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BUFFALO BILL'S

 

 

 

 

 

 

  
  

 

Issued Weekly.

A WEEKLY PUBLICATION
DEVOTED TO BORDER HISTORY

By subscription $2.50 per year. Entered as Second-class Matter at the N. V. Post Office, by STREET & SMITH, 79-8 Seventh Avenue,
N.Y. Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1907, 7x the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, DiC.

 

 

 

[35> Beware of Wild West imitations of the Buffalo Bill Stories.

They are about fictitious characters. The Buffalo

Bill weekly is the only weekly containing the adventures of Buffalo Bill, (Col. W. F. Cody), who is known all

over the world as the king of scouts.

 

No. 304,

NEW YORK, March 9, 1907.

\

Price Five Cents.

 

Rete

 

 

OR,

The Bad Men of Timber Bar.

 

By the author of “BUFFALO BILL.”

 

CHAPTER -I.
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST.

“My dear,’ said the man of the knotted body and the
bull-neck, “look out of the window! Isn’t that the man

| we were speaking of?”

\ Buffalo Bill 12 cried the at with a little, eapile
cry

But for the fact that her face was too pale, she was
a marvelously ‘beautiful girl.

She was young; her eyes’ were a shadowy gray, her
hair brown, her features oval and rather regular, her
fingers slender and graceful. The hand that rested on
the side of the window was small and well-shaped; it
trembled a little, as she looked out.

The man of the knotted body and bull-neck was a

ee who had narrowly escaped being a dwarf.

- As in the case of hunchbacks, his arms seemed dis-

_. | proportionately long. The hands were thin; but those

long arms were as muscular as his tough, Laced body,
and they had the tenacious holding-power of rope fiber.

His big head was set deep between the high, hunched
shoulders, so that it seemed to roll about in a socket
as he swung his head round to look out of that upper
window.

The face was beardless and oe the eyes dark, and
snapping as with hidden fire; the whole look sinister, and
even elfish.

He clung to the ledge of the window, lifted himself
beside the trembling girl, and booed down into the
Street.
At the end of the street, where it joined another, the :
great scout of the West, Buffalo Bill, had appeared,
mounted, and was approaching. ;

“He is going to the hotel there,” croaked the dwarf.
“Ah! but he is a fool to come here, no matter what he
may think about it. My dear, he will be trapped; and
then he will be killed.” -

“Yes, he will be killed!” said the girl.

While the hunchback’s croaking voice shook with
excitement and intensity of feeling, the girl’s seemed

dreamy, and had a monotonous flow, as if the thing did

 

 
 

3 THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES.

 

not matter to her at all; though the hand that shook
against the window seemed to belie this.

They saw the scout ride on until in front of the hotel.

There he swung gracefully from the saddle to the
ground, and gave his horse into the charge of the hostler
who had come forward to take. ie

He mounted the hotel steps to the piazza, and shook
hands with some men who were there.

The watchers at the window could see him clearly,
and could hear his musical voice as he greeted the men
on the piazza.

The dwarf’s look grew fierce as that of a Me animal,
and his dark eyes blazed.

Suddenly his thin, muscular hand slipped mto a
table drawer, and pulled out a big revolver.

“Tf [ but dared now!” he whispered, licking his yellow
lips. “Oh, if I but dared! His lamp could be snuffed
out with a bullet from here, and that would end him.”

He half-lifted the revolver.

“Eulalie, shall I try it?? he croaked, but not as if
he expected an answer. “If I but dared!”

The scout disappeared from the piazza, entering the
hotel.

The hunchback dropped back from the upper window
with a sigh, and restored the revolver to its drawer.

Then he wheeled about in his big chair, and sat stating
at the girl as if he did not see her, while his froglike
mouth worked rapidly and his dark eyes flashed and
burned.

The girl still stood by the window, as if some fasci-
nation held her there.

The room they were in was on the second floor of
a large building, and its windows overlooked the street.
The heavy walls were of adobe, very thick and sun-
defying, as befitted the climate.

The entrance was through a single door, and a
pinched, alleylike way which reached from the head
of a narrow stairs. Apparently, no one could get into
the room except by that way; yet there was another,
known to the hunchback and the girl, and to certain
of their associates.

The furnishings of the room were peculiar.
climbed along the walls in pairs, as if for electric lights,
of which the room showed several; and the railing that
came into the room like a continuation of the passage-
way from the door was of metal, shining and polished.

At one side of the room was a queer, small work-
bench, that let into the wall, with a drop-lid coming
down over it to hide it from sight when it was not in
use.

The furniture was heavy, as if in consonance with the
heavy walls.

A short, thick sword hung above the desk that held
the dwarf’s big revolver.

   

Wires —

  

The floor was littered with scraps of wire, with bits.
of melted metal, and was untidy in appearance.

At one end was a sort of furnace, or crucible, ré-
sembling those used by miners for testing ores.

The dwarf leaned back in his big chair and stared
at the beautiful girl, with a sort of gloating look.

“Eulalie,’ he said, in his croaking, oe tones, 3
Mook at mel on ae

She turned from the window and foaled at hint 9

“You saw that man, Eulalier”’ :

"Wes, She answered:

“And you recognized Jag as Buffalo Bill: ve

“Yes,” oe

“Well, you know the rest? He’s got to be area to
this room. You must do that, and I know ‘you can;
for he'll see that you’re the prettiest, sweetest bit of a
woman in the universe. Just tell him some pretty fairy-
story to win his sympathies; say to him that you have
a sick brother up here who has been wanting to see
him, or that a miner who knows him is dying here and
has a secret on his mind, which he must tell to the great
scout before he crosses over. That would fetch him,
without a doubt.” 3

He laughed, without any sign of merriment in his ugly
face. |

His thin fingers drummed on the thick arm of his
chair, :
“You can do that, Eulalie?”’

Pies.

“I knew you could.”

He arose, and going into a corner of the room threw
back the crimson curtain, or hanging, that was ‘there. .

Apparently, only the bare wall showed, when the
light fell on it.

But the dwarf pressed on a little projection, and a
short rod protruded from the wall.

He gave this a pull.

Immediately there sounded somewhere a low hum-
ming.

The girl began to walk about the room, with an
abstracted air, singing softly.

The dwarf looked at et with ~a malicious grin of
satisfaction.

“She can get him all right! When she cites to him
her siten song, whatever it’is, he’ll come. There’s no
refusing such a girl as Eulalie.”

He bent his head to listen to that low humming.

“The power is all right,” he said. *

He looked at the iron railing that came into the room —
from the door. |

“Yes, the thing is working: and that means feats to
him as soon as he puts his hand on that iron railing.”

He pushed the little rod into the wall, and \ hum-
ming noise stopped.

He withdrew, and dropped the curtain into position,

   
   
‘

ee Oe NY

~~

Tre BUR ATO

Then he looked again at the railing, shining before
him.

“A thousand deaths are in that when it is filled with

electricity,” he said, whispering the words. “It would
kill an elephant, if the beast was fool enough but to
touch it. Oho! Mr. Buffalo Bill, step inside this room
and take hold of that railing as you come in, and there
will be a mysterious disappearance of the great scout
noted in the newspapers of the country.”

The shining railing had seemed harmless enough even
when the deadly electric current filled it.

The dwarf touched it now, and laughed.

“So much for science, and the knowing how!’ he
croaked. “And now I’ve got work to do.”

He turned to the girl.

“Eulalie, when is it the next caravan crosses the Rio
Grande?”

She stopped her singing to answer.

“You know,’ she said.

"Yes, | know, But when is itr’

“By the middle of the week.”

“Well, we must stop it, and turn it in some other
direction, or have it wait a while on the Mexican side
of the river. Aha! Buffalo Bill expects to capture the
smugelers of the border, does he?
fool he is!
back.”
He went over to the work-bench, and taking out some
tools and a copperplate began to work at them.

He inspected the work now and then.

“Good engraving!” he said to himself, puckering his

That shows what a
He has yet to hear of Gorgon, the Hunch-

4

BILE STORIES 4 3
tapped by the wicked little genius of a hunchback who
dwelt in the upper story of the adobe already described.

Whether the authorities in charge of the power com-
pany knew that or not, some men of the town of Timber
Bar who ought to have revealed it were in the secret and
ready to profit by it.

Across the river stretched level lands, and beyond
them the Mexican hills and mountains, invisible now in

the darkness.

Buffalo Bill came from the hotel, secured his horse,
and set forth from the stable along the main street.

As he did so, his horse reared, and he saw that, ap-
parently, the animal had struck a woman, or girl, and
had knocked her down.

The scout drew rein and sprang out of the saddle.

In another instant he was at the girl’s side, and was
lifting her head. €

Her face was white, but her bright eyes were not
closed; from her lips came low moans.

“Are you hurt much?” he asked anxiously. “A thou-
sand pardons for the act of my. horse, which must have
been caused by my own criminal inattention. But,
truly, I did not notice ae until I saw that the horse
had knocked you down.”

“Tt is the Sefior Cody?” said the girl, in cr ptent sur-
prise.

Yess

“Ah, I thought so!

Fe titted: her:

Some men were hastening to the spot. ©

Whert she tried to stand she reeled as if from. weak-

© am not much hurt, ) think.”

horrid. mouth. “That will produce a counterfeit that

) ness and giddiness.
will defy detection. Aha!.Oho! And nobody, except

“I will help you home, or to a doctor’s office!’’ said the

Cv

. RB those who should know, is aware that such a creature scout.
i as Gorgon, the Hunchback, lives in the town of Timber “To my home,” she whispered.
| Bar.” “Ves. Where is it 2” x

*

The men arrived and offered suggestions.

~

CHAPTER TE
BUFFALO BILLS DANGER.

Night had come nee border town of Timber Bar.

Lights gleamed in the saloons and gambling-halls, as
well as in the places where reputable business was con-
ducted. oe |

The lamps of the streets shed their electric light on
houses of adobe chiefly; and the population in the
streets was largely Mexican in its character. The high-
cocked hats of Mexican style was more prominent than
clothing of the ordinary kind seen in an American or
European town.

Near-by was the Rio Grande River, with something
of a waterfall above the town, which drove the dynamos
that furnished the city with its light and power.

The thick cables of the pewer company had been

 

Some looked at her with admiration, all with pity.

“To my room!” she whispered. :

“Yes, said the scout, supporting her clinging form;
“where 48 it 2.

“Right there, boss,” one of the men volunteered. “I _
think she lives right there, as ve seen her go up that
stairway.”

“No, I don’t live there now,” she protested. ‘Round
in the alley, at the corner of St. Theresa Street, is
the place to take me.’

She clung with both arms beounel the scout's neck,
trembling.

“Will one of you take care of my horse?” the scout.
asked of the men. “Just lead him back to the stable of
the hotel.”

He walked along the street, carrying her.

Some of the men trailed after him, while more men —
came out of the houses, and a crowd began to collect.

p

 
 

4 : , tHE BUFFALO BILL STORIES.

“Round into the other eae * she said. “ khurry,
please.”’

“Have a Gar come at once, to the dic, round by.
St. Theresa Street,” said the scout to the men.

“No—no!” she protested. “I don’t wish a doctor!”

“But you need to have your injuries looked to.”

“I don’t wish a doctor!’ She began to cry.
you hear, I don’t wish a doctor ?”

“Yesyall right,” he said.

He countermanded the order.

“Please order the men not to follow and stare so!”
she whispered to him.

“You frighten the lady,” said the scout;
asks that you don’t follow so closely.”

The men dropped back.

Quickly Buffalo Bill made his way, directed by her,
round to the dark alley she had named.

It opened\black as a hole in the wall, and was entirely
unlighted.

His nostrils told him it was a vile, ill-smelling place,
tucked out of sight behind the adobe houses.

“Do

“and she

Under ordinary circumstances Buffalo Bill’s native -

caution would have kept him from going in there.

The alley suggested treachery and’ assassination, and
_ the whole brood of black crimes that love darkness.

But he did not hesitate now.

His sympathies were quickened by this girl’s predica-
ment,

He did not dream that she was a “decoy,” bent on
luring him to his death. He would have declared even
the thought impossible. :

“In there!” she whispered, still clinging leechlike to
his neck.

He entered boldly; and seeing that some men still

persisted in following, to her evident distress, he ordered _

them back.

Passing along this dark alley for some distance in
almost Stygian gloom, he came at length to a stairway
that opened into it.

The stairway was a rickety affair, almost ready to
tumble down; but when she informed him that her
room lay at the head of it he began to ascend it.

It creaked and groaned under his weight.

_ At the top of the stairs, to his surprise, he came
suddenly on a man, who had been standing there in a

crouching position, as if trying to peer through the key-
hole,

The man lifted himself upright, stared at the scout and

the girl, and then cried out:

“For Heaven’s sake, Cody, drop her and run!”

The scout did not know the man at first, and did
not recognize the voice; the light was not good we
to enable him to see ne man’s face.

“Will you kindly stand out of the way?” he re-
quested.

her.

The man caught him by the arm.

‘Non’t try to. goin there! Don’t try it, I bee This
is a plot; this is attempted murder ! i

The girl screamed, as if the words of the man scared

  

“Will you get out of my way?’ said the scout,
irritated.

He pushed the man aside and approached the door.

It opened before he touched it, as if some one within
had known he was coming and opened it.

He saw a dim light as from a hidden candle, and an
iron railing reaching on into what seemed a room.

“For Heaven's sake, Cody——

The ,scout was about to step into the room, but the
man who had protested and warned caught him.

‘The girl screamed again.

There was a moment’s struggle; then the rotten —
stairs fell, carrying the seout bodily downward with his
burden.

He was momentarily stunted by the fall, for it
seemed that the whole stairway had tumbled on him.

When he scrambled up he discovered that the girl
was gone.

He saw that a head had been poked out of the door
above—a ghoulish-looking head, with features like those
of some hideous mask—-and this head was sputtering
something.

At the scout’s side was the man who had interfered
and who apparently had attacked him on the stairway,
the resulé of which had been the fall.

‘This man had him now by the arm.

“Come!” said this man, clinging to the scout.
is the time to get out of this.”

The scout felt like striking him in the face.

Then something in the voice attracted his attention.

It had changed its tone and its accent. _

' “Now

“Cody, don’t you know me >? the man asked. “Pars
yer old friend, Jonas ee: Now git—slide!’
“Cornfire!”

“Don’t speak it out loud, fer the love o’ Heaven!
Gosh-dinged if I want that hawked raound here, yeou
bet! But I’m him; and I know what I’m doin’! So,
come along, and I’ll explain later.”

The scout might still have resisted, or demanded an
explanation; but the hideous thing that peered from the
door above had a revolver, and now began to shoot down
into the darkness of the alley.

One of the bullets cut through the scout’s coat at fe
shoulder, stinging the flesh, and he felt another whistle
by his ear.

There was no time for argument or eclanaticn:

Buffalo Bill ran from that fire of death; and with
him, hopping on before, went the tall form of Jonas
Cornfire, whom he knew as the Yankee detective,

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 

THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES | 5

CHAPTER. 11D
CORNFIRE EXPLAINS.

“An explanation is in order, Cornfire,” said the scout.

He was seated with Jonas Cornfire and another in a
small room some distance from the spot where the
strange adventure recorded had taken place.

Cornfire was apparently the typical Yankee.

He was tall and shambling in gait and manner, his
small head was covered with a nondescript hat, and his
long coat flapped round his lank legs as he walked.

Cernfire’s companion was of altogether another sort.

He was a young fellow, resembling in his dress and,

appearance a young college man, or perhaps a young

business man. )
His clean-shaven face showed flushed animation. His

thick hair was brown; his eyes brown and intelligent.

He seemed wholly out of place as a companion of .Corn-
fire. :

. . Buffalo Bill had already been introduced to him, and

the name given was Archwell Browne.

“But I calls him Stingaree, fer short,” said Cornfire,
when he worded the introduction. “He’s gin’rally called
that ‘on the coast, and‘ it fits him. But he ain’t a de-
tective, as I be; he’s jes’ a fool young American that
come daown here on bizness, and then let himself fall
in love with a girl. Yeou seen the girl!”

Little wonder that the scout was demanding an ex-
planation!

“The explanation,” it’s
interestin’.
her mind. Otherwise, he don’t know what to make of
it. A month ago she was that lovin’ tew him that maple-
sirup wouldn't be no comparison to her sweetness; and
now she don’t know him when she sees him. He was
goin’ tew marry her. Of course, this change in the

said ae "46 short.” an’

, girl has sorter set him off his pins, and he’s j’ined with

me tew find aout some things.’

“But that doesn’t explain,” objected the scout.

“No? Well, gimme time and I’ll git few it.
mixed up some way with them smugglers.”

“T deny that,” said Stingaree, with warmth,

Cornfire blandly waved his hand. :

“Little boy,” he said, “I’m’ tellin’ this story, After-
ward you can amend it; er tell it in yout Own way.
Jes’ now I’m tryin’ to give Buffler the lay o’ the land, as
E seer ity)

“But I insist that you are wholly mistaken.
is a good girl.

She’s

The girl

She has lost her mind, I tell you.”
Buffalo Bill did not believe the girl had lost her

mind, whatever else might be said about her. Her

words to him had not sounded like the talk of a lunatic.
“Go on!” he said to Cornfire.

“TI say; that she’s mixed up with ‘the ae.

Stingaree says she ain’t. Let it go at that fer the

present,

Stingaree believes that the girl has lost

®

T know she was taking yeou, Cody, to that
place that yeou might be killed.”

