old Eli
and are anxiously awaiting the time when Frank
and the flock will once more be eagerly devoting
themselves to winning new victories and glories
“for Yale, for dear old Yale!’’ With one voice the
Tip 1, Yale Club votes the Yale stories to be the
best. ith a voice just as loud and hearty it
wishes Tip Top long life, congratulates the pub~w
lishers and cheers our ao author, Burt L., to the
‘echo. GEORGE TILLOT SON,
Secretary Tip Top Yale Club, Chicago, Til.

When you enter Yale next. fall you will not feel
like strangers, for Tip Top has already made you
well acquainted with the great university. Being a
‘college graduate, Mr. Standish is specially qualified
to describe the college life there, and your own pleas-
ant college days will be like reliving the things you
have read in Tip Top. The term has just begun, and
“every department of the university is booming with
life and activity. You are sure to read with inter-
est the things that befall Frank Merriwell in this,
his senior year. May the Tip Top Yale Club. pros-
per and in the future come to be an influential fea-
ture of Yale life.

We write to tell you how much we appreciate the
ye aoe and its hero, Frank Merriwell. We would

e to
-among the orange groves. It seems we can hardly
wait for every Friday to come to get our paper. We
_ have been reading the Tip Top for about a year.
Wishing success ae be life to Frank — eee
and Street & Smi th THE TIP TOP TRIO,

to form -a’

ave Frank and his friends come to California

Colton, Caltfomia, 2

TIP TOP WEEKLY.

We have been reading the Tip Top from the first
number up to the present date and we have formed
. club called the Tip Top Pleasure Club. We have

ghteen members. IKE MURPHY, Pres.,
Chicago, Ill.

Good luck to the Tip Top Pleasure Club.

I would like to express my opinion of Tip Top and
Frank Merriwell. I have read every issue of the Tip
Top this year and can truthfully say that it is the
best paper ever published, and Frank is the finest
young man in the whole country. Wishing Mr.
Standish good luck, J. ARTHUR WILLIAMSON,

Honey Grove, Texas.

Thank you. We certainly appreciate your praise.

I am much interested in the Tip Top weeklies, hav-~
ing read all but a few early numbers. I think Frank
should marry Elsie and Harry marry Inza. Bart,
think, will take Lucy Livingston, as she is just the
girl for him. I have noticed in a number of the Tip
Tops Inza has said things that have led me to think
that she thinks a great deal of Harry, and no one is
more deserving of her praise than noble-hearted
Harry. I hope Frank will come into South Daketa
while he is in the West, and surely there is no place
in South Dakota that would be more interesting to
Tip Top readers than Watertown, with her beautiful
lakes and summer resorts. If Frank has time before

_returning to college, let him extend his visit to South

Dakota and camp at Stony Point, Lake Kampeska,
near Watertown. It would natur: lly intere a ae great
I

number of readers.
Watertown, §. ‘D.

Frank, no doubt, would be glad to accept your invi-
tation were it not for the fact that he has already
returned to New Haven and is about to start upon
the courses of the year.

In regard to Tip Top Weekly, I would say that
in my opinion it is the only weekly worth reading.
The Tip Top is realistic, and in nearly every num-
ber some moral lesson is taught. Young America -
would do well to take Frank Merriwell as a model in
life. Being a baseball enthusiast, the baseball series
naturally interested me more than any other series,
Having read nearly every number from 1 to date,
I have arrived at the conclusion to which the major-
ity of Tip Top readers have also come, namely, that
Wisie is best suited to become Frank’s wife. Hodge
is indeed a true friend to Frank, but Harry Rattle-
ton seems to me to be as true and faithful a friend
as Frank has. Did Jack Diamond return to the
South after his short stay at Niagara? Jealousy and
revenge seem to be a large part of Jack’s nature, but
under all he has the true Southern heart. May Tip
Top ever continue such a source of interest and
pleasure as it has in the past, for which we thank
Mr. Standish. A DEVOTED READER,

Campello, Mass,

The history of such a splendid fellow as Frank
Merriwell is bound to be interesting wherever the
scenes are laid. When you say Jack Diamond has a
true, warm Southern heart you touch the key to his
character. What more need be said?

