Frontier Boys in Frisco

by Wyn Roosevelt

There was just one thing that saved Jim at this juncture. It was an incident which he did not guess at the time and I am not sure that he became aware of it in later life, and yet there are reasons to surmise that he may have heard of it.

As has not been related, the big guardian of the señorita in the cell high up in the tower, had started to give the alarm to the gang in the banquet hall by pressing a button near the door. James Darlington had seen her make the move to ring, and his alarm had been added to by the cry of warning from the crazy woman. He had to run for his life as the reader well knows.

So much Jim was aware of but he did not see what had happened when the red headed woman started to give the alarm. The Señorita da Cordova was not a cowed and spiritless girl and in spite of the terror of her situation, when she saw the intention of her jailer she glided the length of the cell with remarkable swiftness and caught the arm of the woman. The señorita was not a delicate creature either, and in spite of her apparent pallor, she showed a lithe agility in struggling with this giant of a woman, who had the strength of two ordinary men and was probably nearly the equal of the redoubtable Jim himself.

After a struggle lasting some minutes, the girl was thrown with severe violence against the wall of the cell and lay there stunned and bleeding from a cut on the forehead, but her efforts had given Jim time to reach the library which he had to pass and bolt and lock the door to it, before ever the chase began. Meanwhile the unfortunate woman who had been of so much help to Jim had time to flee to a remote corner of the house, where she would be free from pursuit.

James had determined to make his escape the same way he had gotten in, join his comrade, the engineer, who was outside and together plan a new attack. Perhaps they could get the aid of the Federal authorities.

At that moment Jim's eye fell on the hollow figure in armor which he had dubbed Brian de Bois Guilbert, and he determined instantly to carry out the plan that had first occurred to him, which from its very wildness might spell success. At least try it he would; anything was better than leaving the young Spanish girl in the hands of this evil crew, especially as the Mexican dwarf had openly declared his intention of making love to her.

Hastily Jim lit the wax candles on the mantel, that sent their soft gleam through the long, beautiful room, and gave him sufficient light to work by. Now Jim was not only deft, but desperate. How he got into that suit of medieval armor, he could not tell. It would be doubtful if he could have done so in cold blood, but he was spurred on by the terror of the situation. It was just like a man pursued and in danger of immediate capture by his enemies, who comes to a chasm that in ordinary moments he would not think of attempting to cross, but he leaps it because he has to, or fall into the hands of those who pursue him.

As the renegades rushed through the wide hall, with roar of harsh voices, the big hound in the lead, Jim was nearly all saddled and bridled and ready for the fray. It was with a strange feeling of exultation and also of safety that James Darlington found himself thus accoutered and discovered that he could move with comparative ease in the glittering armor on which shone the lights of the candles from above the fireplace.

It was easy to imagine Jim, who was large enough in his own proper person, and now a figure of gigantic size, to be a hero of old Romance; who with three plumed helmets, unheralded and unknown enters the lists to rescue the oppressed and beautiful heroine from the hands of the ruthless destroyer.

Perhaps Jim was a hero, but I will give a considerable sum to the boy or girl who first finds in the many thrilling narratives of "The Frontier Boys," our friend James spoken of or referred to as "our hero." But to leave this realm of fancy and to come back to the practical world of our narrative.