“T don’t believe it!’ said Stingaree, almost sent

“Tm tellin’ this ‘ere story. Yeou jes’ keep still till
I git through with it. I’m givin’ my opinion; and I'll
tell Cody why I think it, I came here to run daown the
smugglers.”

“And I’m here for the same purpose, said the scout.

“I was sure o’ that, soon’s I seen ye. And it ain’t
the fust time that we've come up together doin’ the
same work,”*

“I been here in this cussed taown three days. I been
playin’ the game of Yankee pedler, goin’ frum haouse
tew haouse with a lot o’ Yankee notions tew sell, as
that give me admission intew the haouses,

“Well, yisterday I got intew the big “doby that hangs
oaout there over the main street, and while standin’ in
a hall I saw this girl goin’ into a room there.

“She had a look abaout her that made me look
twiet, and when she had disappeared I crep’ to the door
where she'd gone in, put my eye to a Kea oles an’
listened,

“T heard then ther deride voice, sayin’ tew her: ‘He'll
be here ter-morrer, and we'll see that he’s dead enough
before he’s been many hours in the town. The govern-
ment is sending him here. When he drops aout of sight
it'll puzzle "em. You can work that trick, Eulalie?’

He looked at the youth as if mens a contradiction,

It came:

“The girl’s name isn’t Bulalie, sO you see you're off
there !”

“But it’s the same girl; and the queer voice I heerd
then I heerd ag’in to-night, when it bellered out over the
alley and that queer-lookin’ thing begun ter throw bullets
at us there in the dark, What yeou got tew say to that?’’

“That the girl you saw each time was some other
girl; and that you’re away off!”

“Well, now, listen. When I was spyin’ on that ole
stairway a while ago, jes’ before Cody come with that
girl, I heerd that same, voice talkin’ behind the door.
It seemed tew be talkin’ tew itself. What all it said
I dunno: but I heerd enough to make me know that
Eulalie was expected soon, and that she was goin’
tew bring a man tew his death there.”

“But you didn’t hear my name mentioned!” the scout
objected.

“Cody, that’s jes’ where yeou’re mistook; fer Udid.- E

99

-heerd yeour name; and yeou was the very man that was

tew be led tew that place tew be killed. What yer got
ter say to that?”

“My name was mentioned in such a way as to make
it seem that I was the man who was to be brought there
to be killed?”

 

“*See Nos.
Cornfire.

271 arr. 287 for further adventures of Jonas

 
een

  

het after the eee fell?” asked Cornfire.

can see things gin’rally sees more clearly.

Oy ‘THE BUFFALO

“Jes’ so, Cody. ‘Buffalo Bill will be here with her soon,

and then we'll finish him!’ That’s what I heerd.”

Cornfire had used the Yankee “dialect” so much in
his detective work, making of it a disgttise, that it
came from his lips even more readily than correct
speech; yet when he wished to he could speak as good
English as is spoken usually by educated people. |

“What d’ye say tew that?” he added, looking ear-
nestly at the scout.

“T accept your statement, and thank you for giving
me help. I am forced to say I was never more com-
pletely fooled in my life. And it seems impossible to
believe now, for the girl had a good face, and an honest
voice.”

“If she is the girl I’m interested in, as Cornfire says
she is, there never was a greater mistake made than
he is making, when he says she is in with the smug-
glers. J know that she has done things that don’t look
just correct to me; but I lay it to the improper influ-
ence of another, and to the fact that her mind isn’t
right.”

This was the protest of the young American.

But Buffalo Bill just then was more interested in
Cornfire’s theories.

“Tf she was hurt by yer hoss, Cody, what became of
“She
scuoted then, seein’ that her game was up, and fearin’
the consequences of a revelation. She wasn’t there af-
ter that, yeou remember.”

“No, she wasn’t there.”

“I’ve been studyin’ this smuggler gang, and I’m here
tew land ’em, and with yeour help, Cody, we'll do it.
This taown is infested with the wust an’ most daring
gang of border smugglers in America. They’re run-
ning goods across the line continual.”

“I received word that a caravan of mules from the
Mexican gulf coast is even now approaching with smug-
glers’ goods,” remarked the scout. /

‘Jes so;.Cody.  Its/a big money-makin’ bizness fer
the men engaged in it. As I ‘said, I been studyin’ the
situation sense I ‘landed here. Dve spotted some of the
smugglers; though so fur I ain’t got no ev’dence ag’inst
’em that would stand in the courts. I’ve got tew git
that. Twict I’ve seen that girl with one of ’em. And
things I overheard, like :that to-night, makes me dead
shore she’s mixed up with the gang in some way.”

“There’s one thing sure,” said Stingaree, “if I come
on the man that has stolen Muriel from me, there will
be one or the other of ts dead in a very short time.”

“Muriel ain't Eulalie, though?” said Cornfire.

“No; I refuse to believe that.” Cae

Cornfire wrinkled his homely face in a smile.

“Well, them that gits out of the woods where they
We're in
the woods naow.”

“SILL STORIES.

CHAPTIR 1V..
BUFFALO BILL'S WARNING.

As both Cornfire and Buffalo Bill were anxious to
open up some sort of lead as soon as possible, they left
Cornfire’s room after a while and went out into the
streets, where they separated, each going his own way.

Stingaree, left behind, did not remain there long; for
within twenty minutes or so afterward he, too, was out
in the streets of the little adobe town, where dangers
were thick as the dust that was kicked up by oe
burros.

Buffalo Bill returned to the street in | front of the
‘hotel.

He hoped that if the girl he had encountered there
had really been a decoy he would now meet her again.

He was loath to believe that she was a decoy; for he
recalled the peculiar sweetness of her voice, even at a
time when she seemed in pain; and he remembered, too,
the quiet, honest light in her pale face. Such a face and
such a voice did not speak of treachery.

‘Yet, if Jonas Cornfire was right, she was as deadly a
siren as ever lured a man to death.

When the scout had been in the street there for some
time without result, he began to feel more and more
that Cornfire was at fault, as he thought the matter
over,

Men came and’ went, pouring into and out of the
saloons and gambling-halls.

No one approached him.

Yet he was wary. He kept a hand on a big revolver
buried in one of his pockets, and had it ready for in-
stant use.

Finally he went round to the mouth of the dark re

into which he had borne the girl and where there had | vs

come stich a startling finish to that adventure.
The place was black as a cave. -

He stepped into it, and stood ‘close against the wall. .

until ie eyes became somewhat accustoined to the dark-
ness.

He could see the outline of the filthy alley fairly
well, after a time of close scrutiny.

It ran on and on into the Say and apparently
ended in a pocket.

The scout walked on into it, holding his revolver in
readiness.

He came soon to the fallen stairway, which lay u un-
disturbed. | _

Its fall must have drawn attention, yet no one was

there now. me

He looked up to the point where the door had opened,
and that ogreish head had appeared, and the revolver-
shots had followed.

The door could be but\indistinctly seen.

As he stood thus, close against the wall, to conceal
himself. as much as possible, he heard light footsteps,

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

THE BUFFALO

and observed that some one, a. woman,

the alley from the street. ,
He shrank closer against the wall.

' As she passed him, with quick steps, he recognized

her, he thought, as the girl he had carried to that place.

had entered

Apparently she had recovered ean) from the effects
of her fall.
But for this suggestive fact, bolstering Cornfire’s

- theories, the scout would have hailed her.

She did not see him, apparently, and he remained
quiet until she had passed on.

. Then, though it gave him an uncomfortably sneaking
feeling to do so, he crept with soft steps after her.

He saw her gain and enter a door, which gave forth

a brief gleam of light as she passed in.

When she had vanished through the door, he ran up
to it, and tried to open it.

He had seen that she turned a key t a lock.

He found the keyhole, but could see nothing, when
he tried to look through.

When he pulled at the door the second time he dis-
covered that it really was not locked, but that it had

stuck fast temporarily.

Fle opened it carefully, and as carefully slipped
through, finding himself in a narrow passage.

He stumbled on rather blindly, and discovered a
stairway.

Seasoned as the scout was, he felt his heart-beats

_qttickening: . What lay at the head of this stairway?

Was that ogreish head and the big revolver up there?
Were Jonas Cornfire’s theories based on facts, after all?
“I may have been mistaken in the girl,” he told him-
self; “yet the resemblance, if so, was most remarkable.”
‘He began to climb the stairway, wondering weet he

should find at the top.

_ What he found was a door, which yielded and moved
inward at his touch.

Before him lay a dark corridor, that was narrow and
silent.

He closed the door quietly behind him, moved
on into this corridor.

Feeling about, his hand came into contact with a wire,
to which he clung, listening.

As he did so a strange, quivering shock shot up-

ward through his hand and arm.

He recognized it at once as electricity, and tried to
draw his hand away; but the muscles of his arm, hand,
and shoulder knotted under the strength of the current,

giving him intense pain, and rendering him helpless.

As he struggled to draw his hand away, he heard

again the voice of the girl.

“Buffalo Bill,” it said, “this is a warning. There

BILL STORIES. 9

are desperate men in this place who seek your life. I
could kill you easily now; and if they were here that is
what they would do. You can see you are in my
power.”

He did. not know where the voice came from. It
proceeded out of the darkness; but whether the speaker
was before him, or over, or under him, he could not tell.
The scout writhed under the influence ot the clectritity
as he listened.

“You have come here on a certain mission,” the voice
went on. “You know what it is. Drop it, and get out
of the country, and stay out of it, and you are safe.
Refuse to do so at once, and your life will be forfeited.
I shall be unable to help you. Take warning!’

The electric current which chained him was shut
off, and his hand dropped from the wire.

He was covered with perspiration, and he could not
deny that the mental shock had been great.

“Who are you?” he asked hoarsely.

“Turn round, and go back down that stairway, and
then get out of the town, to-night,” said the voice. “Tf
you tefuse, your blood is on your own head.”

“Who are you?” the scout asked again.

“IT am the Voice!’ was the answer. “Obey the Voice,
and you shall live.”

Buffalo Bill stood trembling in the narrow corridor.
He feared to take hold of that wire again.

“Do you promise?” said the Voice.

Instead of answering, the scout struck a match, that

he might see where he was.

Then he saw the narrow cotridor.. The outer end
rested on the upper landing of the stairway. The op-
posite end was before him, showing a door.

The corridor was bare, with the exception of ie wire
that ran along the wall.

' “Who are you? Where are you! ?” he asked.

He stepped forward toward the door.

When he reached it he found that it was locked.

He inspected the walls. Apparently, the doors were
the only means of getting into or out of the corridor.

He was sure the girl he had followed had. come into
this corridor, and that it was her voice he had heard.
The certainty that she had passed thnough the door be-
fore him could not be overthrown. ¢.

Cornfire’s contention that she was not what she seemed
to be was almost proven.

Buffalo Bill had a feeling that his peril was very great
so long as he remained in that corridor; yet he could
not resist the temptation to try to unlock the door, that
he might see beyond it.

He failed to unlock it; and finally bent a.retreat to
the stairway, and went ion into the alley.

That electric thrill still seemed to be shooting up ae
arm when he reached the lighted street.

 
 

 

  

CHAPTER V.

SEARCHING.”

Buffalo Bill returned: after a while to Cornfire’s room,
where he found the Yankee detective and Stingaree.

Cornfire had made no discoveries, nor had the, youth.

They looked with inquiry at the scout when he came
in and dropped heavily into a chair by the wall.

Buffalo Bill told them the story of his remarkable
adventure.

To Cornfire, it praca that he had been right in his
guesses about the. girl.

Stingaree contended that whatever, the mysterious
“Eulalie’’ might be or do, she had no connection with
Muriel.

Muriel had disappeared.
three whole days.
described to him by the Yankee and by Buffalo Bill was
the same, though the descriptions tallied.

The next day Buffalo Bill and Jonas Cornfire se-
cured a search-warrant. With local officers they went

He had not seen her for

to the stairway rising from the alley, and entered the

corridor where the scout had been shocked by the elec-
tric current and had heard the warning voice.

But the wire was gone; and when the door at the end
of the corridor was opened, it led only into a small room
inhabited by a peon, who claimed that no wire had ever
been there, and that no. one, aside from members of
his family, had been in the room during the night.

“There is no way to get into this room, or out of it,
except by that corridor?” said the scout to him.

“Sa senor: there is a passage by the roof.”

He showed it to them—a hole in the flat roof.

Buffalo Bill and. his companions climbed through that
hole out upon the roof.

But they discovered there nothing of moment.

The roof was the same as other roofs near it—being
merely the regular flat roof found on most of the adobe
houses of the far Southwest.

They saw but one thing to make them suspicious ; that
was that this roof connected with the roof of the large
building where, as Cornfire stated, Eulalie lived, or had
lived.

For purposes of further search they entered the large
building.

They explored it from end to end. They even pene-
trated into the upper room shown in the opening chap-
ter, where the dwarf and the girl had witnessed the
scout’s entrance into the street in front of the hotel.

Buffalo Bill and his companions found in the room the
long work-bench, though it seemed but an ordinary one;
and they beheld the iron railing, a was, of itself,
unsuggestive. 4

The wires had been removed from the walls, and the
short sword no longer hung over the desk.

THE BUFFALO BILL~STORIES.

‘came down over the small adobe town by the

He refused to believe that the girl

 

  

Cate

“This is an office-room, occupied by an artisan,
the, police official. “We shall find-nothing here.” -

The search was fruitless.

The scout and Cornfire returned Prom it some whe

muddled.

Stingaree was making a search through the town for
Muriel.

He visited her pee ie had until recently | been
her home—but it was now unoccupied ; and the neigh-
bors either did not know what had become of the occu-
pants, or they would not tell.

Thus the day passed, and another night of darkness
Rio
Grande.

This second night the scout disguised lige

He removed his usual clothing and substituted Mexi-

can garments. A big serape wrapped him about, and a
peaked, Mexican hat covered his head.

Yet it was difficult to disguise such a striking form
effectively, as he knew; he was too tall, too large, too
broad-shouldered, to fit in well with the small, cringing
population of such a place; and he was not sure but
that in wearing Mexican clothing he but made himself
more conspicuous.

He again stationed himself near the dark alley; for
twice, he was sure, he had there seen the girl called
Eulalie.

Cornfire was making investigations in another part of
the town, and Stingaree was still prosecuting his fruit-
less search for the girl he called Muriel, refusing to be-
lieve that Muriel and Eulalie were identical.

The hour was somewhat late when the scout took his

position by the wall in the street near the mouth of the

little alley.

He had not been there long when a young woman,
slipping by, lifted the silk and lace mantilla from about
her face and looked sharply at him.

The face was that of the girl who claimed to have
been knocked down by his horse in front of the hotel—
the face of, Eulalie.

There could be no doubt of it in the mind of the
scout. ~ i

“stop!” he commanded, as she hurried on.

He put forth his hand to detain her.

With a.little cry she viene away, and darted into the
dark alley.

“Just a word with you!” said the scout, following
Mier into the se

But she ran onf as if frightened.

There was nothing to do but to pursue; and he fol-

‘lowed, being thus again taken on into the alley that had

held for him such tragic surprises.
He saw the girl reach the same dark door as on the

previous: night; saw her fumble hastily with a key; and

then she pulled the door open and vanished.

t

|

 

 
  
  

 

  
   
  
   
   
 

     
 

 

THE BUFFALO

‘The scout gained the door, and stood before it, lis-
tening.

Not a sound reached him, save such sounds as came
in from the near-by street.

“T ought to have brought Stingaree and Cornfire with
me,” was his thought. .“They could have identified her,
without doubt.”

He stood but a moment in hesitation; then drew the
door open, for it was not locked, and stepped, with
cocked revolver, into the open space beyond, at the foot
of the stairway.

The place was vacant.

He stumbled as before to the foot of the stairway.

Above, he knew, was the corridor, where he had been
trapped by the charged wire and had been warned by
the girl to leave the country.

Since then, in broad daylight, he had visited that cor-

‘ridor, and found no wire there—nothing but the peon’s
tittle room, with the hole leading out upon the roof.

In the interval between the present and his previous
visit, the scout had become more thoroughly aware of

_ the extent and power of the iniquitous organization that

was engaged in smuggling along the Eee border,
with headquarters at Timber Bar.

He was sure that men prominent in the political and

business life of the town were concerned in it, and that

even some of the officials were at least in its pay.
He had even suspected now that the officers who ac-

companied him had sent warning on ahead, so that |

changes could be i and suspicious persons kept out
of sight.

These things were in his mind, as he stood at the .

foot of the dark and silent stairs, listening.

Should he go up, and risk—what?

He decided to take the risk, without returning for
the assistance of Cornfire or Stingaree, of whose pres-
ent whereabouts he was uncertain.

He mounted the stairs cautiously, pausing to listen.

When he reached the corridor he did not put out a
hand to see if the wire was there, but-lighted a match.

Its flash, extinguished instantly, showed that the wire |

was gone.
At the end of the corridor was the door opening into
the peon’s room.
The scout approached it and rapped,
A grumbling voice answered, in Spanish, asking who
he was and what he wanted.
-“Open the door!” said the scout.
There was a shuffling movement, as if some one had
reluctantly crawled out of bed; then the door opened,
and the head of the peon appeared. He carried a

lighted taper.

“What is it you want?’ he asked, with an unpleasant
snarl.

 

BILL, SHORIES = Lao

“You remember me?”

“Yes; the sehor who’ was here with the others  to-
day.” :

“Did a girl or woman enter your room a few mo-
ments ago?”

“No, sefior.”

“No one came in here at all?”

“No, sefior.”

