Gold Plume, the Boy Bandit; or, The Kid-Glove Sport

This issue of Beadle and Adams' weekly dime novel (June 21, 1881) presents "Gold Plume, the Boy Bandit; or, The Kid-Glove Sport," by Colonel Prentiss Ingraham, a sequel to "Little Grit, the Wild Rider." The narrative opens with Daniel Benton, a stock-tender on the Overland Pony Express who has secretly mined gold, receiving a mysterious nocturnal visit from a woman calling herself the Spirit of the Canyon. She demands either his daughter Bessie or revelation of his gold's hiding place on behalf of Gold Plume, the boy bandit leader. When Benton refuses, the gang abducts and kills him. The story shifts to Rocky Glen, where patrons at the Rider's Rest saloon discuss the emerging conflict: Colonel Hewlett has arrived to establish a fort, Little Grit has accepted a commission as lieutenant, and a new Pony Rider named Buffalo Bill—a skilled young frontiersman from Kansas—arrives to replace him in the mail service.