A WORRIED SHERIFF.
The express office and Gopher Gabe’s saloon were robbed that night.
Matt Shepard, sheriff and jailer, brought the news to Buffalo Bill,
at the Eagle House.
“I didn’t think they’d strike so soon,” he said. “That is, if it was
them done it. But Benson has got nerve enough fer anything.”
Shepard was “sore” over the way Benson had overreached him.
“There has been other robberies, though--while Juniper Joe was in the
jail; and of course them couldn’t be charged against _him_.”
He had taken a seat in the scout’s room in his best chair, and now
helped himself from the box of cigars on the table. Nomad was in the
room, and so was the baron.
“What do you think of this chap they call the Fool of Folly
Mountain?” he asked abruptly.
“What do _you_ think of him?” Buffalo Bill returned.
“Well, it’s suspicious, the way he is doin’. There’s a whole lot of
fellers in town ready to swear that he is up to road-agent tricks,
and that what he’s doin’, er pretendin’ to do up there, is jest a
blind. I dunno about it myself, but I’m watchin’ him. I was up there
yesterday, after Juniper Joe got past me, lookin’ round.”
Buffalo Bill seemed amused.
“You didn’t find Juniper Joe there, of course?”
“No. Hardly expected that I would; but I wanted a peek at the things
that feller’s doin’. He’s rigged up a little place where he assays
stuff frum his mine, so he says. I think it’s a bluff. I seen some
of the gold he took down to the express office which he claimed he
got out of his mine by some new and secret process; it was just gold
fused together. He could hold up stages and travelers, git their gold
ore, and turn it into solid pieces that way, couldn’t he?”
“Easy enough, I should think,” the scout admitted.
“So I’ve about arrive at the conclusion that’s what he’s doin’,” the
sheriff averred, biting off a piece of his cigar. “I think I’ll have
some men set to watch his cabin.”
“Er, waugh!” Nomad snorted.
The sheriff gave him a sharp look.
“Jest got a frog in my throat,” the trapper explained. “I’m tuck thet
way et times.”
The baron sucked silently at his long-stemmed pipe, and the
expression of his face was as cast iron as he could make it.
“It come to me,” the sheriff went on, “after I’d started fer this
place, that maybe this fool on the mountain was into that game last
night, instead of Juniper and Benson. Though at first I was sure it
was them; and that they had done it more as a exhibition of clear
sand than to git the money.”
He studied the face of Buffalo Bill.
“What’s your idea?”
“That it was the work of Juniper Joe and Benson.”
“Then you don’t credit the idea that the Fool o’ Folly Mountain may
have turned the trick?”
“I don’t.”
“Do you think he’s giving the public a square deal? Don’t you think
he is lyin’?”
Buffalo Bill seemed to ponder this.
“I’m interested in watching that fellow,” he said. “So, if you’ll
just leave his case with me, it will be a favor.”
The sheriff was glad enough to get it off his hands, he said; he had
now so many irons in the fire that he was burning some of them. But
he declared that in the end Buffalo Bill would discover that the Fool
of Folly Mountain was playing a huge double game and profiting by it.
“That’s the opinion of the town, is it?” the scout asked.
“Nearly every one is comin’ round to that belief. So it wouldn’t
surprise me if a mob marched up there some night and took him out and
hung him. We’ve had too much hold-up work round hyer. And the town is
sore over the way it was fooled by Benson and Juniper Joe. The people
ain’t goin’ to be easy with the next feller that runs a bluff like
that.”
Buffalo Bill laughed.
“I guess there never was a community more cleverly sold,” he remarked.
“And they ain’t any notion o’ bein’ sold ag’in.”
“Y’ cain’t blame ’em,” Nomad commented, as if he felt he ought to do
some of the talking. “Even Buffler was tuck in complete.”
“Budt only at fairst,” corrected the German, coming to the scout’s
defense.
“What I’m up hyer fer mainly,” said the sheriff, “is to git your idea
of what move I’d better make. Juniper Joe and Benson are partners
once more. What deviltry them two can’t hatch up when they’re
together there’s no tellin’. They’ll shore go back to the road if
they haven’t already. I’d like to lay ’em by the heels.”