“Would you mind if I again go out through your
room to. the roof?”

The peon hesitated.

“We poor men have no privileges,’ he grumbled,
“and no privacies; we must even be turned out of our
beds in this way. Would the American sefior permit me,
poor José, to go through his house at night in this man-

ner® But 1] must submit!’

He drew the door open and stood aside, holding ‘up
his taper.

There were occupants of the small beds in the room,
as the scout could tell when he entered; but delicacy
kept him from demanding to see who they were. Even
a peon family, he recognized, has some rights.

Afterward it occurred to him that likely the girl he
was looking for was concealed in one of those narrow
beds.

_ He crossed the room, climbed by a stool to the hole
in the reof, and drew himself up and out on the flat
surface.

The sky was dark, and what light came over the edge
of the roof from the streets seemed to make the dark.

ness more intense.

‘The scout recalled the general shape and extent of
the roof, and felt his way along in the darkness.

When he had discovered nothing, and was in no mood
for spending his night there, he found a low place on
the street side, and deliberately jumped down, prefer.
ring that to returning by way of the peon’s room to the
alley.

He landed close by a little Mesicaa who scampered
away as if,a ghost had leaped at him.

The scout was not satisfied with his adventure.

He had seen the girl whom he now called Eulalie, and
had lost her in that singular and mysterious manner.

He believed that she had been surprised on discover-
ing him in the street there in Mexican garb, and had
laid no trap for him, but had simply fled.

He was strongly tempted to go back and search those
beds in the peon’s rooms; and he might have done it had
he not reflected that it would now be useless.

Even if the girl had been in one of them, it was no
indication that she was there now. |

She had been given one time and noon | to
escape.

 
   

0. ‘ THE BUFFALO

CHAPTER: VI.
SOME STARTLING DISCOVERIES.

Strolling along, close by the wall, with his serape
drawn up, to conceal as much as he could his features,
the scout came to the stairway which led up to the
room where the work-bench had been seen.

This stairway opened on the lighted street.

With officers, he had ascended it by day, and had

searched that room without effect.

He turned into the lower landing, and ciood there,
hesitating.

A man passed him as he thus stood in the daw
a man in Mexican dress.

‘That you, Manuel?” he said, “I am late.”

He hurried on without waiting for a reply.

There was nothing in this that under ordinary cireum-
stances would have struck the scout as suggestive or
peculiar. He had simply been mistaken for another
man, by one who was in a hurry to get somewhere and
announced himself as late.

Nevertheless, the incident impressed itself on his

mind.

This stairway did not lead toward the peon’s room,
nor toward that alley where Eulalie had disappeared.

It led up to the room where the work-bench had been

seen, and where the. shining iron railing extended into .

the room from a certain hall, or corridor.

More than once, when uncertain, Buffalo Bill had fol-
lowed what seemed an inward, guiding monitor.

So he did now, and began to ascend the stairs.

He kept his face muffled in his serape and his hand
on his revolver.

At the top of the stairs he denned and listened.

Hearing nothing, he moved along the wall, with his
' back against it, the movement being thus a sidling one.

He pressed one hand against the wall; with the other
he drew and held the revolver.

As he thus passed along something clicked under his
fingers—-the fingers that were rubbing against the wall.

He stopped when he heard it, and passed his hand
again over the wall there, for that click was suggestive.
Another click sounded, as he bore hard on the wall.

“More electricity,’ he thought; “I wonder what it
_ means?”

He was sure that if it were electricity it behooved
him to be careful.

_ He heard now voices, which sounded as if behind the
wall, in another room.

He slipped farther along, toward the door at the cor-
ridor’s end; and had ‘scarcely done so when, to his
amazement, the wall opened where he had stood, and
two Mexicans came out.

They were talking in low tones.
Though the light was so poor that he, being in the

 

BILL STORIES.

_ shadow, was not seen by them at all, he could see dimly

the two men.

One of them, he oho. was short and squat, his
body, hidden by a voluminous serape, seeming to be fat
and round and supported on short legs.

The other was not a large man, but seemed tall by
comparison with his companion.

The short, squat man, whose form was so covered that
it could not be seen, spoke in whispers, and croaked and
squeaked in a most peculiar way.

“The course must change, so that they will pass the
Point of Rocks, and strike the Santa Clara valley, to
hide,’ he was saying. “Bear it in mind, Perez, and

hasten the information.” | :
The other man gave a promise and stole down the

stairway. ;
The small, benched: -tp man, as he seemed to be, stood
for a moment, looking after Perez, before turning about.

Then he pushed on the wall, thus opening the nedee

door, and was gone from sight.

The scout tiptoed to the hidden door, and soos look,
ing down the stairway.

“Now, if I were but two people at once .!? was his
thought.
me.’

He wanted to follow the man ‘iho had gone down
the stairway; and he wanted, at the same time, to know
what had become of the man who had vanished through
the wall.

That croaking voice haunted him.

He was sure he had heard it before—when that ogre-

ish head had appeared above him in the dark alley, and
the revolver held by the owner of the ogreish head had.
shot its bullets down into the alley at him.

He had not been, here in this hall, able to see if the
man who had gone back through the secret door had an

ogreish head or not, yet he was sure such must be the ~

Case.

He wondered what the order given to the man who
had departed meant.

He thought, of course, of smuggled goods and smug:

glers’ burro-trains, and felt almost sure that the words

applied to something of the kind.

Even while thus thinking and puzzling, Buffalo Bill

was pressing on the wall which held the hidden door.
But he could not produce that click again.
He failed, apparently, to press in the exact spot
touched by his hands before, :
He felt all over the wall, pushing now here and now
there; but always without result.
He began to feel that he ought to have followed the
man who had gone down the stairway.

“Too bad that Cornfire or ‘Stingaree isn't with |

 

 

 

   
   
   
  
  
   
   
    
 

    
 

- hidden door and: learn what lay on the other side of it.

 

THE BUFFALO,

besides, the man was pe far

him in the street;

enough away by this time.
So, there was nothing left to do but to try to find the

He widened his search, as effort after effort failed;
and came thus at. length to the end of the corridor,
where was the door leading into the room which held
the work-bench and the iron railing.

This door was locked; but by means of a wire he had
brought, fitted for the purpose, he quietly turned the bolt
and let himself into the room.

It was perfectly dark.

Buffalo Bill stood still after entering, listening.

He had been taught by experience not to touch his;

hands to anything like a wire, and he did not put them

out to feel about.

Thus it happened that he did not lay them on the
iron railing. :

Whether it was charged or not, therefore, made no
difference to him at that time.

As he glanced round he thought he heard a hum of
low voices.

Then he was sure that behind something on the wall,
which resembled in the darkness a picture, there was a
faint gleam of light, much as if pinholes were there,
through which light was coming from another room.

The discovery was so suggestive that he tiptoed to a
point in front of the picture.

He could not then see the light, for the picture—it was
really a picture—shut it out.

He stepped up to the picture.

It was hung high, above his. head.

But there was a chair near, which he quietly put in
position in front of it.

By mounting on this chair, and stooping so that his

body was bent, and then pushing the picture to one

side, he found that light came through two tiny holes
there. |

The thing was so strange and suggestive that he made
as good an examination of it as he could.

The examination revealed that two small holes in the

wall had been .covered over by a bit of flat cardboard,

which, apparently, had been clamped tight against the
wall.

In some manner, by reason of a jar or otherwise, the
cardboard had slipped, and the holes were not now cov-
ered.

With the cardboard in position the light would not
penetrate into this room through those holes.

It required but an instant for the scout to under-
stand that these holes had been bored by the occupant
of the room to enable him to look through into the other
room, and thus spy on what went on in there. ‘The

BILL- STORIES. : IT

cardboard, together with the picture hung against the
wall there, were to conceal the holes.

Stooping, as he stood on the chair, to bring his eyes

_on a level with these holes, Buffalo Bill looked into the

room.

Already he had heard in there a hum of voices.

Now he was astonished; for he was looking into a
dimly lighted place, where several men were grouped,
these men talking, in low tones, in the animated Mexican
fashion, with much shrugging of shoulders and gestures
of hands.”

“Something of interest must take place in there occa-
sionally, of which the occupant of this room wishes to
be cognizant,’ was the scout’s conclusion.

Spying was never a thing that Buffalo Bill liked.

He did fot even relish it when the cause seemed to
justify, as in this imstance.

What he liked was the Be of the life under ve
open sky.

Vet even there, ae with rascals of every variety,
and with murderous redskins, had often made stealthy
work a necessity.

Having come to Timber Bar for the sole purpose of
unearthing and destroying the smuggler organization
which was believed to exist there, he could not hold
back now, when what might be valuable information
seemed within his grasp.

“T think I’d better lock the door into this room first,’
he said to himself, dismounting from the chair. “The
occupant might come in suddenly, and he would be
much surprised if he found me in here, not expecting
We

He stniled, with a sense of the humorous, as he made
the reflection. ‘

Having locked the door, he made his way through the
darkness back to the chair, and again applied his eyes
to the small holes in the wall.

He was startled as he did so, for he heard one of
the men speaking of “Sefior Cody.”

“Gorgon says that he has come here to destroy us,”
said this man, “and it is so. It is his life or ours.”

The scout looked at the man, and beheld a dark-faced
Mexican, dressed in serape, slashed trousers, and tall
Hate.

There were gold hoop-rings in the ears of this Mexi-
can, as the scout could not fail to note, for they glit-
tered in the faint light.

“He will be here soon,’ said another.

This evidently referred to “Gorgon.”

As the scout stood thus, looking and listening, he
heard steps by the door of the room he occupied, and
then hands shaking and twisting the door-knob.

The occupant of the room had returned.

 
CHAPTER VII.

THE BATTLE WITH THE DWARF.

Buffalo Bill stepped softly off the chair, and moved

as softly toward the door.
The man was enraged at finding the door locked, a
‘sort of foolish rage, for it appeared from what he was
muttering that he thought he had forgotten and locked
it himself.
“The fiends have got the key!’ he snarled.
Buffalo Bill felt a little thrill. of increased. interest,
for the voice was of the croaking variety, so that he
thought it the voice which belonged to the ogreish head.

“Ah, here it is! I am addled to-night; [ have no more

sense than a cat!”

The words were croaked again.

The scout heard the key fitted to the a of the
lock, and heard it turn.

He moved into the dark space just at the side of the
door, and waited with almost breathless expectation.

The door opened, and a form was cine seen moving
into the room.

“Dark as a tomb in here!” snarled the croaking voice.

The man did not observe the scout, for his eyes were
not accustomed to the darkness, though the hall from
which he came was as dark as the room; besides, he was
not looking for any one in the room.

But the scout saw him, even though indistinctly, and
recognized him as the squat, thick figure, wrapped in
the big serape, whom he had seen before that evening.

“Ho! I must have a light?’

The squat figure pushed the door shut with his foot,
and reaching out a hand touched an electric button.

The room sprang into a blaze of blinding light.

Even as it did so, the hands of the scout shot out
and grasped the man by the throat.

There was a snarling cry, which was choked short;
and this was followed by a struggle.

The fellow was the dwati of the ogreish head, and
though he had never been more astonished in his life,
he was not ready to yield without a fierce fight.

He half-dropped to the floor, shooting out his long
arms and encircling the scout’s body, thus attempting to
drag the scout down on top of him,

Those arms had the holding power of ropes, and their
muscles were so powerful that they seemed to draw the

scout up to the knotted breast with the crushing power
of machinery. c

In spite of his own tremendous strength and fighting
ability, Buffalo Bill would have had a terrific contest
to subdue the dwarf if he had not secured that choking
grip on the latter’s throat.

The dwarf flung his legs about and struggled fiercely

for a few moments, and then succumbed to the terrific
choking.

  

\
\

 

THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES.

As his big head fell back limply, Buffalo Bill reached
up and shut off the electric light.

He arose then, and, closing the door softly, locked it.

He had no more than returned to where the dwarf
was lying unconscious, when footsteps were heard out-
side, and some men came to the door.

Apparently, they were the Mexicans who had been
in the other room.

At any rate, they had been ae by the sounds of
the struggle, and had come to investigate it.

They tried to open the door, but finding it locked
ed themselves ue calling the name of “Gor-
gon.”

- Buffalo Bill judged that the man 1 who now lay breath-
ing heavily on the floor was Gorgon.

The scout’s fingers again pressed the throat of the un-
conscious man, ready to tighten into a choking clasp, if
he showed signs of returning animation.

When “Gorgon” did not answer to the calls the men
went away, after expressing wonderment concerning the
sounds they had heard. |
_ The scout lost no time in turning on the light again,
and in searching for cords with which to tie his captive.

He found cords in the desk by the wall. Turning
off the light, he applied them to the wrists and ankles
of the unconscious dwarf, and also made a gag and
thrust it intohis wide, froglike mouth.

The scout had been given a good view of the hideous
features of this man monster; had seen the short, ‘squat,
hunchbacked body, the long, serpentine arms, the short
legs, and that masklike face, whose utter ugliness can-
mot be pictured.

The sight was enough to ae him shudder.

_ He was sure this was the ogreish head he had seen
at the top of the stairway in the alley, when those bullets
were shot down at him in the dark.

Having seen to the security and continued silence of -..-ff

his prisoner, Buffalo Bill remounted the chair in the
darkness, and again applied his eyes to those tiny holes
in the wall.

Though the holes were so small, they enabled him to
get a good view of the interior of the other Le and to
see the men who were in it.

There had been a marked addition to the company.

Several of the men in there now were not Mexicans.

All stood about in little groups, discussing something,
and they seemed excited.

‘There was some talk concerning “Gorgon,” who, it

appeared, was mysteriously. delaying ; and, apparently,”

his coming was desired.

But the talk concerned chiefly a certain caravan which
was soon to arrive in Timber Bar.

This caravan, the scout judged, was a burro-train,
and held a large consignment. of rich goods, to be smug~

 

 

  
  
 

 

 

  
 

  
   
   
   
   
   
  
   

    
 

 

tHe BUY ALA) BILL STORIES. : 19

eled across the Mexican boundary into United States
territory, 2”
The excitement of these men had been produced by

their discovery that detectives were in Timber Bar for

the purpose of ferreting out smugglers.
‘The scout was not a detective, yet he heard himself

now spoken of as one.

He was gratified, too, by the discovery that of all the
“detectives” who were supposed to be at the moment
swarming in Timber Bar, he was the one most feared

by these men.

He tried to fix the features of the men nearest him
in his memory, so that later he could identify them.

While he was making these discoveries, he heard the
dwarf stirring, showing that he had returned, or was
returning, to consciousness.

The gag did not prevent him from groaning, and his
groans were so loud that the scout feared they would
reach the men in the other room.

He stepped down from the chair, and, moving across
the room to where the dwarf was lying, he pressed the
cold muzzle of his revolver against the big, hideous
head.

“Stop that!” was his low command.
stop it, this will stop you!”

The groans ceased.

The scout retreated to the chair, and again climbed
up to the pinholes in the wall, and renewed his watching.

For a long time he stood there; though what he heard,
being chiefly a repetition of the things learned already,
hardly paid him for his effort.

“Tf you don’t

CHAPTER VIIL
De BD BAS i Ei B AVE LO. an

As Buffalo Bill watched and listened, he was given a

- genuine surprise at last.

A young man came into the room, his face covered
with a half-mask-made by twisting a handkerchief about
it, so that only his eyes and the forehead were visible.

This man was young, and was an American, as his
voice showed.

The thing that astonished the scout was that, appar-
ently, this young man was none other than Stingaree.

He had not suspected Stingaree of playing double,

and he could hardly credit his eyes and his ears.
The young American was greeted warmly by the men
assembled, and was informed, in tones of excitement,

that for some strange and inexplicable reason Gorgon

had not appeared.

“Have you been to his room?” he asked.

They told him they had, that he was not there, and
the door was locked.

“Well, that’s strange,” said the young man, “for I saw

him early in the evening, and he told me he would be
on hand promptly, and that I must certainly come!”

The scout peered long at this youth, and was still
puzzled.

Whether he was Stingaree or another, he could not
teil.

While he was studying the young American, : other
men entered the room, two of them Americans.

The young American took his seat at one end of the
room, and a lodge organization seemed the result.

That it was a lodge, in its form at least, was soon
shown by the transaction of certain business, while they
waited for the coming of Gorgon.

When it began to seem that Gorgon was not e
they sent a delegation to his room,

This delegation found the door locked and the room
dark, and returned with that as their report.

Talk of the detectives who had come into the town
followed, with especial mention of Buffalo Bill,

Finally, after an earnest discussion, the death of Buf-
falo Bill was voted.

Then a box was produced, and into it strips of paper
bearing names were thrown.

“Qh, if I could get hold of those strips of paper!” was
the scout’s wish; until he reflected that probably the
names were not the real names of the members, but’
names adopted.

Even then, the handwriting on the paper’ might help
him,

He discovered that they were about to draw out a
name, and that the bearer of the name was thus to be
chosen to assassinate him.

The cold-bloodedness of the procedure amazed him.

It was not often that a man thus saw. himself con-
demned to death by a band of criminals, and the choosing
oi the one who was to commit the murder. _

Even in Buffalo Bill's wide experience the mae was
unique.

He saw the fateful slip drawn from the box by a
Mexican who was blindfolded for the purpose.

He heard the name called aloud, as the slip was held
up and read.

It astounded him, for the name was

He mae about over the room.

“Eulalie’”’ was, apparently, not there.

No woman was present, so far as he could tell; - though
it was possible she was there disguised and hidden by
one of the big serapes, which even the young American
wore.

