Beadle's New York Dime Library, No. 1102

# Museum Catalog Note

This issue of the pulp magazine contains "The Stranger Sharp," a Western serial by Albert W. Aiken, author of "Overland Kit" and other frontier tales. The story opens in Santa Fé, New Mexico, at midnight in the grand plaza, where an armed crowd has gathered around a young woman of mixed Indian and white descent, dressed in Mexican velvet and wielding ivory-handled revolvers. The crowd, including men from various nations, calls for her execution, but none dares approach. A well-dressed stranger named Jackson Blake, claiming to be "the Fresh of Frisco" from California and a professional gambler, arrives and witnesses the scene. He immediately confronts Laff Pick, a local bully and quarrelsome Missourian, who taunts him about his refined appearance. Blake responds with witty insults, particularly targeting Pick's prominent nose. When Pick attacks, Blake effortlessly evades his blows and responds with humiliating slaps rather than punches, leaving the crowd astonished.