Jack Renauld

“ Reynard dropped his prize like a hot potato, and was off like shot, and the poor cock came back fluttering and trembling to Jack and his comrades.
"O musha, naybours!" says he, "wasn't it the heigth o' luck that threw you in my way! Maybe I won't remember your kindness if ever I find you in hardship; and where in the world are you all going?"
"We're going to seek our fortune till the harvest comes in; you may join our party if you like, and sit on Neddy's crupper when your legs and wings are tired." ”

“ Frank James and his horse had alighted in it without the slightest injury, and Jack saw the beast swim ashore and wade out.
They had been swept some distance down the stream by the fierce current, and had got out near a wide opening in the rocks on the side opposite Jack.
"Stop where you are!" shouted Jack.
The drenched fugitive looked at him and laughed ironically.
Then he dashed ahead, for Jack had drawn a pistol, and was aiming it at him.
Just as the horse leaped into the opening in the rocks, the young inventor fired at the bandit. ”

“ Catching a warning look from Jim Reynolds, he paused; a queer light had kindled in his eyes. "Has he went an' lost hisself?" he finished.
"We don't know what he has went an' did," answered Jack, with tremendous scorn.
"Come up to the clearin', boys," interposed Jim. "Ye ain't in no all-fired hurry, are ye? 'Twon't cost nuthin' ter have a sociable chat."
"Mebbe they think as how we ain't good nuff fur 'em," growled Tom Smull disagreeably, in an aside, to Griffin.
"We don't have a chance to pay many calls out here," said Bob; "eh, Dave? ”

“ Jack was rendered angry.
"See there how they've baffled us!" he cried with a frown, as he pointed down at the scattered trails.
"Gee whiz!" groaned Tim, "they've throwed us off ther course entirely now, Wot one'll we foller?"
"If you mean so that we can corral the James Boys, I cannot say–one trail is the same as another."
"Blast thar lubberly hides!"
"I've got a plan though."
"An wot's that?"
"To pursue any one at random."
"But mebbe it won't be ther one we wants."
"Any one will do. Whoever the man is, we can perhaps catch him and force him to confess where the rest are to meet. ”

“ Gertrude turned pale.
"And the only man who could have cleared Jack can never do it!" she said despairingly.
"Also," I replied coldly, "Mr. Armstrong is for ever beyond the power of defending himself. When your Jack comes to me, with some two hundred thousand dollars in his hands, which is about what you have lost, I shall believe him innocent."
Halsey threw his cigarette away and turned on me.
"There you go!" he exclaimed. "If he was the thief, he could return the money, of course. If he is innocent, he probably hasn't a tenth of that amount in the world. ”

“ Keep your eyes open for danger, or I may have to peril all by raking you out of a trap. Dismount, throw your bridle over a bush, and follow me into the house. He’s watching!”
“I twig,” said Sparrowhawk, getting off his horse and disposing of the bridle as Jack had directed. “Fear not for me.”
Jack soon conducted him to the presence of the captain.
“Here’s a chap named Sparrowhawk, capen, from New York, which he’s a cracksman. He met Smith that deserted from you a little time ago; had to get away from the cops, so he come west, and now he wants to join yer. I can vouch for him for all that.” ”

“ Up sprang the horse, and began to kick and rear and gallop, so that Reynard was dashed against stock and stone, and got battered black and blue, so that he was not far off losing both wit and sense. And while the horse galloped, they passed Jack Longears, the hare. ”

“ RAYNOR’S UNLUCKY POCKET. It was the most unpleasant predicament of his life in which Jack now found himself. Naturally, his chum felt the same way about it. The irony of the situation was irritating.
Having chased away, at the risk of their own lives, some desperate crooks, the lads who had done all this found themselves accused of being nefarious characters.
“They are Anglise,” exclaimed one of the men as he turned a bull’s-eye lantern on them.
“No, sir, we are not. We are Americans,” exclaimed Jack proudly. ”

“ It will be a game set-to, and cutting up will prevail, while the claret will be in full supply. The visitors, if they do not find themselves in Chancery, will be in the lane that leads to it. The Hole-in-the-Wall will be the rendezvous on this occasion, where friendship and harmony will do their best to crown Jack Randall’s latest hit.”
From this period we do not hear of Jack in the ring, though he constantly put on the gloves at benefits at the Fives Court, often donning the mufflers with the scientific Tom Belcher, his brother boniface and neighbour at the Castle. ”