“Kulalie.’”’

While the scout was reexamining as well as he could
the faces in the room, a third and as tremendous a sur-
prise as any came to him.

The continued absence of “Gorgon,” on whom these
men apparently much relied, had caused them great un-
easiness.

\

 
 

    

i4 THE BUBEALO

The scout was sure that Gorgon was not the right
mame of the dwarf; but that it had been given him,
or he had assumed it, because of the resemblance of
his face to that of one of the gorgon heads seen now
and then on water-spouts and fountains. The dwarf’s
head and face certainly entitled him to be called “Gor-
gon.” ’

And it was Gorgon who now gave him his new sur-_

prise.

The dwarf’s tremendous strength of arm had enabled
him to-break the cords on his wrists.

He had a knife concealed in his clothing.

This he secured, ripped the cords from his ankles,
tore the gag out of his mouth, and with a bellow like
that of an enraged bull he rushed blindly through the
darkness at the scout with the knife.

The scout jumped | down from the chair to meet this
mad rush.

The dwartf’s blade ripped his coat. ‘Then Buffalo Bill
caught the knife-hand, threw one arm round the hunch-
back’s knotted body, and the two went rolling on the
floor together.

The sounds of the fall and the struggle, together with
the croaking yells of the maddened dwarf, reached to
the men in the other room.

The scout and the dwarf fought in the darkness, the
dwarf screaming and gurgling as if he were an enraged
beboon, and using such strength that the scout found
his hands full to keep himself from being horribly cut
with the knife.

He succeeded in striking the dwarf’s wrist such a
paralyzing blow that the knife fell to the floor, thus
disarming the hunchback.

By this time the men had streamed from the lodge-
room out in the hall and the stairway that led to the
street, and some of them were at the door of the dwarf’s
room, hammering on it, and asking excited questions.

- “Break it down!” roared the dwarf. “I’ve got him in
here; smash the door, and come and get him.”

His croaking voice screamed into a high, whining
shriek.

The excited men outside began to hammer on the
door.

The dwarf now got the scout round the legs and tried
to drag him toward the door, yelling commands at the
same time to the men.

For a moment the scout was tempted to shoot the
fiend, feeling almost justified.

Time and again he tried to get the dwarf by the
throat, once being severely bitten as he made the effort.

But he made the eftort again, and this time, because
the dwarf’s arms were round his legs, he succeeded in

gripping the huge, bull-neck, and set his fingers firmly
in the bulging muscles.

 

BILL STORIES.

The dwarf’s yells and calls ee quickly to cho-
‘king gurgles.

Yet he continued to pull the scout toward tre door.
The scout released one hand long enough, as he
neared the door, to push the electric button there, and
give light; for he found himself at a disadvantage in
the unfamiliar room in total darkness. —

His fingers clamped so tightly now on the dwarf’s
throat that the wheezing gurgle stopped, while the star-
ing eyes seemed to start from their very sockets..

Then the head fell back, for the scout’s fingers had
done their work.~

Buffalo Bill lowered the unconscious form to the
floor, and looked about, feeling much like a caged rat.

The men were hammering and yelling at the door, and
he knew that some one had run for an ax, while others
were trying to fit keys to the lock.

“It’s all right now,” he said, croaking the words and
trying to imitate the voice and pronunciation of the
dwarf. “I'll open the door a a second. Don't break
it down; it’s all right now.’

He looked round. .
At the other side of the room he saw the crimson
curtain. ,

Z

‘Tt had been there, and Hel had inspected what was
behind it, when, with officers, he had searched this reom,
finding at that time nothing.

The curtain offered only temporary safety.

Then he looked at the windows opening on the street.

Those windows were barred now, and no light from
the street could come in. .

The windows offered hope of a desperate kind, and he
rushed to the nearest.

He. tore the bars from their fastenings, and threw
aside the heavy wooden, inner shutter, or blind.

The clamorous: crowd at the door did not longer

choose to obey his orders to remain there without break- iS

ing the door down, and they were again hammering on
it, and calling questions.

The dwarf lay on the floor close by the door, breath-
ing stertorously; but his heavy breathing was not heard
in the general uproar.

Buffalo Bill threw up the sash of the window and
looked out into the street.

It was a long jump down to the street, and he did

not care to take it. In addition, a crowd was gathering,
and he did not doubt that it held enemies.

He glanced upward.

What he saw there was more promising.

The roof was flat, resting on projecting beams, and
one of the beams projected over the window.

He crawled through the window and stood upright on
‘the outer window-ledge.
The crowd in the corridor was banging at the door

 

 

 
 

 

THe BUPPALO

and trying to chee it sone - they had grown cucpicious
of that voige which had counseled them to quiet.

Loud cries came from the people in the street, as the
scout stood out on the window-ledge and reached up
to the projecting beam.

Just at that moment the ogreish dwarf came back to
consciousness and began to roar like an angry tiger.
Buffalo Bill had to jump to reach the end of the
beam.

It was a perilous performance; for, if he failed to
reach and hold it, he would fall to the street below.

He caught the end of the beam; then, placing his
feet against the wall, he walked them up it; and, by

sheer exertion of tremendous muscular power, he drew

himself up to the beam, and over upon the flat roof.

It was such a ‘splendid exhibition of gymnastic ability
that it drew cheers from some of the people in the street.

‘But 2 pistol -shot sounded there, too, as he threw him-
self over upon the roof.

‘The bullet whistled above his head. .

He dropped flat upon his face, and lay there, panting,
his strength sadly told on by that climbing feat, and by
the exertions he had previously put forth.

As he lay regaining his breath and strength, he still
heard the croaking commands and cries of the dwarf;

‘then heard the door smashed in, and the men stream-

ing into the room from the corridor; and heard, like-
wise, confused cries and shouts from the street.

Another bullet whistled over his body.

Fearing to tarry too long on the roof lest he should
be surrrounded and trapped there, Buffalo Bill edged
farther along, until he felt safe from the bullets,

Then he sprang up and ran across the roof, heading

‘back from the lighted street. °

When he had crossed several of the flat-roofed houses,
for they stood together with roofs joining, he found a
ladderlike way that permitted him to descend into an

- alley,

Lt was, as he soon saw, ae same alley in which
‘already he had encountered some remarkable adven-
titres,

He did not see any one, and did not believe he had
been seen. :

Standing close by the wall, he drew his Mexican se-
rape close about him, and pulled the Mexican hat down
over his eyes.

He heard shouts ae cries - excitement in the street.
beyond.

Out there, and in the other street, as well as on the

tops of the houses, he knew that men were now looking
for him.

He congratulated himself on the fact that he had
worn that Mexican clothing; and he hoped that, as a
disguise, it had been good enough to screen his iden-
tity from the crowd.

 

BILL STORIES: | . ts

“P’m out of that hole, anyhow,’ was his thought;
“and certainly I gained information this evening worth
while.”

 

CHAPTER IX.
THE MAYOR OF TIMBER BAR.

It was nearly an hour later before Buffalo Bill left
the alley.

In the meantime, “searchers had entered it, and had
gone out again.

With one of the searchers he had talked, and had
given him suggestions for continuing the search, tell-
ing him that an American had run past the mouth of
the alley some moments before. His own command of
Mexican was so good that this searcher did not sus-
pect him,

But now he stole. forth, when the riotous clamor was
somewhat spent. ‘

One of the first men he saw was Jonas Cornfire.

Stingaree, the young American, was close by Cornfire.

Both were in Mexican clothing, but the scout recog-
nized *them.

“Hello!” he said, touching Cornfire on the shoulder.

“Geewhittaker!’’ the Yankee gasped. ‘That yeou?
Well, I wouldn’t knowed ye, stooped over as ye air!
Yeou aint moren. hali as tall as common, Here's
Stingaree. We been lookin’ fer ye all round, and
cal’latin’ tew help ye if ye needed it.”

Stingaree came up, with a lazy, sauntering motion,
in imitation of a low-class Mexican. -

“Hello!” he said familiarly, but hardly above his
breath, :

The scout tooled at him oo

“Where can we go?” he said. “I don't care to run
into that howling mob, and we need to have a talk to- |
gether,’’ '

“My room,” suggested Cornfire.
nigh it to-night, so fur’s I know.
anywhere,”

They separated, and when they came together again
they were in Cornfire’s room.

Buffalo Bill cast aside the eres serape and
threw off the peaked hat.

“Glad to-get rid of them,” he. said. “And 1 can tell:
you that since putting them on I’ve had some lively ex-
periences.”’ . :

He again looked keenly at Stingaree.

“We're dyin’ ter hear of ’em,” said Cornfire. “We
couldn’t jes’ git the straight of the hubbub aout in the
street, but we discovered there was a man-hunt on, and
we guessed yeou was in it, either as the hunted er the
hunter.”

“I was the hunted this time.”

“We're dyin’ ter hear it,’ Cornfire repeated.

“Ain’t been shan :
IT reckon it’s safe’s

 
 

 

    

16 THE BUFFALO

The scout told his story in a few words. :

As he did so he looked Stingaree straight in the
face.

“Of course, you don’t know anything about this, Stin-
Sarees «ie. said.

“Me? How should I?” said Stingaree, apparently as-
tonished. !

“Well, the only reason is that I can almost swear
that I saw you in that room, when [ looked through
those pinholes in the walls. It was either you or your

brother. Now, which was it?’

Stingaree flushed.

“To the best of my eee he said, “I have no
brother in this section.”

“And you were not there yourself?” ~

“Of course not!”

“T beg your pardon, then,” said the scout, “for what

[ said, and a even the momentary suspicion I held
against you.” ‘

He turned to Cornfire, |

“Now that you know what I have discovered, what do
you. say to going with it to the mayor of the town?”

“Will it do any good?”

“That's to be seen. 1 fancy that it will serve, at
least, to show the extent of the smuggler organization
here in Timber Bar, and how much the local officers
can be relied on.”

“They can’t be relied on at all,’ Cornfire sputtered.

“T shall go in my own proper person, without any
disguise. If I am attacked in the street, I know how to
defend myself.”

He rose to get ready.

“But no man kin defend himself ag’inst assassina-
tion,” Cornfire objected; ‘ ‘and that’s the thing yeou’ve
got tew watch fer in a consarned greaser community like
_ this,’

Stingaree made no motion to accompany them as they
rose to go.

“You're not going?” said the scout.

“Well, now, see here,’ said the young man, ‘e you
think I’m going to tfail round with you while you have
that opinion of me, you're. mistaken.
dwarf is the devil who has bewitched Muriel. I’ve
heard of him before, but never seen him, and he rather
answers to the description.”

“How could such a monster bewitch any woman?”
asked the scout. ‘

“I can’t answer that, and I hope I’m mistaken. But
you’re searching for one thing, and I’m searching for
another. I want to discover what’s happened to Mu-
riel; you're after smugglers. The two roads may come
together after a while, and it looks as if they would;
but—just the same, I oe 80 with you, since you’ve
had that thought about me.’

“Drop it out of your mind,” said the scout.

_may be smugglers.

I believe that —

BIEL SIFORIES,

“No, 39

They went without him.

“T’ve found Stingaree straight so far,”
in his behalf, as they went on their way. -

Though the hour was so late, they found the. ae
of Timber Bar without trouble.

He came from the Monte gambling-hall, hee he
had been playing.

He seemed ill at ease, and was. rolling a cece
when the scout and Cornfire approached him, his fin-
gers noticeably shaking. Apparently he had lost heavily
at the gaming-tables. ey

Yet his Mexican affability did not es him, =

“The American sefiors would see me in a i
he said. “Very well; it is just over-the way.” oo

When they entered the office he showed en to seats,
after turning on the electric lights, and took a seat by
the window, where he regarded them oe while he
rolled another cigarette. ae

He was thin and sallow, and his black: eyes were oon
and furtive.

* said Corfire,

He lighted the cigarette and put it between his sal-
low lips, and regarded them out of the corners of his
eyes. 2

rash, yes,? he said, as Buffalo Bill told“his story, “I

have already had some such news from the police de

partment. But the story of the smugglers I do not
believe.

They meet there twice a week. He merely misunder-

stood what they were saying, or perhaps’—he looked |

any at the scout through the cigarette smoke—
“perhaps the sefior was a bit excited or imaginative.”

“Maybe you will deny that there are smugglers in
Timber Bar?’

“Oh, as to that,’ he shrugged his shoulders, ey would

not dare to say. In such a town, on the border, there

tion of smugglers. The thing is quite improbable.”
“YT presume you do not credit my statements concern-
ing the attempts made on my life?” said Buffalo Bill,

somewhat nettled.

“What I should say, if I expressed any thought on the
subject, would be that I think the sefior is highly im-
aginative.”

Again there was that expressive shrug of his shoutl-
ders.

Buffalo Bill saw that it was useless to hobs. for aid
from the mayor of Timber Bar, and -he soon took his
leave.

“Well, what do you think of it?” was his indignant

question, when he and Cornfire were outside...
“Same’s I’ve allus had,” said Cornfire;

than yeou kin see him. That mayor knows all about

    

What the sefior beheld was a lodge of artisans.

But I am sure there is no organiza-«"~

“and that is,
never trust one of these yaller-bellied greasers farder

 

)
{
!

 

 

 

 
 

_ me, and so J’ll tell you.

follow. We must capture that dwarf.

 

 

THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES. ; 17

that org’nization o’ smugglers, and I wouldn’t put it
past him if he’s a member of it.”
“Just my thought. And perhaps I’ve i foolish,
in that I’ve given him that information, and so per-
haps have given it to the smugglers.”

“There’s one thing, Cody, that I am certain of y at-
firmed Cornfire impressively, “and that is, frum naow

on yeou and me both need ter keep aour eyes open

mighty wide, er we'll. drop sudden intew that sleep
that no knows no awakening. The smugglers air
aroused naow, and know that we’re here, and particu-
larly that yeou’re here; and they'll stop at nothin’.”

As Buffalo Bill and Jonas Cornfire made their way
by back streets and°alleys from the office of the mayor
of Timber Bar, they encountered Stingaree.

The young American was oe and had seemed
in. a hurry.

“Where away?” said. aes to ay

Stingaree stopped in hesitation. -

“Cornfire,’” he said, “I think you have confidence in

low that I believe to be Cody’s hunchback set out
through this street for the country. I’m following him,
and got this horse to do it with as soon as I could. He’s
got some start of me now, but I can soon overtake him.
The scamp was disguised, with a big serape wound
about him, but I knew him, for all that; for he can’t

hide that squat body of his, try as he may. And

so

 

He stopped and looked at the scout.

“Weill go with you,” said’ Buffalo Bill. “Tell us
where we may overtake you, and we'll get horses and
If I have for-
feited your confidence, Stingaree, I can only\say, in jus-
tification of my suspicions, that had you been situated as
IT was you would have thought as I did.”

A minute later Stingaree was jogging on in pursuit of

- the dwarf, and Cody and Cornfire were hurrying to
get horses to follow him.

CHAPTER x:

THE DWARFS MISSION.

Gorgon, the dwarf, had received a severe shock, both —
mentally and physically.

It bruised his mind as well as
his body.

Though he had been sorhewhat startled and alarmed
on discovering that Buffalo Bill had come to Timber Bar
for the purpose of ferreting out the flourishing smug-
gler organization which existed there, Gorgon had not
really believed that the scout could accomplish his pur-
pose; and he had at once laid; plans which promised to
put a speedy finish to Buffalo Bill’s remarkable career.

But right on top of this, Buffalo Bill had shown such

meaty

 

Not ten minutes ago the fel-

cleverness that he had not only seen and heard the
secrets of the smugglers’ “lodge-room,” but had ceme
nigh compassing the death of the dwarf in the latter's
own workshop.

After Buffalo Bill’s escape and the futile hunt for
him, Gorgon had called together a few of the leading
spirits of the criminal organization of which he was
the head and directing force.

He told them that, since their lodge-room secrets had
been opened up by the scout, and the faces of many
of them had been seen, and their voices heard by him,
the only thing that promised safety was flight tempora-
rily from Timber Bar for the most of them.

In addition, the rich mule-train of smuggled goods,
now on its way to Timber Bar, must without fail be
diverted to another point, lest it should fall into the
hands of the government agents.

Though already he had sent a messénger to do that,
he intended to set out himself that night; both to make
sure that the caravan was properly diverted, and for the
purpose of getting out of Timber Bar for a few days.

His followers could see that he was in a panic,
though he tried to assume his normal, cynical coolness.

The terrific combat with Buffalo Bill had shaken his
nerves, and had frightened him, and the scout’s escape
but added to that nervous fright.

His own panicky spirit was thus communicated to
his followers, and plans were made for a wholesale exo-
dus from the town.

After he had held this conference, the terrified hunch-
back made hasty preparations for his flight.

He had_a talk with Eulalie, giving her certain instruc-
tions.

Then he went to the stable where his big mule was
kept, and led the animal forth surreptitiously, settling
on the back of the mule himself the heavy saddle. .
_When he rode forth from the town, with the night
already well spent, he chose a side street, to avoid be-

“ing seen, and he wore a big, disguising serape.

This attempt to keep from being seen was the very
thing that caused him to be seen by Stingaree, who was
haunting the side streets for greater security.

But Gorgon rode on, blissfully unaware that the oe
of an enemy had alighted on him.

On leaving the town’of Timber Bar behind him, ‘he
crossed the Rio Grande at a well-known fording-place.

The water was low, and the mule had no trouble in
wading across.

Then the dwarf took the highway that led to the little
Mexican town of Pablos.

