Beadle's Half Dime Library, No. 67

# Patent-Leather Joe; or, Old Rattlesnake, the Charmer

Beadle's Half-Dime Library, Vol. III, No. 98 (1878)

This serial Rocky Mountain romance by Philip S. Warne follows Arthur Hamilton, a greenhorn from Virginia City, who challenges professional gambler Patent-leather Joe to a high-stakes chuck-a-luck game using a doubling-bet strategy that guarantees eventual victory. When Joe refuses to honor their written agreement, young miner Flash Lightning intervenes with drawn pistols, forcing the gambler to repay his victims and surrender two hundred dollars to Arthur. The two victorious men become partners. Meanwhile, Patent-leather Joe returns to a hidden woodland valley where he encounters Berenice Granger, a beautiful sixteen-year-old blonde girl. As he holds her close in the moonlight, his affection shifts from paternal to passionate; she trembles with confused alarm at his heated kiss. The narrative suggests impending conflict between the newly-formed partners and the vengeful gambler.