“ Maurice pave him a thump with his crutch. "You aren't much of a hero, either," he said. "Who took the roof off when his tooth was pulled?"
"But that hurt," said Jack, still laughing.
"I am willing to own I have been making an awful fuss, but someway I hadn't thought about it, and I am willing to try if the rest are."
"But I haven't any trouble," said Katherine.
"Everybody has hard things to bear sometimes," replied Rosalind.
"Doesn't Maurice ever snub you?" asked irrepressible Jack.
"What shall we call our society?" Rosalind inquired, looking around the group for suggestions. ”

“ He preferred to lurk alone in dark corners, where he would spend long hours, squatted on his tail, almost motionless, dreaming sadly of some mysterious, unattainable future. But, for all his unlikeness to his colleagues and their comicality, his queer little crumpled, wrinkled face never failed to produce its effect on the spectators. Jack was perfectly irresistible; no one could look at him for any length of time without bursting out laughing. ”

“ After breakfast on the following morning, Jack mounted the steersman's seat, and sent the Terror rolling to the place where the bandits were last seen.
There he saw a large plain trail they had left.
"I'll follow their tracks," said he to Tim, who had taken a seat beside him. "It's an easy trail to follow, and if we have say sort of a chance, we are bound to run them down in a short time."
"I ain't so sure about that my lad."
"Why not?"
"Jesse James are mighty cunnin'."
"That's a fact. He may fool us yet,"
"Still thar ain't no harm in tryin'." ”

“ Fourteen dames have been drowned there, and you shall be the fifteenth. When they came to the river-bank, he bade her put off her cloak, her shift. It is not for knights, she said, to see ladies in such plight; they should bandage their eyes with a handkerchief. This Renauld did, and the fair one threw him into the river. He laid hold of a branch; she cut it off with his sword (cf. the Polish ballad, where the catastrophe, and consequently this act, is reversed) . "What will they say if you go back without your lover?" ”

“ Why, Jack thought, even the laugh of Slim Jim, the cracksman, was very deceptive, it sounded so boyish and natural; just as though he did not have a care or a worry in all the [96] world. He must be a pretty clever young chap if he could pretend to be such an innocent, when really he was such a desperate rascal—so that paper had stated.
Having quitted the company of his friends, Jack began to advance in the direction of the other camp. He needed no better guide than the glow of the fire they had burning over there on the shore ”

“ Jack will forget me. He is wedded to his business: he is angry with the world, maddened, desperate. I have walked out behind him at church in Belfield, and he has not seen me: I have met him driving in the streets, and he has not turned his head. The598 men who once trusted and believed in his father treated him shamefully after his misfortunes came, and Jack resented it: he goes about the place seeing nobody, holding his head high, and showing the men he meets that he asks no favor of any one of them. ”

“ Jack himself is the motive force of the enterprise, and he disturbs the quiet of this waste of sunshine by his presence for about six months in the year. With his strong spirit, the embodiment of generations of pioneers, he faces the Apache, the marauder, the financial risks. He spurs his listless people on to toil, he permeates every detail, he storms, and greater men than he have sworn like troopers under less provocation than he has at times; but he has snatched from the wolf and the Indian the fair land of Bavicora, to make it fruitful to his generation. ”

“ Fortune seemed to favor them.
The first person they saw standing on the platform waiting for the train, was Frank James.
Jack lightly stepped up behind him.
Grasping both of his arms, he exclaimed:
"Frank James, you are my prisoner!"
A startled cry burst from the outlaw's lips, and he made an effort to tear himself free and reach his pistols.
But the iron grip of the young inventor was not to be shaken off so easily, and the wiry bandit found himself as helpless as an infant in the hands of Jack. ”