He hurried the mule on with sundry whackings of a
big cane, the said cane being really a sword-cane, the
keen blade hidden within a canelike sheath.

The dwarf did not contemplate a pursuit, and so took

 
 

18 ae THE BUFFALO

little pains to hide his movements*when he was once
well beyond the town.

Morning had dawned across the brown, Mexican
hills by the time he reached Pablos.

But already some.of the inhabitants were astir. |

‘To the people of Pablos, Gorgon was a character
both admired and feared. He had been there many
times, distributing ‘alms, and making prayers in the
little chapels; yet, though they accepted his alms. readily
enough, they piously crossed themselves on his approach.
This was both because he looked so like what their
minds imaged as a demon, and because, when in Pablos,
he always stopped at the shop of Pedro Pasquale, who
was believed by them to have sold himself to the devil.

Pedro was a dried-up, mummied specimen of Mexi-
- can, who sat in a little shop, to which few people came,
who smoked interminably the small cigarettes which
his thin brown fingers were always busily rolling, and
who, according to the belief of the peons, held com-
munication with the devil every night.

It will be seen that the peons of Pablos were a sim-
ple-minded, superstitious race, who believed literally
that a man can sell himself to the devil, and who held
that strange spirits hovered over the hills, and even
that those same spirits. poisoned now and then the well
of some family they did not like. >

Always, they observed, the well hamenert clgeeda
to a man disliked by Pedro, or one whom he feared;
from which they should have argued, but did not, that
Pedro was himself the well-poisoner.

_ As soon as he was in the narrow streets of Pablos,

Gorgon drove his mule up to the shop of Pedro, and
there dismounted.

_ Ina little while after Gorgon entered the shop, Pedro
came out and led the mule to the adobe shed in the rear,
and stalled it there.

Then Pedro went in again, and was no. more seen
for some time by the gaping peons.

They were pleased, however, that Gorgon had come,

even though he associated with a man sold to the devil,
for always the coming of Gorgon meant presents to
the villagers and to the local chapel.

,Gorgon stretched himself out in Pedro’s easy chair,
and took from a shelf some of Pedro’s cigarettes.

“How has the child of the Evil One fared since last
I met him. here?’ he asked, an evil grin on his ugly
features,

“Ah, as to that,” said Pedro, ae his shoulders
to indicate that he understood the humor of the ques-
tion, “T pave not seen my father, the devil, since last
you came.’ (

“Aha! Oho!” the dwarf ried. “Tf you go to call-

ing me the devil, the peons will stone me out of the
town,”

 

_ turn it into the Santa Clara valley.

BILL STORIES.

He lighted his cigarette and began to. ‘smoke, ‘exhaling
the smoke from his lungs.

“Tt surprises you to see me here? Fas i asked.

“No, sefior ; i am never surprised’ by your coming
or your going.”

“The devil can be expected to come. ue any time, eh Ae

“And to go at any time.”

‘Very true; and it’s an a ee matter that has
hurried me here this time.
Santos caravan? It should be neahy:

“Tt is less than a day away,”
placidly.

“T wish it were a week away!”

“Santa Maria!” said Pedro, interested,
you have been storming because they came too slow.”

“But it is different now.” ae

He bent forward.

“Listen! . The serpents of the United States Govern-
ment are in Timber Bar. At their head is. the noted bor-
der scout and detective called Buffalo Bill.”

Pedro was so astonished that he swallowed his smoke
and gurgled.

 

' “And hear you, even a worse’ thing!
scout has seen many of our men, and heard them, and
has looked into our secret rooms!”

Pedro crossed himself, and looked eid

“In the name of the Evil One, how did it happen Pre

“T’ll tell you, when I have more leisure. Just now, tell
me where the caravan was when you had word from it.”

“At Los Pinos Wells, on the desert route. José came
in with the word not an hour ago, and I was preparing
to send him on to you with it as eon as he had rested.
He is asleep now in the next room.’

“It’s taking the old route, and coming to Timber.

Barn

“Si, senor.’

“Then Ve must be ued at once and sent be eke
with orders that it is to go beyond the mountains, into
the Santa Clara valley, and hide there until word comes
to it when and how to move. This is all important.”

He had stopped smoking, and bent forward, ham-
mering out his words with the thin fingers that held the
cigarette, his evil face pushed. close up to-the lean
brown one of his Henchman and obedient servant.

. May the saints save us!” gurgled Pedro. ;
_ “I have left Timber Bar for a few days, and shall
trouble you for a bed and quiet here. We must wait

until the detectives have bécome discouraged and leit
Timber Bar.

coast yet?”
“Yes; it left two days ago.”
“Then another runner must be sent to stop that, and
We cannot let those

rich goods fall into the hands of the foul vultures now
in Timber Bar.”

Have you heard of the Las —

said Pedro, smoking —

 

‘Heretofore -

The. he coe

The second caravan has not left the.

ie

 
 

 

THE BUFF ALO

“How did they know this?” asked Pedra.

“About the smuggling?”

“Aye, sefior, about the smuggling?” _

| I don’t know. We have probably been too bold
e lately.” |
Poe ‘The hawk that ees too often to the hen-pen gets
caught at last,’”’ said Pedro, quoting one of the Mexican
f) sayings, applicable to this case. “You were cautious,
f sehor? I have been. as still as the dead; and the
- rtinners, José and Manuel, have talked no more than
if they were tonoueless” > =

“Manuel is here?”

“He is at home, .sefior.”

“I shall trust you to have both Manuel and José
moving inside of the hour.’

“Tt shall be done, sefior.”

“And another thing.”

Gorgon settled back in his chair again, beginning

to feel better, though his muscles and nerves quivered
whenever he recalled that frightful combat at Timber
Bar with Buffalo Bill.
“Another thing,” he repeated; “I may be followed
| to this place. It is across the boundary, and well within
Mexican territory, but those devils stick at nothing.
They would pay.no attention to such boundary lines, if
once they struck my. trail. I may need some means of
defense here.”

Pedro regarded him with a sort of helpless terror.

“Not here?” he gasped.

“T hope not here, nor anywhere; biit I must be pre-
pared. You have guns and ammunition here, and you
can command the services of some of the peons.”

“Not of many, sefior; you forget how they look oh
me. I am gifted with the Evil Eye, and they would as
. soon companion with the devil himself.”

“We don’t care for their comradeship or their good-

' will; but we can make them fight, if need be. You can

onee them into that. You can make them believe

that their chapel is about to be desecrated by the terrible

Americans, or something of the kind. Get the priest

into the building here, and frighten -him into helping
; he can command all the aid he desires.”

oe yellow face still showed fright.

He gasped as he thought the matter over, and forgot
to smoke his cigarette.

“If it must be, it may be done,” he said refuctantly.
“But the sefior is alarmed unduly, perhaps, and

“I have a feeling, Pedro, that'I may be followed. I
may not be; I hope I shall not be. But if I am, ané
_ they come here, I shall fight to the death before being
taken.”

His croaking voice rang.

“It shall be as the sefior desires,”
nervously, and without enthusiasm.

He arose, threw into the little oven of adobe the

 

said Pedro, but

 

BILL STORIES.

13

butt of his cigarette, and went out, to summon José
and Manuel, and give them the strenuous orders of
Gergon,

ieee

CHAPTER XI.
THE CAPTURE OF THE PEON RUNNER.

The first of the slim peon runners to leave the town of
Pablos was José. /

A view of him, as he turned, by a narrow way, along
the river-path that led into the hills, one have de-
lighted the eye of an artist.

His ‘head, shoulders, and legs were es a flowing
cloth about his middle and loins being his only garment.
His thick, black, Indian-like mane of hair fell, none:
down on his broad shoulders.

He was much more Indian than Spanish, as was shown
in his face and physique.

José, the peon, was the modern representative of those
Indian runners of the old days—runners of Peru, of
Mexico, of the wild tribes of other sections—whose fleet
feet, untiring lungs, and corded muscles carried them
over leagues of plain and mountain with a speed that
seems to us now simply marvelous.

It is recorded of the hunters of certain early Indian
tribes that if, in shooting at a deer, they missed, and
lost one of their arrows, precious because few, they
immediately set out to run the deer down; and that
they accomplished the feat almost invariably, the deer
having no show against them in a long race, though it
could defeat them when the race was short.

José was of this breed.

Though he had so recently come in after a long,
hard run, when aroused and told that he must go forth
again, he swallowed a little wine, put a cigarette be-
tween his lips for a few puffs, ate a handful of dried
raisins, girded his loins, and set out.

Having left the caravan the afternoon before, he
knew about where he should encounter it, and so shaped
his course.

Unfortunately for José, this course brought him, the
next morning, \in sight of Buffalo Bill, Jonas Cornfire,
and Stingaree, who had followed the dwarf with, such
success that they were approaching the village of Pablos.

The first that José knew of their presence, he was
looking into the muzzle of a revolver, that was pointed
at his head by a tall man who had risen up from behind
a rock by the trail, and who commanded him in a loud
and startling voice to halt.

José halted with comical suddenness, so that, in bring-
ing himself to a stop, he nearly pitched forward on
his head.

Theri he beheld two other men, on the other side of
the trail, who also held weapons pointed at him in that
terrifying way.

 
Gg
\

ee
ee
4
X

A

THE BUFFALO

 

José crossed himself piously and gave himself up for

‘lost.

The tall man wearing a Mexican serape, whom José
could see at a glance was not a Mexican, came up to
him, with the pistol still pointed, while the two other
men scrambled forward, uttering exclamations.

“FHe’s a runner,” said the scout, who knew the breed
well. “And the speed with which he was going indicates
that he bore news of importance. We'll see what it is.”

José trembled and looked about, not understanding a
wotd, but hoping for some loophole of escape, for his
judgement told him the message he bore was what had
brought this “hold-up.”

But there was no way of escape.

“Tf the Senor Americans, please,’ he whined, “I shall |
hope not to be delayed, for my wife lies sick of deadly)
fever in ae village of Espafiol, and 1 ay to her as fast
as I can.’

“And carry a message to her?’ said the scout, in the
mongrel Spanish of the country.

/ “No, sefior; no message. I swear it.’ But she is very
ill, and I was sent for to come in haste. Perhaps she
dies now while I wait here.” .

He shifted from one bare foot to the other, licked his
dry lips, and eyed his captors with crafty gaze.

“Just go through him, Stingaree,’ commanded the
scout. ;

Stingaree “went through” the peon runner so success-
fully that he unearthed a scrap of writing hidden away

in a moisture-proof case beneath the runner’s armpit. ”

When taken from its case and read, the writing proved
that in stopping José they had made no mistake.

It was an order from Gorgon to the captain of the

, mule-train, ordering him to hurry to thé Santa Clara

valley and there lie in hiding until further orders
reached him; stating, too, the reason, that fear of a
swarm of detectives who had descended on Timber Bar
made this necesssary.

The three Americans could read the mongrel Spanish
in which this was penned.

“Aha! Just the information we want!’’ said the scout.

“Faound with the goods on him, by Hen!” exclaimed
the Yankee.

“From Gorgon, and I wish I had my fingers on his
throat!” cried the young American.

José stood by, narrowly watching, filled with a deathly

fear now, since the discovery of the message he had -

been bearing to the commander of the mule-train.

Though he heard the characteristic comments, he
did not understand them, He knew, though, that these
terrible men were enemies, doubtless some of the very
enemies that had caused Gorgon to send him flying with
the message. Pehaps they would shoot him, when they
finished talking of the letter?

Shifting uneasily from one brown foot to the other,

BILL STORIES.

he was steeling his muscles and nerving his heart for a
run for life, if he saw that they meant to kill him.

Buffalo Bill began to ask questions.

“Where is this mule-train ?”

José affected not to understand this, though the speech
was in his native tongue. «

It was repeated, and for emphasis the cold muzzle
of the scout’s revolver was thrust into José’s face, which
had a marvelous effect on his understanding.

He now told them, with quick speech,
speed of utterance by the deadly fear that shook him.

“The dwarf sent this?” said the scout.

“Gorgon sent it.”

“And Gorgon is the dwarf who came from Timber

Bar? x

José admitted that the American seher was right in
this. / |

“Where is the dwart now?”

“In Pablos.”

“That is the little villlage over there at the foot of
the hills?”

Again José generously admitted pe the American
senor was right. ,

The scout turned to Corfire and Stingaree. |

“I suppose if we substituted a message of our own
for this we wouldn’t dare trust this peon to bear it?”
“TY don’t think so. What’s yer idee?’ said Cornfire.

“We could substitute a message, signing the name
Gorgon to it, which would order the mule-train to go
straight to Timber Bar as fast as possible; and then
we could capture it there. But, of course, the runner
wouldn’t deliver it?” |

“Not him,” said Cornfire, “unless one of us could stick
clost tew his heels, and prod him continually with a
pistol. He’d back-track with that message straight tew

the dwarf, and there we'd have all the fat right intew

ine fire.”
“As I thought.
“But one of us might carry such a message,” sug-
gested Stingaree. |

é

It wouldn’t be safe.”

The scout began again to question the trembling

runner, and by deftness and threatening gained much

information concerning affairs in Pablos, and about
Gorgon, and where he was stopping; for the runner
answered’glibly enough when compelled to speak.

Again the scout turned to his companions.

“I think I'll make this rascal guide me to that mule-
train. You and Cornfire may try to capture the dwart
in Pablos, if you like.”

Cornfire’s eyes glittered with decided interest.

“Hooray!” he said. “If we do try that, Stingaree,

we're in fer a hull lot of adventures, and mebbe we |
But if Cody thinks it’s

won't come back frum it.
we're ther boys tew try it.”

spurred to.

   

 
  

  

 

f
ff
it

{
{

CHAPTER XI.

CORNFIRE AND THE DWARF.

Cornfire, pee atcless. set out for the village of Pablos

alone.
-, At the last moment, Buffalo Bill decided that he would

need Stingaree with him, to watch the peon; for if the

scout suffered himself to be hampered too much by the
necessity of guarding the prisoner, it might interfere
seriously with his main purpose.

It was night before Cornfire penetrated into the village
itself. \

Throughout the afternoon he spent his time on the ~

slope of hill overhanging it, and studied its streets and
houses, its lazy-moving population, and especially made
sure that he saw whoever departed from it.
For he did not wish to enter the cage and find the bird
flown.
His post of observation was so good that when night
came he felt sure the dwarf was still in Pablos.
Cornfire made but few preparations for entering.
Chief of these was that he cooked what food he had,

: by a hidden fire, and ate all of it, being a firm believer

in the dictum that a full stomach conduces to courage
and success.

The only other preparations were the examination of
his weapons, the tethering of his horse on another
grazing-area, and the drawing of his serape farther up
about his neck as he set forth.

José had been forced to tell where, in the village,
Gorgon might be found.

His description of the place was accurate enough;
yet, after entering the town Cornfire had some difficulty
in finding it.

Finally he located the little shop kept . Pedro
Pasquale.

It was dark, and closed against business, which’ was

the principal reason Cornfire had trouble in locating it.

There were a number of Mexicans in the street; and
these had spotted the tall, lank figure; for in spite of
his endeavors to shorten himself, Cornfire was not built
on telescopic principles, and met with poor success.

The staring peons did not yet know he was not a
Mexican, for he adopted the privilege of the country and
kept his face somewhat muffled.

Yet they were sure this tall fellow, who looked to be
a Mexican, did not belong in Pablos.

Having located the shop of Pedro Pasquale, and found
it dark, Cornfire began to wonder how he was to get into
it, ,

_ And he‘wondered, too, how he should get his prisoner
out of the town, if he succeeded in capturing him.

For, be it remembered, this was Mexico, not the
United States. Cornfire had no police authority here;
no laws authorized him to invade Mexican territory. and
take out a prisoner to the United States. Even in

 

LHE BUFFALO

attempting such a thing he became himself a law-

_ border.

  

{

 

BILL STORIES. (oa

breaker.

_ Few scruples troubled Jonas Cornfire. When he set
out to make an arrest he did not stop to discriminate
as to legal matters and those considered illegal. To his
mind, Gorgon, the dwarf, being a resident of Timber
Bar, which was in American territory, could not escape
the penalties of his crimes by simply crossing the —
Too many men relied on such things, and
Cornfire did not believe in it.

Having surveyed the shop from the front and found
nothing very promising, he went round to the rear, which
opened on an alley, and took a look there.

The alley seemed more promising only because it was
at the moment untenanted, for the staring peons had not
yet followed round there.

“Til see if I kin raise anybody,’ thought Cornfire.

He tapped softly on the door.

He had to repeat his knocks several times before he
made any one stir within.

Then he heard low voices, and soft footsteps came to
the- door.

He heard a bolt shot back, and the door was drawn
open just a little. Thé room was dark.

Cornfire was prepared for this.

He thrust in his broad shoulders before the man at the
door could prevent; and then, with a jump, was inside.

The man was astonished and ee and roared
at him in villainous Mexican. ae

Under the serape, in a pocket of his coat, Cornfire had
a pocket flash-light, one of those little electric torches
now so common, which gave forth a flash when the
button was pressed.

He threw his hand out with this electric flash- ‘tout in
it, and the next instant the room was vividly illumi-
nated.

He saw two men; the man by the door, who was
Pedro, and in a chair, by the wall, the hunchback.

The latter rose-with a croaking snarl, as that light
struck him in the eyes, and with a growl like that of
some enraged animal he leaped across the room.

- Cornfire closed the door behind him by kicking it with
his foot, and set his back against it.