{am a confirmed reader of your excellent Tip Top,
and, being much interested in the Inza-Elsie question,
I think I do not intrude by writing my opinion.
I petics far more correspondents are in favor of
Elsie. I also notice that few express their reasons
why she would make a better wife for Frank. ‘G,”
in 229, writes: ‘“‘Inza is too much the make-up of
Frank” to make him a good wife.
are noble, generous, lovable and courageous,
Frank like either were she bz use, selfish,
fickle? I think not. Again, an Elsie
that Inza was too proud. A
pride like Inza’s
noble chare ac teristics.
He is a “‘wonderful’’
haps he is referring to the time when Herbert Ham-_
merswell tried to show attentions to her, after bring-—
ing a ee to provoke Frank to fight when in her
company. Faith in each other is essential for — {
and wife’s Aan: Does Elsie have such
Frank? No, at least I have never had proof of ic
Elsie’s liking for Frank is more like the liking of a
sister for an older brother. Some reader may_ask
where Inza’s great faith in Frank comes in. It is—
shown in a hundred places. Who was it expressed
fear of Frank’s safety in breaking the colt at Bad- —
ger’s ranch? Be sure it was not Inza, for she had
too much faith in Frank’s prowess for that, I will
wry ‘several papers—longer ones and more thought

in them than this. (RRY HEWES,
Grand Rapids, oe

Your ideas are set forth very clearly and.
guments will attract the attention: of may
readers, _ .

admirer wrote
person destitute of.
also,

He says, she is haughty.

poe ened ane eae

 

 

As he says, both —
Would
cowardly, or = =
is without one of mankind’s most rs

student of character, but per- _
 

PIP“ DOr

I have read a great number of the Tip Top Series
in fact all of the last hundred, and very nearly all of
the first. After reading No. 231 and Mr. D. &.
Carey’s letter, I thought that’I ought to take a
hand. Of course, Mr. Carey is right in some things
he says, but why can he blame Bart Hodge for hav-
ing a temper and will of his own? What do individ-
uals think of a man who has no will, but is guided
= everything he does by some one else? If Mr.
arey is guided by some of his friends in Spring-
fic 1d, does he not think it better to look over all <8
facts and judge for himself. In reg: 3
gambling debts, why, Bart never
told him, that they were paid.
any one to pay them, but, of course,
paid by Frank he can never § for;
thing, when he ran away from Frank the
he ee ao he was doing what was it by Fr
in regard to his baseball playing at. Maplewood, was
he not right in openly asserting that he did not like
the pitcher, and were not all members of the team
feeling ‘the same way? He caught for the pitcher
only because he wanted to help Frank, and did not,
as Mr. Carey says, ‘“‘help to lose it,’’ but did the best
he could under the circumstances. Then, again, at
college last year. Bart was Fee enemy and
Badger was Bart’s. Why should Bart give in to
Badger?  Merriwell is a different character, and
does as very few’ young men do. Mr. Carey’s posi-
tion is well taken, but there is always another side,
and I would like to hear more of him, although
my age may be greater than his, still I think our
schooling is about the same, for I’ve never taken
any course but in the high school here. I admire
Badger, but he, like Bart, has a will of his own,
and I don’t see how the readers can think of such
a thing as putting Badger in Hodge’s place. Bad-
ger, of course, is married, and, I hope, setiled
down, so he will have to be left out now, and some
one else take his place. Rattleton, Browning, Dia-
mond and all the rest are good characters, and f
hope to read more of them in the future. 'And an-
other thing. Rattleton is always relying on Frank
for everything, so I think when the marrying time
comes he should marry Inza, whom, he can depend
upon all the timé to help him along. I don’t know
whom the others should marry, but let Diamond
marry Miss Reynolds and let Mr. Standish select
for the rest. Hoping to read your splendid weekly,
Tip Top, for years yet, a
Tenn,
good defence of

ay
Nashville,

_We think you have made a very
Bart.

Having been delighted by seeing my letter in No.
229 of the Tip Top Weekly, I now take. time and
pleasure in again corresponding with one of the
greatest publishing houses in the country. Of all
Frank’s friends I think that Harry Rattleton is
the truest, as he proved to be in No. 194, the title
of which is ‘‘Frank Merriwell's Stratagem, or True
Friends and False.’ It said that even Bart Hodge
and Jack Diamond did not stand by him through it
all. Next comes Hodge, then Diamond, then Brown-
ing, and so on, I think Inza is the best girl for
Frank's future wife. FEilsie has tried to come be-
tween Frank and Inza. Suppose that you met a
young lady and another girl should try to come be-
tween you and the first lady you met and liked,
whom would you naturally like the most?

