Beadle's Dime Library No. 347

Denver Duke, the Man with "Sand"; or, Centipede Sam's Lone Hand

By Captain H. Holmes, published in The New York Weekly (June 17, 1885).

A Western adventure serial opens with stage driver Whiplash George transporting a single mysterious passenger from Denver to Leadville. The well-dressed young man reveals little about his business, claiming he will "create a sensation" in certain circles. Upon arrival at the Grand Colorado hotel, the passenger is discovered dead—choked, bearing marks of murder on his neck caused by experienced strangulation. The valise he carried has vanished from the stage during transit.

The body is identified by a beautiful nineteen-year-old woman known as Leadville Lucy as her brother, Victor, though she claims ignorance of his full name and her own real surname. She swears vengeance over his corpse. An inquest is convened with surgeons confirming the victim's neck was broken by rope. The coroner's examination begins probing the circumstances of the murder while Whiplash George and others speculate about responsibility—some suggesting Don Frisco, the highwayman, though the method seems inconsistent with his typical tactics.