The flash-light had died out, and the room was
plunged into a darkness so dense that neither he nor
the two men could see anything.

But Cornfire knew that Pedro was near.

He ducked sideways as Pedro sprang at him.

It was just in time.

Pedro, lunging at him, was encountered by the dwarf,
who had flung himself across the room with incon-
ceivable fury.

The two clutched and fell to the floor together, fight-
ing like dogs.

  

 
 
  

       
  
 
    
 
   
 
   
 
 
 
    

 

22.

  
   
 

Cornfire stood at one side
advantage of any turn favorable

Yet, as he could hardly see the
struggling, fighting, and gouging”
floor, he could do nothing.

“Dog eat dog,” was his thought; | "em beat .each
other intew pulp, and then my chanct will come.”

So far the dwarf and ‘Pedro each imagined that he
was fighting the disguised Yankee.

But now Pedro discovered his error, hearing ie
croaking snarl of Gorgon.

Thereupon he began to yell out.
killing,” he shouted.

The dwarf gave a convulsive gurgle of astonishment.

His hands came away from about Pedro’s body; he
had been bending Pedro over as if he would break his
back.

Cornfire :-began to think that his opportunity. had
arrived, and he was congratulating himself that these
two friends had received the blows and the general
mauling that had been intended for him,

“It is Pedro you are

snarling angry questions.
“Where is he? Where is the foul fiend?’ the dwarf
yelled.
Cornfire was thinking of giving the dwarf this in-
formation, when the door flew inward under the rush

“Don’t let him get out!’ howled the dwarf.
the door there; he must not get out!”

Cornfire judged that if ever it was coming, his time
had arrived.

He jumped at the dwarf, whom he could see faintly by
‘the light that came in from the alley. |

He tried to catch Gorgon by the throat, hoping to

there could be an interference.
_ But the dwarf knocked aside the Yankee’s outstretched
hands, and then slashed at him with a knife.

The knife-point caught Cornfire on the breast, giving
an ugly rake, from which blood flowed; and.then he and
Gorgon grappled, the latter yelling for help.

Mighting thus, the two men reeled, half-falling, out
of the door, into the alley.

 

Pedro was yelling at the newcomers, trying to make
them understand the situation, though he did not very
well understand it himself. °

Then he sprang through the doorway, landing astride
of the Yankee, who had succeeded in getting the dwarf
beneath him, and was trying to snap on the dwarf’s
lean wrists a pair of handcuffs. i

The attack of Pedro Pasquale, combined with the
furious struggles of Gorgon, who was trying to wrap
his ropelike arms round the Yankee, 1
Cornfire; and when the other Mexicans began to pour

  

BILL Sto!

him limb from limb, if once they got him in their power.

Gorgon and Pedro pulled themselves apart, the dwarf
’ flashed and roared.

advantage of by leaping away through the alley toward

‘of people from the alley, who heard the screaming battle. ©
“Close

yank him through the open door into the alley before

though he had fancied that he had them well in mind, as

disconcerted |

 

  

     
   
  

   
 

came running from the
1, he began to see that, for
pture the dwarf was doomed

Out of the 1
alley, all abo
the time, his
to failure. oe

The thing to thiy was his own safety; for
he was sure the enraged Mexicans would almost tear

   
 
  
  
  

     
    
  
   
 
   
    
  
   
   
 
   
    
  
 
 
 
 
   
   
   
   
    
  
 
 
   
 

So he threw off the twining arms of the dwarf, making
no further effortsto use the handcuffs, but abandoning
them there in the alley, and then rose to his feet, shaking
away the Mexicans who were attacking him.

He wheeled round, smashing a blow into the face of
Pedro Pasquale, that tumbled him over to the ground.

Then Cornfire began to run, with some of the Mexi-
cans dragging at him and clutching at his legs.

He saw that they would soon pull him down, and Hey
were hampering him so that he could not get along. |

His big revolver came out, and spouted its fire.

He did not try to send bullets into any of the yelping |
pack that harried him, but only meant to scare them.

The effect was all that he desired.

With cries of alarm they fell back, as the revolver

It gave the Yankee an instant’s respite, which he took

the street, where more men were gathering.

' His revolver, turned upon these, tore up earth and
pebbles at their feet, scattering them, and opening a
passage. ae :

He ran into the street, with Mexicans from the alley
bellowing behind him.
_ A revolver barked there, and the bullet came whizzing
past his head, sending the Mexicans in the street scam-
pering for safety.

The dwarf had fired the shot, and he was now in |
pursuit, bellowing at the men with him not to let the i
American get away. Na |

He was not a good runner hinelfs: so that, personally,
he had small chance of overtaking the long-legged
Yankee; but some of those with: him were good runners,
though their courage was not as sound as their legs. q

Having gained the street well in advance of his pur- »
suers, and finding it now cleared by the shots that had 4
been fired by himself and the dwarf, Cornfire ran briskly q
along it, looking for some point of safety.

He saw men swarming in the streets beyond, for,
apparently, news of the fight at Pedro’s had spread like
a prairie-fire.

He turned aside and sought some other way, pre-
ferably a dark alley.

His unfamiliarity with the streets made him lose time,

 
     
 

a result of his study of the afternoon from the hill-
side.
But fooling down on the streets of a town from such

  
 

  
 

   

: THE BUFFALO
a point | ‘is ‘quite ‘different from trying to tread those
same streets in the darkness of night, with a mob howl-
ing at one’s heels, and enemies showing at every point.

The Yankee turned and dodged, seeking a good open-
ing, and all the while he lost time; so that the Mexi-
cans, led by oe and Pedro, began to crowd him
hard.

He did not care so much for the yelling Mexicans, but
Gorgon began to use his revolver again, and the shots
flew so close that the Yankee’s life was endangered.

When one of Gorgon’s bullets cut through Cornfire’s
coat, burning the skin, he became desperate. He did
not want to be shot in the back by the fiendish dwarf,
and, apparently, that would soon be the thing which
would happen.

Seeing men still in front of him, some of whom began

to fire on him, he.turned again.

He saw before him a cubelike house of shining white,
with its door wide open.

It was the little village chapel.

Crowded and desperate, he darted into it, as a rabbit
seeks refuge in a hole.

He knew the walls were thick; of adobe, and that he
could hold a regiment at bay there.

The serious question of the situation was, if he en-
tered that chapel, how was he to get out?

But another bullet from Gorgon’s revolver, ripping
‘through his clothing, sent him scurrying into it.

CHAPTER: XII.
THE PROTECTION OF ST. JOSEPH.

As soon as he was inside the chapel Cornfire closed
and hastily barred the door.

It was a heavy affair of oak, with henry iron hinges.

Inside was a big wooden bolt: but as the chapel “for
years had been kept open night ‘and day, this bolt was
hardly in good working order.

It stuck and refused to budge, even while Cornfire
_ was strugging frantically to shove it into position, and
the pursuers were at the door.

Cornfire braced his shoulders against the door,
the leading Mexicans flung themselves against it,

With a mighty, surging heave he shot the wooden
bolt into place, sinking to the floor as he did so.

He dropped down just in time, for a bullet from
Gorgon’s revolver came through, tearing out a ne
splinter just where his body had been.

-Cornfire threw himself face down on the floor and
glanced about,

There were some windows, two on each le: but
he believed he could command’and hold those with his
revolver.

He took out the a and filled
chambers; then held it in readiness for use.

When a second bullet from Gorgon’s revolver splin-
tered through the door a roaring hubbub sounded out-
side, by way of remonstrance. _

Gorgon was heard to scream out in angry wrath, and
there were sounds of a struggle.

The Yankee -lay listening.

as

the empty

BILL STORIES.

they shouted wild protests.

Y/

43

Then he comprehended, being aided by some words

he heard.

Gorgon, in shooting bullets through the chapel. dis
was guilty of sacrilege, and that sacrilege the pious
Mexicans would not longer permit.

Already the fact that an impious American, who was
perhaps a criminal, or worse, was inside the chapel,
made the sacrilege bad enough; but they did not intend
to have the door of the sacred edifice torn into splinters
by Gorgon’s bullets.

Gorgon raved now like a veritable fiend, cursing the
Mexicans for fools and senseless cattle.

But the Mexicans held him, and finally twisted the
big revolver out of his hand.

“You mean to let him stay in there?” howled the
enraged dwarf. “I say he must be killed in there, or
dragged out and killed!”

Killing in the chapel! Its sacred walls to be spattered
with human blood! Such a thought horrified them until

The Yankee began to smile,
humorous way. -

“By Hen, if I but had somethin’ tew eat an’ drink
in here, I reckon I could: hold this fort fer a month,
easy! Mebbe there’s wine in here, and some kind of
altar-bread; and if there is I’m hunk.”

He listened to the war of words raging outside.

A Mexican stepped up to the door, calling:

“Will the Sehor Americano come out if we give him
safe conduct out of the village?’

“And murder me soon’s I’m out,
thought the crafty Yankee.

“Not just yet a while,’ he answered.
be glad to accept your offer when daylight comes.
to do it in the night.”

“The sefior will be safely conducted from the town,
and will not be harmed, We do this because we do not
wish the chapel desecrated.”

“After daylight,” said Cornfire, afraid to trust them.

“He refuses to come out!’ he heard Gorgon roar.
“He will continue to desecrate your chapel. Are you
going to let him?”

A few of the Mexicans agreed with him in declaring
that a worse sacrilege than the polluting presence of
the American in there could not be imagined; and
that it was preferable to drag him out, since he pelused
to come out.

These malcontents, led and influenced be Ghvsoe,
whose gifts to the chapel and to the poor made his
opinion of some worth, ran round to the side windows,

Soon a head appeared at'one of the windows.

It was greeted by a shot*from Cornfire’s revolver.

The clamorous declarations that the Yankee was
desecrating the chapel worse than it could be desecrated
in any other way, was renewed, and increased in me
after that.

But no other head appeared at the windows, and
the Mexicans would not let another bullet be shot
through the door.

So Cornfire lay on the floor, with that howling mob
outside, and felt as secure for the moment as if he had
been safe in his room in Timber Bar.

Yet he did not know what time would rode
Already it had brought some kaleidoscopic changes.

in his wide-mouthed,

if not sooner!”

“Perhaps I shall.
I fear

 
 

24

The numbers outside were constantly augmented,
until it semed that the entire population of the village
was there, with many more added from the adjacent
country. -

They surrounded the Se and their talk made an
interminable and confused hum and chatter.

Cornfire could hardly tell what any one was saying,
because of the multitude of voices.

He did not shift his position on the floor, where he
had found himself safe.

He began to wonder more and more how the adven-
ture would end.

Daylight would come by and by.

The hours stole on with slow steps.

The moon rose, and sent shafts of light through the
windows.

The crowd outside remained, and the talk buzzed
without end.

Now and then Cornfire could distinguish the croaking
voice of the dwarf.

Midnight came and went.

Cornfire grew sleepy, in spite of the peril of his
position; but he resolutely een off the feeling and
‘kept himself awake.

As day began to break, with red flashes, in the east,
showing that the night had worn itself out, he began
to move softly about “the chapel.

He found neither food nor wine.

‘The place had a solemn look in the dim light of early
morning. The images of saints. seemed peculiarly ghost-
ly.

“By Hen,” said Cornfire to himself, as he returned
to his position by the door and lay down to think over
the situation, “I gotter git out 0’ this somehow!
stay here ferever. (There ain't nothin’ tew eat in here;
and jes’ ther knowledge that there ain’t makes me
so hungry that I can hardly stand it a’ready. What
will I do by another twenty-four hours?”

As day broke, he judged that the watchers outside
did not number so many as in the night.

_ A storm was threatening; and because of it some had
returned to their homes; but enough were still there to
make any attempt to get out of the chapel an exceed-
ingly ticklish performance, that was apparently fore-
doomed to failure.

Then a brilliant thought came to ibe shrewd Yankee.

He had been looking at the ghostly figures of the
saints and listening to the talk outside, which still droned
on interminably, as through the whole night.

' “They’re so feared that ther chapel will be hurt, that
I reckon they’d be even more p’tickler of one of 1)
images,” he said.

He took up one of the figures.

This was the chapel of St. Joseph, and the figure
he had taken up was that of St. Joseph, its patron
saint.

By this time Cornfire was in a desperate mood.

“lim goin outer this, he grumbled, “iu [ have to
fight my way through the hull.village; and here goes!’

He walked to the door, carrying the figure of the
saint.

There he quietly slipped back the wooden bar, and as
quietly opened the door.

A more astonished and bewildered mass of people
cannot be imagined than the Mexicans of Pablos when
the tall Yankee, minus now his serape, appeared in the

Neanit))

THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES.

doorway of the chapel, holding the image e ch Joseph
against his breast, and swinging in his right hand a
revolver.

They fell back, wild-eyed, with cries of amazement.

The image of St. Joseph! They were aghast.

Their cries brought people swarming from the other
sides of the chapel, and. a roaring babel of cries and
exclamations was the result.

The Yankee stood quite still for a minute, looking
about, to see the result of.his venture.

Not a man came toward him; they were too horrified
by his amazing act of vandalism, This was desecration
of a character they had not even dreamed of, and they
wondered that the saint did not strike this man dead.

For some time Cornfire had perceived the storm of
wind and rain that was brewing, and now, as he glanced
about, he saw lightning flame over the rim of the hills.

To the simple- -minded Mexicans that lightning gleam
was a warning and a portent. They were prepared for
some miraculous manifestation, and if the earth had
yawned they would not have thought it strange. That
it did not yawn and engulf this sacrilegious American
was the thing that was. strange.

Fortunately for Cornfire, ae dwarf was not ‘there at
the moment. :

Gorgon had scant ou scruples, and no more
superstition, and his big revolver would. probably have
made a hole in the ‘Yankee as soon as he appeared, in
spite of that protecting image of the-patron saint.

Seeing that he was not to be rushed. on by these
people, who fell back before him. instead. Cornfire
stepped deliberately to the ground from the doorway and
moved toward the nearest street.

He half-expected a shot from somewhere, and was
surprised that none came.

The Mexicans fell back, their mouths filled with ex-
clamations of horror.

Cornfire walked to the street, carrying the image; "
set out along it, hurrying his footsteps.

The people followed him, though they kept well away
from him. Their talk and cries of angry amazement
rose in a storm of sound.

Above it, as the lightning gleamed, came the sound.

of thunder, jarring from the hills, adding to the fears “~~

and the superstitions of the populace.

Cornfire had not gone far in this way when he heard
cries of another kind.

If Gorgon had small piety and superstition, Pedro
Pasquale had quite as little. Pedro had hastened to
Gorgon with the astounding news of what the American
was doing.

Gorgon came leaping to the chapel,
with his big revolver.

He found the people leaving it, as they followed in
pursuit of Cornfire.

It was Gorgon’s croaking voice that Cornfire heard
now, and Gorgon came running after him, pies his
revolver,

Recognizing the voice, and knowing that a turn in
the situation had come, the Yankee broke into flight,
sprinting at swift pace toward the end of the street,
where it opened into the highway that led to the hills.

People scampered out of his way with exclamations of
excitement. Behind him, following Gorgon and Pedro,
came an angry mob, howling i in a strange way.

The dwarf pitched up his big revolver and fired, re-

armed | oe

pi
ie

 
= ee

 

-he thouwht, as he ran on;

- ‘THE BUFFALO

gardless of the image, whereupon the populace howled
in another key, fearing the bullets would strike the image
of St. Joseph—a disaster which they contemplated with
feelings of terror.

The bullet whistling by the Yankee’s ears but added
to the speed of his flight. He ran as if he were a peon
runner sent on a mission of life and death. ‘And indeed
it was a matter of life and death to him.

He still saw that the chances were in his favor, if
one of Gorgon’s bullets did not bring him down. Gorgon
was not a fast runner, being too short in the legs; and
the peons would not cugsee with oy spirit Such a
chase. .

Again and again Gorgon fired, some of the bullets
coming so close to the running Yankee that he felt the
wind of their passage. -

But none of them struck him.

He gained the highway at the end of the street, and

_ tan along it; but soon he turned from it, seeking shelter

from Gorgon’s revolver-fire behind rocks and bushes.

As he thus turned aside, he left, in the first clump of
bushes, the image of the patron Saint.

He had not injured it, and he set it carefully upright,
as he dashed on. -He had only used it because, his life
being in such peril, he saw no choice of any other course.
He had no desire to irritate and outrage the feelings, of
the pious peons.

He began to feel safe, for already he was leaving
behind the revolver wielded by Gorgon, and the village
runners had not joined in the pursuit with any: spirit.

“It was a tight hole I was in, but I got out of it,”
“yit I can’t say that is a

vict'ry. I went in there tew git the dwarf, and am

tryin’ now tew feel happy that I didn’t lose my life.

‘Pools ‘rush in. where angels fear to tread! I ain't
an angel, even if I was in that chapel; so I reckon I must
be one 0’ the fools.”

Though thus condemning himself, he was really feel-
ing in rather good spirits. -

He was still alive and uninjured; and there are worse

things, he knew, than failure.

 

CHAPTER XIV. /
BUFFALO BILL'S DEATH DEFIANCE.

The thunder-storm whose early lightning-flashes
Cornfire had seen as he made his escape from Pablos
was gathering strength, at a somewhat later hour, while
Buffalo Bill was making his way toward the spot where
the runner had intended to intercept the caravan.

The noted scout was alone, and on horseback, his
eye vigilant and keen.

Behind, Stingaree waited, with the peon runner, José,
a prisoner in his charge. It had been thought best to
drop Stingaree and the prisoner,
might be wholly ‘untrammeled, for he knew he was
approaching danger ous territory.