HARRY H. HICKMAN,
Philadelphia, Pa.

If you should meet and like twenty girls in suc-
cession, would it make any difference to you whether
you met the one you liked best. of all first or last,
number three or number twelve? Not a bit, we
think! We merely suggest this question so that you
may apply it to’ and test your own hypothesis by it,

_-It is a long time since we have seen anything from
our city in your valuable paper, but now we are
happy to say that the literary taste of Paterson has
“developed sufficiently to warrant the formation of a
Tip Top Club of our young men, for the perusal of
your interesting pages. We believe it to ‘be the fin-
est paper of its kind, and we will strive our *very
best to emulate the noble characters of your heroes,
We believe Fletcher Parsons, our president, resem-
bles Frank Merriwell very much. The list of our
members is as follows: President, Fletcher Hurst
Parsons; Vice-President, George A: Hilton: Secre-
tary, Harry George; Treasurer, Frank B.. Jacques;
‘Harry Golding, Fred Hoagland, James Mickel. Will-
jam Rainey Hewitt, Ray Doherty, John Childs, J.
Reinhart, ‘Chas. J. Sackett, Abraham Danish, ot
we, hope to have our number daily increased.
HARRY GEORGE, Secretary,
Paterson, Nota

tastes of Paterson feel the in-

ei the literar

fluence of your club and come into an even closer

peer em iance mH TOR ae:

; pt strong prejudice.

WEEKLY.

ago I had th

who is on Z . J
foreign waters, and in his 1 or he says:
some of the back lumbers On Tip Top.
ead one in six eenih ,

which
“Send
[ haven't Thi shi ws what
the American boy thinks of the ‘“‘best ‘ ’ Jmagine
the joy of is boy, thousands of miles from home,
package of twenty or more Tip Tops
iS never read. [I have read every number
and have passed many happy hours (not
Merry. I got off the train with Frank at
Imost five years ago and have been with
him ever. since, in all his troubles, pleasures, sports
and adventure and like dear old Rattles, was sure
he would always be victorious. . Standish must
traveled extensively to so vividly describe the
it parts of the earth, and I , i
lent of human nature. His
heir m: anner

> Opens the

a bit too severe in ; re 2mé irks about 5
do n at think how hard it has bs: n for him to always
do ri ges I think he has mac great improv rement
in his iture since he first met Mer 3adger is
aaurhen fine > character, He is almost i Hodge
I aiso like Browning and Diamond
could not get on very well without
very clever. Danny and Bink m:
shop’ very well. As for Elsie and they are
both dear girls, but I like Elsie She is a
true heroine, as she has shown any times. I guess
Hammerswell will not bother . while. I
hope I have not written too much. wishes to
the publishers and Mr. Standish.
a DRAGON,
Mt. Clemens, Mich
You hav indeed had a long and friendship
with Tip Top. May -this pleasant relation long con-
tinue. - re
[have read your weekly and I can safely say that
it cannot be equaled in the United States. I will not
say that I am in love with it, for when one is in love
he cannot criticise the object of his affection. ‘I have
read from No. 1 to the latest, and I have never
missed one. Therefore, I beg to be allowed to ex-
press my theughts in your paper. The characters
are drawn true to life.. And they are all original. f£
have seen An your Applause Column the name of
Donald E. Carey, who criticises Hodge. I would like
to say a heres words as regards that matter. In the
first place, will Mr. Carey kindly remember that he
is redding a book that is an original and not a copy
of some other books. Mr. Standish has put those
stories together to interest young America and bene-
fit them at the same time, His object was to get a
lot of characters together, each of a different na-
ture. There is where the originality of the thing
appears. One of his strongest characters is Bart
Hodge, the best man in the book and true to life.
As for Bart’s hot temper, why shouldn’t he get hot?
It is his nature, and Frank, by using a little judg-
ment, could plainly see what you do not. You speak
of “dear old Buck.” Of course, he has no temper at
all. Ah, no! He never gets jealous or hot headed,
You are calling him such a good character, merely
because a minister says so. If you will read a few
back numbers you will find temper, jealousy and a
few other of Mr. Badger’s faults—although I don’t
wish to say anything against him. As for using
Diamond’s views, you are entirely wrong. Who do
you think has the hotter temper, and who is the
most jealous? Now please don’t forget that duel
about Miss Reynolds, and I also think it was Dia-
mond’s idea not to take the trip with Frank in hope
of meeting Miss Juliet this summer. .You are ecriti-
cising Hodge, and you say you know his double. [
should like to meet the young lady who says she
would like to give you a good shaking. . She ex-
presses my thoughts exactly. Frank has a friend
who never confidence in him. One who wor-
ships him, I mean Rattleton, but still truer and
more faithful is Bart Hodge. I trust that Mr. Carey
will see this in your paper and think it over. This
is the first time I have written to your paper, ene
I could not stand the criticism of my friend, Hodg
As for Frank Merriwell’s getting married, I hops
he'll wait until he *s thirty at least. But I know Mr.
Standish will fix that all right. As for Elsie and
Inza, it is merely a boy’s love, and I think Frank
will meet his fate later on. Trusting the Tip Top
will keep on forever, A Hodg sd Admirer,
. ELLENBOGEN,
Brooklyn, N.Y:
It would seem that some readers, however few,
have aggregated and exaggerated the shortcomings
in Bart to which human beings are heir. They seem
to examine his character under the PS: glass