“ No lies!"
"I tell you I don't know."
"We'll see," said Jack, pulling out his watch and drawing a bead on the man. "It is now three minutes to four. At precisely four o'clock, unless you tell us where I can find the James Boys, I'll fire!"
"Say! don't do that!" cried the bandit, in alarm.
"That's the law."
"But I really don't—"
"One minute."
"For Heaven's sake, let up!"
"You are wasting valuable time, Wood Hite."
"If I knew I'd tell you quick enough."
"Your time on earth is growing mighty short."
"Won't anything else satisfy you?" ”

“ I say, Jack, I’d advise you not to have too much to do with him. He’s done you harm enough as it is.”
When we returned to Beadle Square we found our amiable fellow-lodgers evidently expecting our arrival. It was so long since I had taken supper at Mrs Nash’s that I seemed quite as much a stranger as Jack.
“Here they come,” said Horncastle, who always shone on occasions like this. “Here comes the two smallpoxes. Hold your noses, you fellows.” ”

“ Jack turned pale, and crushed the paper in his hand. Evening found him wandering on the heights of Hampstead, but the next morning he was at his easel. He was a free man now in every sense, and the world looked brighter to him. He worked as hard as ever, and with increasing success, but he spent most of his evenings with his comrades of the brush, with whom he was immensely popular. He was indifferent to women, however, and they did not enter into his life.
But a few months before the opening of this story Jack had taken his new studio at Ravenscourt Park, in the west of London. ”

“ Jack was an expert climber, but if any of my boy readers think it a simple thing to “shin up” a greased pole, just let them try it once—and fail.
Jack Van Arsdale tried it manfully once, twice, thrice, and each time came slipping down covered with slush and shame. And all the watchers in the boats off-shore joined in a chorus of laughs and jeers. Jack shook his fist at them angrily. “I’ll fix ’em yet,” he said. “If ye’ll but saw me up some cleats, and give me hammer and nails, I’ll run that flag to the top in spite of all the Tories from ’Sopus to Sandy Hook!” ”

“ Sheriff Timberlake sat on the steerer's seat of the electric stage beside Jack, and the moment the old fashioned Western home referred to came in view he pointed at it and said:
"There is the home of the James Boys."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Jack, eying the house intently.
"Yes; it is the residence of Dr. Reuben Samuels, their step-father, and the mother of the two villains. She's a Tartar about her boys–a regular she-fiend in temper, although a woman of fifty-five. Ah–see! There she is now!" ”

“ Two minutes!"
"Good Lord A'mighty!"
"Speak–quick!"
"It's as much as my life is worth!"
"Very well. Ten seconds more!"
The outlaw was as pale as death.
The bandages around his head added to the look of unutterable woe upon his haggard face.
He trembled like an aspen, and burst into a cold, clammy perspiration, and was breathing heavily.
Jack glanced up from his watch.
"Time's up!" he exclaimed.
"Mercy!"
"Speak, or perish!"
"Yes! yes! I'll tell."
"Well?"
"To-morrow at two o'clock they'll be in Husking Valley." ”

“ They had but little time to waste,
"Our plan to save the people in that stage coach from robbery is a very simple one," said Jack. "We must run ahead and intercept them."
"Supposin' them 'ere lundsharks is on ther road now? They will sight us again along ther trail," said Tim.
"We can make a detour," replied Jack. "The only place they are apt to use to waylay the coach will be along the ledge mentioned by the storekeeper."
"Fer sure." assented Fritz, "Ach, I vish me dot ve vos fighdin' dem now! Let her gone, Shack!"
The inventor started the Terror off. ”

“ Rankin had received from a client the disposal of several passes on a special train that was to take some railway officials and their families to Niagara Falls to see the great swimmer, John Jackson, together with his dog, endeavor to swim the Whirlpool Rapids. Half the world was excited over this event, which had been advertised everywhere. While dining with Jack at the Mackintoshes on the Sunday previous to the event, Rankin proposed that Margaret should accompany Jack and him to see the trial made. ”

“ That is the way that Renan and France write, only they do it better. But, really, a rationalist like myself becomes a little impatient and feels inclined to say, “But, hang it all, what do you know about the heredity of Jack or the psychology of Jack? You know nothing about Jack at all, except that some people say that he climbed up a beanstalk. Nobody would ever have thought of mentioning him if he hadn’t. You must interpret him in terms of the beanstalk religion; you cannot merely interpret religion in terms of him. ”