José had given him the direction and the landmarks.

But there was one thing José fad not told him, per-
haps because he had not known it.

Another runner had been sent to this caravan from
Timber Bar some time before Gorgon despatched -José’
from the village of Pablos. Mention of this fact has
been made; a

So taart the “scout

BILL STORIES. 25

This runner, unintercepted, had reached the mule-
train with his word from Gorgon; and the mule-train
had already turned aside toward the Santa Clara valley,

There were desperate men with this train, desperadoes
who would sell their lives rather than give up their
freedom.

Some of them were Americans;
and criminals.

At their head was Denver Dick, keen-eyed, dark-faced,
every inch a villain, who hesitated at no crime in the
calendar.

\He was Gorgon’s most reliable man on the road—a
fighter and all-round bad man, on whom Gorgon relied
greatly.

Into Denver Dick’s hands had come that message from
the dwarf, statiné that Buffalo Bill and several detectives
were at Timber Bar for the purpose of breaking up the
smugglers’ organization.

Dick swore violent oaths when that message came
to him.

He started the runner back with an answering
message, and then shifted the course of the mule-train.

, The runner returned to the mule-train within a few
hours,

He had seen Buffalo Bill. Observing that he was an
American, who seemed to have partly disguised himself
by putting on a Mexican serape, the runner had
hastened back with the news, and stated his belief that
here was one of ‘the men who had made trouble at
Timber Bar.

Dick swore even more violently when he learned this.

It seemed apparent that the American had learned
of the route of the mule-train, and was coming to
spy on its movements, if not more.

Dick did even more than swear; he detached himself
and some of his most desperate fighting men from the
train, and under the guidance of the runner set forth
for the. purpose of intercepting the. American.

-“The storm that had. stirred the superstitions of the
peons at Pablos was breaking heavily over the hills, as
the scout rode forward.

In the midst of .a blinding flash of lightning, and .
before its thunder broke upon the ear, the bold scout
heard the sharp crack of a rifle, as a bullet whistled by
his head.

Another shot sounded almost at the same instant, this
shot killing his horse, which dropped, with a lurching
movement that hurled him heavily to the ground, his
leg being pinned by the horse in its fall.

Buffalo Bill knew what to expect; and, though his
leg was held as in a vise, he drew his revolver, and
shot the first man who came dashing on him.

He fired another; and then the smugglers under

all were smugglers

‘Dick hurled themselves upon him, beating him with

their revolvers, and threatening him with death.
Buffalo Bill saw how cleverly he had been trapped.
Nor did he expect anything but death, now that
these men had him in their power.

“He assumed a tone of defiance, as they yelled at him;
for nothing he could say or do could make his situation
worse.

He was persuaded that help could not reath him, with
Cornfire perhaps in Pablos and Stingaree not near.

The outlaws dragged him from Deneath his dead
horse. <

 
 

    

Ko 26.

They had masked themselves, lest he should discover
their identity.

Dick stood before him, raging.

“Tt cut your cowardly heart out!” he yelled.

The scout folded his artns and smiled into the masked
face of the infuriated desperado.

“Tt will be a quick death, and, therefore, an easy
one,” he said calmly. “You can’t do more than kill
me,” :

“We can tofture you!” said Dick.

He glared at the scout, while the other masked out-
laws gathered round, commenting and screaming their
hate at him.

“You come out here from Timber Bar?” said the
masked leader. :

“Ves, By

Buffalo Bill did not see that anything was to be Bere
by lying.

“What for?”

“To become acquainted with certain gentlemen smug-
glers like yourself.”

The lightning was blazing, and now rain began to .

fall. w

“Hang him!’ roared Dick .

Preparations were made for this at once, ‘the smug-
glers jumping to their work with an eagerness that
showed how they panted for the death of Buffalo Bill.

The scout was bound hand and foot..

“What ye got to say?’ said Denver Dick, as, with
rope round his neck, Buffalo Bill was led beneath the
limb of a tree. |

“Nothing. I simply scotn and defy you!’

“You'll tell us how many detectives air with you, over
there in Timber Bar!” said the leader, oe Dick.

“T shall tell you nothing.”

He saw no way of escape. Hence, being he was
to die in a few minutes, he rather hoped by a defiant
attitude to throw Dick into such a rage that he. would

shoot him, thus ending the thing quickly. Death by a.

bullet did not seem so dreadful as death by the rope.
Dick again drew his knife and threatened the scout
horribly, waving it before his face.
“I defy you!’ cried the scout.
There was a blinding flash of lightning, ;
And as if his words. had summoned it the oe
bolt shivered the uplifted knife.
A terrific thunderclap came at the same moment, so
keen and terrible that it seemed to jar the ground.
Denver Dick was knocked down by the thunderbolt.
The outlaws shrank back, some crying out with fear.
Then the unexpected again happened, and it added
to their panicky condition.
A pair of revolvers began to rattle, sending bullets
into their midst.
One of the startled smugelers fell dead, and another)
tumbled over, badly hit.’
vihat pait ‘of revolvers, | mingling with the keen re-
ports of the thunder, sounded as if a dozen men were
firing upon the smugglers.
Their panic became demoralizing.
They saw their leader dead on the ground, and two
other men down, while the hidden revolvers barked
and their bullets came flying.

‘Slide?’ some one yelled. “We'll all be killed!”

He “slid,” with a rapidity that did credit to the agility
of his legs.

: nN an x j
J/ THE BUFFALO BILL. a

 

His companions “slid” with him, ‘Funning: wildly for

the shelter of the near-by rocks and bushes.

Buffalo Bill had been as astounded as the smugglers,

At a time when he had not dreamed of aid, it had
come to him.

He marveled at it, as much almost as he marveled at
that friendly lightning-bolt that had shivered the knife
of the smuggler leader and struck him to the ground.

His marveling was hardly lessened when, as the smug-
glers scampered off in blind panic, he saw Stingaree
come jumpitig toward him over the rocks.

Stingaree swung a revolver in each hand, and sent
shots into the bushes where some of the outlaws were
vanishing.

As he came up to Buffalo Bill he whipped out a
knife.

“Onick !” he whisperse "lve oot "em on the run,

but they may get over their scare and come back any |
minute.’
His knife slashed away the cords that held the scout. ,

Buffalo Bill cast the rope from about his neck.
“Come!” said Stingaree. “There’s good cover over

there,”

He leaped off in the direction from which he had
come, with the released scout leaping along with him.

They heard some of the smugglers riding away, and
others chasing their horses, with heavy oaths, trying to
catch them.

“We'll take a horse or two, after they’ve cut out.
I think some of the horses got away. Come on, this
way.”

Stingaree was still running.

The scotit kept close at his side.

They did not stop until they had run near a half of a
mile.

The storm taged, howling over the rocks,
blinding dash of rain.
_ “Good thing this storm came on,’
he stopped at last, panting.

’ said Stingaree, as

“He got away from you?’

“Yes; wriggled out of: his bonds and cut out, ae :

I knew what he was up to. I chased him in this ditec-

‘tion, and so came on you, just as those fellows were

about to do you.”

The scout caught him by the hand.

“Stingaree,” he said, and his voice shook,
to thank you for my life!”

“The lightning cut in. about tight,” said Stingaree.

“Yes; it seems that even Heaven helped me oa
those desperadoes.”

Stingaree looked at the flashing lightning.

“It’s a terrific storm,” he said.
better go on?’

The scout had taken him by the hand, disregarding

“T have

‘the rain, and was shaking: his hand warmly.

= Stingaree, ” he said, “forgive me for having: doubted
2 at any time. I[ know you are trie Pic.”

 Stingaree’s face flushed with pleasure.

“That's all right,” he said.. “But I’d like to know,
myself, who the fellow was that am said looked so
like me,

“We may know in time. Perhaps a was, any imagina-
tion that made him so resemble you.”

They went into foe e, and remained js Aor mote: «

than an hour.

   

 

 

with a”

“And it’s a pood thing
all-round that that peon gave me the slip.” :

“Do you think we had-

 

 
 

  

 

 

 

   

. 7 iE BUPPALO BIEL, STORING, = : Z

 

When, with the storm clearing away, they crept back
to the spot where Buffalo Bill had come so close to
death, they found the bodies of Denver Dick and the
man killed by Stingaree. The wounded smuggler had
disappeared.
“Too bad I had to do it,” said Stingaree,. with genuine
regret, as he looked at the body of the man’ he had slain.
The smugglers had departed, eppatenty, taking with
them nearly all the horses.
But a horse was found running loose among the rocks,

. and he was captured.

99

v iney killed your horse, a better one than this,” said
Stingaree, “and we'll just take him for you. I wonder
where that peon runner is?” :

Buffalo Bill was glad to get away from what he
considered a dangerous vicinity; yet, loath to give up
the mission which had sent him to that place, he and
Stingaree circled through the hills, looking for the
trail of the retreating smugglers.

They did not find it, for the violent rain had washed :

Mout.

They spent an hour or more looking for it, and in all
that time saw nothing of the smugglers.

“We'll back-track for the village of Pablos,’ said
the scout. 1 shouldn't be surprised if Cornfire may be
needing our help.”

 

CHAPTER OV.
THE CAPTURE OF THE DWARF.

Jonas Cornfire, in his flight from the town, was pur-
sued soon by the dwarf and Pedro Pasquale, with some
men whom, they gathered and armed for the purpose.

But most of the peons of Pablos were willing to let
the Yankee go, for they feared his revolver, and the
storm terrified them. When they had found the image
of St. Joseph, left by him at the edge of the town, they
bore it reverently back to the chapel, where prayers were
said and thanks given for its safe recovery.

Cornfire had not gone a great distance when he dis-

covered that he was being followed.
“They can’t keep my trail in this storm,”
thought.

was his

eile jes! shape my course tew foller Buffalo Bill and.

Stingaree.
dwartl

He found the horse he had left tethered on the hill-
side, and, mounted, ee on through the blinding
Tain’

The force of the wind and rain became so strong that

Wisht, though, I could have captured that

he took refuge by and by under a sloping roof or rock |
_ close by the trail he had been traveling.

There he felt so safe that he built a fire, using some
dry twigs and roots he found close against the rock-
wall, and-by that fire he tried to dry himself, and felt
more comfortable.

“Tf I only had something tew eat!” was his thought.

He was sitting comfortably humped over his little
fire, and the storm was clearing away, when a shadow
darkened the opening into the place ‘where he was, and
instantly there was a flash of a pistol.

The indefatigable dwarf had trailed him Son. in
spite of the difficulties, and took that shot at him as
soon as he saw him.

The bullet laid open the Yankee’s cheek as if it had

a

 

 

been cut with a knife-blade. With the blood spurting
from it, he jumped at the monster, whom he dimly saw
in the opening through the veil of the. drifting powder
smoke. ff

Gorgon had been too sure of that shoe

He had believed he could not miss the head of the
Yankee, on which he had pulled; and he was some: °
what surprised by the mad bull-rush with which Corn-
fire jumped at him.

He threw up the revolver and fired again, but missed
this time; and then Cornfire was clutching him, and
they fell to the ground together.

The dwarf, as he went down, yelled loudly for as-
sistance, for he thought Pedro Pasquale was not not
far off.

Then he began to battle for his life and liberty, using
his long arms and tremendous strength with desperate
courage and energy.

Cornfire had the fight of his life on his hands now.

To and fro they swayed and struggled, rising and
falling, one now on top and now the other, gouging,
striking, groaning, and swearing.

Gorgon’s usual luck seemed lately to have deserted
him. .

As he fell back, slipping, and, at the same time, with
arms wound like ropes round the Yankee, thinking
to drag his foe down on him, he struck his big head
heavily against the rocky side of the half-cave in which
the fight was taking place.

The blow’ was stunning, and the ropelike arms half-
released their hold.

The thing the Yankee had been trying to do now
he did; he smashed his bony fist into the dwarf’s face,
still further stunning him, and then caught him by the
throat.

The dwarf slid to the ground; ‘and the Yankee, who
had writhed round to deliver that blow, fell on top of
him, still clutching him by the throat.

The struggle was renewed; but the blow and the fall
together had dazed the dwarf, so that Cornfire had
him sadly at a disadvantage.

Though the fight continued for a minute or more
longer, the dwarf was overpowered and reduced to
unconsciousness.

Cornfire sprang out and removed the rope lariat of
his horse, and with it tied the dwarf’s hands and feet
before he could recover and resist.

Then he squatted back, breathing heavily, and waited
for the dwarf to come to his senses.

He was sitting before the dwarf, grinning, when the
latter opened his eyes.

Pedro Pasquale had not come to the dwarf’s aid, if
he heard him; and the keen ears of the Yankee, strained
to catch tie approach of any foe, had detected nothing.

The storm was passing, and the rain had almost
ceased. :

The dwarf opened his eyes and stared at his con-
queror.

“What are you going to do with me, now that you’ve
got me?” he asked through swollen lips, speaking with
such, difficulty that he could hardly articulate.

vl reckon, naow that I’ve got .yeou, Ill jes’ hold
yeou.’

‘How much will it be worth to let me gor
well.”

LL reckon yeou kin afford tew.”

Til pay-

   

  
  
 

 

os THE BUFFALO BILL STORIES.

Ves, I can; I’ll pay well.”

“Well, naow, I’m like most Yankees, in that I dew
love money; but I don’t love it so well as that. I’m. -

goin’ tew take yeou back tew Timber Bar; and I reckon

when I git ye there, er mebbe before, Ill have you

-answerin’ questions and explanifyin’ some o' the things
“and myst’ries I’d like to understand.”
‘Name any sum you like, and let me go, and I'll
t pay ait.’ |
“Gorgon,” said the Yankee, “I’ve got some honesty,
which is a thing likely yeou can’t understand, and some
perfessional pride; and the two of ’em says fer me tew
hold yeou, and by Hen, ’m goin’ tew do it!”
Then he began, with great deliberation, to bind up the
bullet-wound in his cheek, tearing strips of soft cloth
from his clothing for the purpose.

wel

 

CHAPTER XVI.
EULALIE AND MURIEL,

Buffalo Bill and Stingaree came along that trail, later
in the day, and they met Cornfire, who had his prisoner
tied up in the hole under the shelving. rock.

Pedro Pasquale had not returned to aid his over-
thrown chief. ee
Nor had Denver: Dick’s friends been seen again.
Buffalo Bill had been anxious to follow their trail,
if it could be picked up, and so discover the mule-

train.

But this had been given over for a time.

It was thought that it would not justify the risk, to
penetrate Pablos for the sole purpose of trying to
capture Pedro Pasquale. |

So the three friends shaped their course, with their
prisoner, for the Rio Grande and Timber Bar.

They did not enter Timber Bar until night of the
next day, for they did not want to give warning to the
dwarf’s confederates there. Oy

The dwarf had raged and raved, and had then become
sullen and refused to talk.

He would not answer Stingaree’s frantic questions
about the girl who had been with him in Timber Bar,
nor tell whether she was Muriel or another.

He even ‘laughed at the young man’s appeals, and
took delight in thus torturing him, :

But when the Rio Grande was gained, and, in the
night, Timber Bar was entered, he seemed shaken by
new convulsions of hope and fear; hope that some of his

friends would discover his plight and rescue him, and ~

fear that they would not, and he would suffer the con-
sequences of his crimes. ;
Buffalo Bill had to gag him before they had pro-

ceeded a block along the street that led toward the

house where they were taking him to, for he began
to roar out and yell, to summon help. i

They moved rapidly, and had him safe in a room at
the hotel where Buffalo Bill had stopped, before any
of his friends became aware of his predicament.

The scout there prepared for a battle, not being, sure
but that an attempt would be made to storm the hotel
and set the prisoner at liberty.

That the dwarf hoped, and really believed, this would
| be done, was seen by his actions, and the manner in
| which he listened to every sound.

  

~ *T can’t think otherwise.

- But the news that the dwarf had been captured,
which he thought would arouse his friends, had on
them a ‘contrary effecte fe

Already having been plunged into a panic by Buffalo
Bill’s discoveries, the few who had remained in Timber
Bar hastened now to get out of town before they
should be themselves arrested. ;

So that no one came to the aid of Gorgon.

Then he raved more than ever, when the gag was
out of his mouth, denouncing his friends as false and
cowards, and threatening vengeance on them.

Later in the night, when the scout, with assistance,

_ visited that upper room where he had experienced such

strange adventures, he found one person there.

It was the girl known as Eulalie, —
_ Stingaree, who was with the scout, rushed to her,
calling her by the name of Muriel.

She looked at him vacantly, and did not recognize

“him; though he clung to her, telling her to speak to

him, and asking innumerable questions.
“She has lost her mind, just as I feared!’ he wailed.
Later, it was found that she had not lost her mind,

but that, falling under the influence of Gorgon, he had

hypnotized her, and used her in his work, for she could
do many things he feared to do himself, or feared to
trust to his subordinates.

The hypnotic spell passed off itself the next day, when
she stood before’ Gorgon, and he, refusing to aid her,

and denying even that he knew her, laughed harshly, in

utter defiance of the scout. . |

That harsh laugh broke the spell that held her.

She was herself again; no longer Eulalie, the myste-
rious, but Muriel Matuchi, the girl who loved the young
American, Stingaree, and had promised to marry him.

That marriage was celebrated shortly afterward.

Gorgon, the dwarf, whose real name remained un-
known, was sent to prison, where for several years he

‘languished, convicted of the crime of smuggling.