close

loses

 
TIP TOP WEEKLY.

Correspondence.

Jack, Holyoke, Mass.—No premium.
S. Olsen, Omaha, Neb.—No premiums,
Joseph Raymond, Denison, Tex.—No premium.

Elm, Chicago, Iil.—They wear the chevrons of their
office,

B. B. D., McKeesport, Pa.—There is no premium
quoted.

Ed Fonderhide, Dayton, O.—AIll the quarterlies are
in print.

W. C., Champaign, Ill.—Apply to the Congressman
of your district.
. V. W., Greenville, Miss.—The club you speak of
will answer your purpose very well.

Scott S. Hill, Pinckney, Mich.—You must be mis-
taken. The quarterlies have always been sold at
50c. a piece.

H. K. A. G., Philadelphia, Pa.—By paying particu-
lar attention to the way in which you walk. Try to
bear your weight in such a way that it will come
on the outer side of your feet. If you are still young
this deflection will probably correct itself unless it
is an incorrigible defect.

Bart Hodge II., Chicago, Ill.—l. Address President
Arthur T. Hadley, Yale College, New Haven, Conn.
2, From $7 to $15 a week, board and room. 3. All
universities issue annual catalogues. 4. That de-
pends on yourself. After grammar school it usually
takes four years in the high school to prepare for
college.

S. R. K., Dayton, Ohio.—The province of Louisiana
was ceded to the United States by France in 1803.
It consisted of a tract of land which now comprises
the following States: Louisiana Arkansas, Mis-
souri, Iowa, Minnesota, North and South Dakota,
Kansas, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, the greater

parts of Colorado and Wyoming, together with Ok-.

lahoma and Indian Territories.

 

LATEST ISSUES.

236—Frank Merriwell’s New Protege; or, The Star of
the Freshman Class.

235—Frank Merriwell’s Captivity; or, The Vendetta in
Kentucky

234—Frank Warciwell’s Hustlers; or,
Colonels.

os eee Merriwell’s Find; The Hoosier Her-

cules.

232—F rank Merriwell’s Double Play;
Own Game.

231—Frank Merriwell’s Archer; or, Beating the Red
Bowman.

230—Frank Merriwell’s Battery; Taming the
“Broncho Busters.”’

2299—F rank Merriwell’s Rough Riders; or, The Ath-
letic Team at Badger’s Ranch ;

228—Frank Merriwell's Speed; or, Breaking’ the Chi-

cago Colts.
227—Frank Merriwell’s Vault; The Blades of
Hitting .the

Toledo.
or, Yale Athletes at

Cracking the
or,

or, Winning His

or,

or,

226—Frank Merriwell’s
Eastern League.

225—Frank Merriwell’s
Niagara.

224—Frank Merriwell’s Wrist; or, The Nerve of Iron,

223—Frank Merriwell’s Camp; or, Yale Athletics in
the Great North Woods.

222—Frank Merriwell’s Athletic Team;
the Adirondacks.