“The only thing that can be done for a time,” the scout answered,
“aside from keeping up a continual watch, is to stop shipments of
gold out of Blossom Range until they have been apprehended.”
“Which would tie up the business of the camp,” Shepard objected.
“But it’s better policy to keep the gold here than to lose it. Yet
there is one other thing that can be done: that is to send such a
strong guard with every stage that goes through that the road agents
won’t dare hold it up.”
“You see, speakin’ gin’rally, we figger that we’re workin’ ag’inst
jest two men,” said the sheriff; “when, as a matter of fact, we
don’t know how many we’re up ag’inst. Benson and Juniper Joe, in my
opinion, has got scores of men who will help ’em, right hyer in this
camp. I remember two months ago, when Benson was workin’ the road, we
tried sendin’ through strong guards with the stages. There was _ten_
men on one stage that was held up in the cañon jest t’other side o’
Stag Mountain. But there was _twenty_ of the road agents that held it
up. Five of the guards was shot dead in the fight, two more wounded,
and the whole shipment was lost. They even took the stage horses.
That’s the kind of men we’ve got to deal with.”
He knocked the ashes from his cigar, swung one leg over the other,
and went on:
“Then there’s the Utes. They ain’t road agents, but they’re
treacherous devils, and they hide the road agents. They do it because
the agents supplies ’em with whisky and amm’nition. Old Iron Bow, the
Ute chief, is as big a rascal as ever walked on two legs, and the
most of his waryers air jest like him.
“Three weeks ago, when I was after Jimmy Blood, I had a tip that he
had hiked to Iron Bow and that the chief was hidin’ him. So I goes up
there with a gang of my men at my back, and demands him. The chief he
gives me the laugh; says ’t no white man ain’t been in that village
for a month. I wanted to search the tepees, but he wouldn’t let me.
I didn’t dare try it without his consent; I didn’t have men enough,
in the first place, and, in the second, if I’d got the Utes started,
there’d been a merry old party; it might ’a’ put ’em on the warpath,
and I didn’t care to take that risk. Jimmy was there, I reckon; but
he made a sneak afterwards, and got out of the country. He was heard
of, anyway, over in Albuquerque.”
He paused for breath.
“So,” he added, “that’s the situation. If any one reckons that bein’
sheriff of this county is a snap, let him take another think. It’s
plantin’ gray hairs in my head fast enough, I tell you; which is
maybe because I try to play square and do my whole duty.”
He was on the point of recurring to the subject of the possibility of
apprehending Benson and Juniper Joe, when there was a tap on the door
that stayed him.
When Buffalo Bill opened the door in answer to the knock he saw a
veiled woman.
“May I come in?” she said, looking past him.
But when she was inside and beheld the sheriff she seemed on the
point of making a retreat.
“I’ll go, madam,” said Shepard, rising, “if you think you can talk
better without me bein’ here.”
“No; stay!” she said, after hesitating. “Perhaps it is just as well
that you should hear what I’ve come to say to Mr. Cody.”
Buffalo Bill had put out a chair for her. When she took it she lifted
her veil and revealed herself as Vera Bright.
The woman looked about the room, then fixed her eyes on Buffalo Bill,
though she gave a glance now and then in the direction of the sheriff.
“I think I can guess what Mr. Shepard is here for,” she said, making
her beginning. “It concerns the escape of Juniper Joe from prison.”
“You’ve hit the nail straight on the head, madam,” Shepard admitted.
“That’s a thing that’s worryin’ me a whole lot right now.”
He was trying to study the face of the woman, as he had an idea that
she bore him no good will, for the reason that he had held her in
Blossom Range at a time when she was very anxious to get away.
But the study of her face could not reveal much. The paint and powder
were laid on too thick for that. Her abundant hair was blondined, or
false--perhaps both. But artificial as she was in appearance, she
seemed at the moment at least to be in earnest.
“I think I can perhaps give information of value,” she declared, “if
I am assured that I shall be shielded.”