Pedro Pasquale disappeared from Pablos and so
was not punished even by the Mexican authorities. _

As for the young man seen by the scout in that
secret room, whom he at one time had almost believed
to be Stingaree, he could not be found. -

“It was a mistake of mine,’ the scout admitted.
He was about Stingaree’s
size, and looked something like him, but his face was
hidden,” on

A month later this young man was captured by the
scout, in another town, where he had been trying to
pass some of the counterfeit money which the dwarf
had manufactured in Timber Bar.

Then Stingaree knew, what he would not otherwise
have believed, that the young fellow was his own cousin,
of whose presence in that section he had not been .
aware.

It should be said, in closing, that the mule-trains were

-eaptured later, and that the destruction of Gorgon’s

band ended smuggling along that portion of the border.
THE END.

Next week’s issue will be No. 305, “Buffalo Bill and
the Barge Bandits; or, The Demon of Wolf River
Cafion.” You will find it an interesting story, filled

with lively incident.

 
 
 
  
 

 

 

 

 

ISSUED EVERY TUESDAY.

 

 

 

BEAUTIFUL COLORED COVERS

Buffalo Bill wins his way into the heart of every
one who reads these strong stories of stirring adventure
on the wide prairies of the
Boys, if you want tales of the West that are
i) drawn true to life, do not pass these by.

PRICE FIVE’ CENTS PER COPY

 

West.

For sale by all newsdealers, or sent, a the pupeiers ie any address upon receipt of price in money or postage stamps

 

 

HERE ARE THE

278—Buffalo Bill’s Daring Plunge; or, The oy Ghost
of Mahoe.
279—Buffalo Bill’s Desperate Mission; ‘or, The eine:
-. up in Hidden Valley. .

280—Buffalo Bill’s Ghost Raid; or, Hot Times at Bubble

Pricking.
281—Buffalo Bill’s Traitor Guide: ‘or, The Vengednee
. of Alkali Pete.
282—Butfalo Bill’s  Camp-fires ;
.. Snake River Crossing.
283—Buffalo Bill Up a Stump; or, The Pawnee Poker of
i the Bitter Root,
284-—Buffalo Bill’s Secret Foe; or, The Wizard of Windy
; Gulch.
285—Buffalo Bill’s Masicr-ctroke:
Death Valley.
286—Buffalo Bill and the Mashed Mystery; or, Teton
John, the Half-breed.
287—Butfalo Bill and the Brazos Terror; or, The Lone
- Star Outlaws.
288—Buffalo Bill’s Dance of Death; or, The Night
: Hawks of Snake River,
289—Buffalo Bill and the Creeping Terror;
Black Spider of the Shoshones.
290—Buffalo Bill and the Brand of Cain; or, The Wan-
dering Jew of the Plains.
2901—Buffalo Bill and the Mad Millionaire: or,
Redskin Rovers.
292—Buffalo Bill’s Medicine- lodge;
Queen of the Kickapoos.
203—Buffalo Bill in Peril; or, The Red Amazons of
| the Niobrarah. °

or, The Bad Man of

or, The Specter of

- The

The
or, The White

 

LATEST TITLES:

294—Buffalo Bill’s Strange Pard; or, Wolfer Joe on
the War-path.

295—Buffalo Bill in the Death Desert; or, The Worship

of the Phantom Flower...’

296—Buffalo Bill in No Man’s Land; or, The Sky-mir-
ror of the Panhandle.

2907—Buffalo Bill’s Border Ruffans;
Game of Panther Pete.

298—Buffalo Bill’s Black Eagles; or, The Snake-master
from Timbuctoo,

oa Bill’s Desperate Dozen; or, The Raiders of
Round-Robin Ranch. .

or, The Scalp-hunter of the

or, The Desperate

co Beae Bill’s Rival;
Niobrarah.

301—Buffalo Bill’s Ice Chase; or, The Trail of the Black
Rifle.

302—Buffalo Bill ae the Bay Bocise or, The White
Flower of Fetterman Prairie.

303—Buffalo. Bill and tlte White Specter; or, The Mys-
terious Medicine-man of Spirit Lake.

304——Buffalo Bill’s Death Defiance; or, The Bad Men of
Humber Bar.

305—Buffalo Bill and the Barge Bandits; or, The Demon
of Wolf River Cafion.

306—Buffalo Bill, the Desert Hotspur; or, Pizen Jane, of a :

Cinnabar.

307——Buffalo Bill’s Wild Range Riders; or, The Venge-
atice of Crazy Snake.

308—Buffalo Bill’s Whirlwind Chase; or, The Mustang
Catchers of Bitter Water.

S09 = Batale Bill’s Red Retribution; or, The Raid of the
Dancing Dervishes.

If you want any back numbers of our libraries and cannot procure them from your news-

dealers, they can be obtained from this office direct.

STREET & SMITH, Publishers, 79 Seventh Avenue, NEW. YORK ciry.

Postage stamps taken the same as money.

  
About the
Early —
Numbers of —

TE, receive hundreds of letters every

week from readers asking if we can

supply the early numbers of Tip Top containing Frank’s adventures. In
every case we are obliged to reply that numbers | to 300 are entirely
We would like to call the attention of our readers to the fact that
the Frank Merriwell Stories now being published in book form in the Medal

out of print.

Library are inclusive of these early numbers.

150 entitled “Frank Merriwell’s Schooldays.”

The first book to appear was No.
We give herewith a complete

_ list of all stories that have been published in book form up to the present writing.

ey kis tank Retirees Bee eae eee teas:

Screen
ESSE 6

 

AT

MEDAL LIBRARY

10 CENTS

AT 10 CENTS

t50—Frank Merriwell’s Schooldays.
167—Frank Merriwell’s Chums.
178—Frank Merriwell’s Foes.
184—Frank Merriwell’s Trip West.
189—Frank Merriwell Down South.
193—Frank Merriwell’s Bravery.

_ 197—Frank Merriwell’s Hunting Tour.

296—Frank Merriwell’s Protégé.
300—Frank Merriwell.on the Road.

201—Frank
205—F rank
209—Frank
213—Frank
217—Frank
225—Frank
229—Frank
233—F rank
237—Frank
240—Frank
244—Frank
247—F rank
251—Frank
254—Frank
258—Frank
262—Frank
267—Frank
271—Frank
276—Frank

Merriwell in Europe.
Merriwell at Yale.
Merriwell’s Sports Afield.
Merriwell’s Races.
Merriwell’s Bicycle Tour.
Merriwell’s Courage.
Merriwell’s Daring.
Merriwell’s Athletes.
Merriwell’s Skill.
Merriwell’s Champions.

Merriwell’s Return to Yale.

Merriwell’s Secret.
Merriwell’s Danger.
Merriwell’s Loyalty.
Merriwell in Camp.
Merriwell’s Vacation.
Merriwell’s Cruise.
Merriwell’s Chase.
Merriwell in Maine.

304—F rank
308—Frank
312—Frank

- 316—Frank

320—F rank
324—Frank
328— Frank
332—Frank

330—Frank

340—Frank
344—Frank

Merriwell’s Own Company.
Merriwell’s Fame. :
Merriwell’s College Chums.
Merriwell’s Problem.
‘Merriwell’s Fortune.
Merriwell’s New Comedian.
Merriwell’s Prosperity.
Merriwell’s Stage Hit.
Merriwell’s Great Scheme.
Merriwell in England.
Merriwell on the Boulevards.

348—Frank Metriwell’s Duel.

352—Frank
356—Frank
359—Frank
3262—Frank
365—Frank
368—Frank
371—F rank
374—F rank
377—F rank

Merriwell’s Double Shot.
Merriwell’s Baseball Victories.
Merriwell’s Confidence.
_Merriwell’s Auto.

Merriwell’s Fun.

Merriwell’s Generosity.
Merriwell’s Tricks.
Merriwell’s Temptation.
Merriwell on Top.

AT 15 CENTS

(imcreased Size)

280—Frank Merriwell’s Struggle.
284—Frank Merriwell’s First Job.
288—Frank Merriwell’s. Opportunity.
292—Frank Merriwell’s Hard Luck.

 

380—Frank Merriwell’s Luck.

383—Frank Merriwell’s Mascot.
386—Frank Merriwell’s Reward.

-389—Frank Merriwell’s Phantom.

@ We will be glad to send a fine complete catalogue of the Medal Library which is
just filled with good things for boys, upon receipt of a one-cent stamp to cover postage.

STREET & SMITH, Publishers, NEW YORK CITY

 
 

Sparta egies
BR ee

ISSUED EVERY WEDNESDAY. L

 
  
  
   
 

 

Dont miss these.

   

OL! —)

BEAUTIFUL COLORED COVERS

There are a large number of boys to whom stories about the same
characters, week after week, become monotonous,

It was to suit these

fellows that we published. Brave anv. Boxp.
Each story is full 30,000 words in length and is complete in itself,
having no connection with any that went before or will come after.

PRICE FIVE CENTS PER COPY

For sale lh all Naan or sent, eo the ees to any address upon ee of price in pn or postage a

 

  
   
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

190—Captaip Mystery; or, The Brave Girl of Boulder Bar. By

a Herbert Beliwood.

191—Silver Sallie; or, The Three Queer Pards of Poker Pocket.

By Ses Cowdrick,

192—The Romie Raiders; or, Secret of the Golden Dagger. By

Capt: Hal Hazelton.

193—A Baptism of Fire; ot, At the Front With the Japs. By

: Mark Darran.

194—The Border Nomad; or, Sharper Stokes? Double Deal.. By

i Herbert Bellwood.

95—Mark Mallory’s Sane. or, Friends and Foes At West

Point. By Lieut. Fred Garrison, UL S.A,

1I96—A Strange Clue; or, The Sharks and Sharps of New York.

Bh By James Fisk.

ao ae or, The Boy Sleuth of Kansas. By Richard
| Tal

'ro8—The Electrié Wizard: or, Threvgle Air and Water to the

Pole. By Emerson Bell.

99—Bob, ‘the Shadow; or, Solving a Double Mystery. By

, Richard Hackstoff.

}200—Young Giants of the Gridiron; or, Fighting For the Foot-

. ball Pennant. By Frank Mertiwell.

[2o1—Dick Ellis, the Nighthawk Reporter; or, The Biggest News

“Beat” on Record. By Robert Reid.
202—Pete, the Breaker Boy: of; The Young Coal Mine Ferret.

i By Richard Hackstaff.

BP 3— Young Maverick, the Boy From Nowhere; or, The Ten-

. derfoot Oil King of Texas. By Sam Rusher.

204—Tom, the Mystery Boy; or, Trailed By a Secret Shadow.

a By Robert Reid.

205—Footlight Phil: ot, From ‘Call- boy to Star.

Henty ‘Abbott.

By Manager
7 ite Sky Smugglers;

ot, Gordon Keith's Great Balloon

Chase. Py Lawrence White, Jr

 

HERE ARE ADELIS LATEST TITLES:

207—Bart Benner Mine; or, The Boy Who Got There. By
Lieut. Lionel Lounsberry.

208—The Young Ranchman; or, Bart Benner Going Tt Alone.
By the author of ‘ ‘Bart Benner’s Mine.”

2090—-Batt Benner’s Cowboy Days; or, The Young Hunter of
the Bic Horn. By the author of “Bart Benner’s Mine.”

210—Gordon Keith in Java; or, The Search for the Lost Wild
Animal Taker. By Lawrence White, Jr.

2tr—Ned Hawley’s Fortune; or, Lost in the Heart of New Yorks.
By Herbert Bellwood.

21z—Under False Colors; or, Dick Danperfeld’s Mystery. By
Police Captain Manning.

213—Bags, the Boy Detective; or, Following a Warm Trail. By
Richard Hackstaff.

214—-On the Pampas; or, A Strange Chase Across South Amer-
ica. By Lawrence White, Jr.

ais—The Crimson Clue}; or, Dick Dangerfield’s Mission. By
Police Captain Manning.

216—At the Red Horse; or, Herr Driesbach, the Lion King. By
Charles H. Day.

2a17—Rifle and Rod; or, A Cruise Down the Lake, By). M.
Merrill. :
a18—Pards; or, Comrades for Life. By Colonel Prentiss In-

graham.

2i9¢—Afloat with a Circus;
By Henry L. Black- ‘

220—Wide Awake; ot, The Boys of the Bicycle Brigade. By
Weldon J. "Cobb.

221—The Boy Caribou Hunters; or, Treasure- trove of Hudson's
Bay. By Charles B. Cross.

222—Westward Ho; or, The Cabin in the Clearing. By Henry
L.. Black,

223—Mark Graham; or, , The Boy Wanderers of the Desert. ”
HG Emmet.

or, The Diamond-seekers of Natal.

 
 

THE R i

 

 

ISSUED EVERY MONDAY.

HANDSOME COLORED COVER

 

aN

Ted Strong wants to make your acquaintance, boys, and we are
convinced that you will be proud to have him as a friend. The
tales of his adventures among the cowboys are full of fascinating

interest.
and he upholds the title.

He is known to every ‘one as | Nine of the Wild West”

PRICE FIVE CENTS PER COPY

For sale by all newsdealers, or sent, postpaid, by the publishers upon receipt of price In money or postage stamps

 

 

HERE ARE THE LATEST TITLES:

126—King of the Wild West’s Strategy; or, Stella’s

Trick Pony.

127—King of the Wild West’s Tangled Trail; or, The
Disappearance of Stella.

128—King of the Wild West’s Long Ride;
Lost on the Red Mesa.

129—King of the Wild West’s Phantom; or, Stella in
Danger.

130—King of the Wild West’s Broncho-busters; or,
Stella’s Fort in the Coulée.

131—King of the Wild West’s Corral; or, How Stella

_ Brought the Warning.

132—King of the Wild West’s Tenderfoot Pard; or,
Stella’s Surprise Party.

133—King of the Wild West’s Night Wrangler; or
What Happened to Stella.

134—King of the Wild West’s Outlaw; or, Stella to the
Rescue.

135—King of the Wild West at the Throttle; or, Stella
in the Flames.

136—King of the Wild West’s Trail; or, Stella Finds
Bill Blue.

or, Stella

137—King of the ‘Wild West’s Race; or, , Stella Among 5

the Seris. ©
138—King of the Wild West’s Fire-signal; or, How
Stella Foiled the Marauders,

 

139—King of the Wild West Rides the Line; or, Stella

Saves Old Glory.

-140—King of the Wild West’s Treasure ; or, Stella on

the Walls of Montezuma.

141—King of the Wild West’s Totem; or, Stella Makes
a New Maxim.

142—King of the Wild West on the Box; or, Stella in
the Mountains.

143—King of the Wild West’s Slick Trick; or, Stella _ |

Buys a Town.

ee King of the Wild West on Vanishing Island ; or,
Stella Solves an Enigma.

145—King of the Wild West’s Decision; or, Stella's
Waif of the Plains.

146—King of the Wild West’s Broken Cinch; or, tella’s
Stratagem|

147—King of the Wild West’s Iron Box; or, Stella
Turns the Tables.

148—King of the Wild West’s Lost Brand; or, Stella in
“No Man’s Land.”

149—King of the Wild West’s Snow Camp; or, Stella
Lost in the Wilderness.

130—King of the Wild West's Great “Wolf-hunt; pt

Stella Conquers “White Fang.”
151—King of the Wild West at the Lone Tree; or,
Stella Finds the Mother Lode.

 

 
 
 

 

 

 

 

Pee on ey ee a oe ee
[THE FAVORITE LIST]

OF FIVE-CENT LIBRARIES

 

 

 

Buffalo Bill Stories

Buffalo Bill is the hero of a thousand exciting adven-
tures among the Redskins. These are given to our
boys only in the Buffalo Bill Stories. They are bound
to interest and please you. :

 

 

 

 

ROUGH RIDER WEEKLY

Ted Strong was appointed deputy mar-
shal by accident, but he resolves to use his
authority and rid his ranch of some very
tough bullies. He does it in such a slick
way that everyone calls him ‘‘King of the
Wild West” and he certainly deserves his
title. $100 in cash are given to the readers
of this publication,
Buy a copy and learn how to come in for a

DIAMOND DICK WEEHLY

The demand for stirring stories
of Western adventure is admit
ably filled by this library. Every
up-to-date boy ought to read just
how law and order are estab-
lished and maintained on our
Western plains by Diamond Dick,

share of it.

Bertie, and Handsome Harry.

 

These are stories of the adven-
tures of boys who succeeded in
climbing the ladder of fame by
honest effort. No more inter-
esting tales can be imagined.
Each number is at least one-third
longer.than the ordinary five-
cent library.

We know, boys, that there: is
no need of introducing to you
Nicholas Carter, the greatest
sleuth that ever lived. Every
number containing the adven-
tures of Nick Carter has a peculiar,
but delightful, power of fascina
tion.

 

 

BRAVE AND BOLD

Every boy who prefers variety
in his reading matter, ought to
be a reader of Brave and Bold.
All these were written by authors
who are past masters in the art
of telling boys’ stories. Every

tale is complete in itself.

 

The adventures of a poor waif
whose only name is ‘‘Bowery
Billy.” Billy is the true product
of the streets of New York. No
boy can read the tales of his trials
without imbibing some of that
resource and courage that makes
the character of this homeless boy
stand out so prominently.

 

 

The Tip Top Weekly

Frank Merriwell and his brother Dick are known and loved by over one
hundred and fifty thousand of the best boys in the United States.
both clean-cut, vigorous fellows who dare to do right no matter what the
We are sure you will like it.

They are

consequences. Get the current number.