221i—Frank Merriwell’s Discovery; or, The New Lon-

Wonders; or,

Throw;

or, Sport in

Curves; or,

don Boat Race.

220—Frank Merriwell’s Clipping the
Tiger’s Claws.

219—Frank Merriwell’s Compact; or, The Triumph
ot Badger.

218—Frank Merriwell’s ‘‘Liner;’’ or, Elsie, the Mas-
cot of the Nine.

217—Frank Merriwell’s ‘‘Pull’’; or, True and Tried,

216é—Frank Merriwell’s Phantom; or, The Ghost of

Barney Mulloy.

215—Frank Merriwell’s Favor; or, True as Steel.

214—Frrank Merriwell’s Stroke; or, The Test of, Friend-

ship
2i3—Frank ‘Merrtwell’s Handicap; or, The Heroteys of
sie.

Back numbers always on hand. If you cannot get our

publications from your newsdealer, five cents a copy will
bring them to you by mail, postpaid.

 

 

 

TIP TOP LEAGUE MEMBER'S BADGE.

HALF PRICH TO OUR READERS ONLY.

In response to the urgent request of a host of Trp Top readers
the publishers after carefully considering a number of designs for e
badge of membership in the TIP TOP LEAGUE, finally adopted
one which is an artistic gem of excellence. The picture shows the
design, butit does not give youan adequate idea of the exquisite
beauty of thiselegant ornament. It is solidly and substantially
made, finished in gilt und beautifully embossed. The widespread
desire for this badge gave us so much faith in the enterprise that
our first order was enormous, but we have been obliged to give a
second order, We still offer it at the very low figure of TWENTY
. CENTS (‘Ten Cents in Cash or Stamps and ‘Ten Cents in Coupons,

AN EXACT PICTURE OF THE LEAGUE BADGE

elt iis Mim ss

 

Each coupon is worth five cents when accompanied by five cent
in stamps or coin. TWO COUPONS AND TEN CENTS SECURE
YOU THE BADGE. Youcan get as mauy badges as you desire
at the same rate by use of the extra coupons. Badges without
coupons will cost fifty cents each. The coupons are free to TIP
Top readers, and we adopt this method to prevent others from
getting the badge at the special rate given to our patrons, IF YOU
ARE A READER OF THE TIP TOP YOU ARE A MEMBER
OF THE LEAGUE, AND ENTITLED TO WEAR THE EM-
BLEM OF THE ORDER—and our word for it, you will be mcre
han pleased after you receive it.

TIP TOP LEAGUE

MENBER’S COUPON

This Coupon and FIVE CENTS
will be accepted for ten cents
towards the purchase of the
League Badge.

STREET & SMITH.

 

 

 

TIP TOP LEAGUE

MENBER’S COUPON °

This Coupon and FIVE CENTS
will be accepted for ten cents
towards the purchase of the
League Badge. °

STREET & SMITH.

 

 

 

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subject to

... TIP TOP LEAGUE...

STREET & SMITH, 238 William St., N.
See Sern . peste Se ka ae

 
 
Beware of Imitations

STREET & SMITH introduced the illuminated covers on five-cent weeklies.

STREET & SMITH originated the continuous series of stories, each complete
in itself, yet part of a consistent whole.

STREET & SMITH employ the best authors, and pay the highest prices for

their work.

STREET & SMITH’S five-cent weeklies are of uniform dimensions (same size

as this one), and those not conforming are not Street and Smith’s.

STREET & SMITH’S Tip Top Weekly has three times the circulation of any

publication issued by rival publishers.

STREET & SMITHY’S lines are the most popular because they are the best.
STREET & SMITH’S publications have been weakly imitated by envious rivals.
STREET & SMITH’S publications invariably give complete satisfaction—make

no rash experiments,

STREET & SMITH’S Tip Top Weekly contains the only Frank Merriwell
Stories. Burt L. Standish is the author.

STREET & SMITH’S Do and Dare. The only Phil Rushington is the hero of

this series. Stanley Norris is the author.

STREET & SMITH’S Comrades. The Railroad Adventures of Tom Wright
and his Chums. By Robert Steel.

STREET & SMITH’S My Queen. The best and most life-like stories for girls.
By Grace Shirley.

STREET & SMITH’S Nick Carter Weekly. The only stories of the greatest

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Get STREET & SMITH’S and you get the best. Look for the firm’s imprint
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