“I think we can promise that, so far as the men in this room are
concerned,” the scout assured her.
“I don’t know that Mr. Shepard will be likely to think that anything
I say can be believed,” she said. “He remembers that I lied to him
when I was brought back from Calumet Wells; but I wanted to get away,
then, and so thought I had cause for lying. But in this case it’s
different. I’ve got a good reason for telling the truth.”
She turned to Buffalo Bill.
“I don’t need to tell you why Tim Benson killed John Ward, as you
know all about it. But you may not know that when he killed him he
made me his deadly enemy.”
“I had guessed as much,” the scout told her.
“So, now that Benson is still hanging round here, and he and Juniper
Joe are again together, I want to tell you to watch the saloon of
Gopher Gabe.”
“We have been doing something in that line already,” the scout told
her.
“Then you have suspected Gopher Gabe?”
“Perhaps I shouldn’t say as much as that; but resorts like his are
always to be held in suspicion. Even if the proprietor is straight,
such a place draws shady characters of all kinds.
“Perhaps you do not know,” he added, “that Gopher Gabe’s place was
robbed last night.”
Her surprise showed, even under her paint and powder.
“I was not aware of it.”
“The post office shared the same fate,” he told her.
“It puzzles me,” she said; “for that would indicate that the robbers
were not friends of Gopher Gabe.”
“And you had thought they were?”
“Yes, I thought so.”
“The robbery at Gopher Gabe’s may have been a mere blind, madam,”
said Shepard. “I’ve known o’ the like.”
“That would explain it.”
She turned back to the scout.
“There is one other thing I wanted to mention,” she said. “This new
man up on the hill that they speak of as the Fool has been visiting
Gopher Gabe’s place. I saw him go in there only yesterday.”
“That so?” said Shepard. “You know, Cody, I said I had been
suspectin’ that feller. He’s crooked.”
“He is gambling at Gopher Gabe’s,” said the woman. “One of the girls
with the company here has told me that. I am sure he is in with
Gopher Gabe’s gang.”
“It seems to be an important bit of evidence,” the scout admitted.
“Yaw, I pedt you!” gulped the German.
“I’m allowin’ et seems ter be,” Nomad added.
“You’ll all come round to my opinion of that feller after a while,”
the sheriff declared confidently. “I’m goin’ to---- But I forgot,
Cody, that you asked me to keep my hands off him; that you wanted to
handle that part of the thing yourself.”
“That is my wish,” the scout admitted.
“You knew that Gopher Gabe is interested in the Casino?” said the
woman.
“Yes,” the scout told her.
“The two are connected. The waiters go from the saloon to the wine
rooms back of the Casino through an alley leading from the rear of
the saloon. The distance is but a few steps.”
The scout nodded.
“And of course if the waiters can go through there other people can,
from the wine rooms to the saloon. My suggestion is, if you could
get a man in there as one of the waiters, and have him watch, some
revelations would come that would surprise you.”
“It might be done,” said Shepard, straightening up in his chair as
the idea struck him; “though jest now I don’t know how we could work
it to get a man in there.”
She laughed unpleasantly, and suggested, as if she did not mean it,
that some night they might rap one of the waiters on the head, and
then put a man in his place.
Nomad, who was sitting near the door, now made a sudden dive at it,
breaking the conversation abruptly; then flung the door open and
raced along the hall. They heard the click of his revolver as he
cocked it, and his bawling command to some one to stop; and heard,
likewise, the pattering of feet.
The incident brought up every one in the room. Buffalo Bill and
Shepard jumped to the door; the baron tumbled out of his chair,
dropping his pipe; and the woman stood up nervously.
Nomad soon returned, grunting and fuming.
“Waugh!” he breathed. “Thar was a critter out thar eavesdrappin’. I
heard him breathin’, by the lower aidge o’ the door, as he listened,
and jumped fer him; but he was too quick fer me. I might ’a’ shot him
as he skedaddled, but I didn’t hardly want ter do et; an’ when I got
ter the foot o’ the stairs, he was clean gone.”
“An eavesdropper!” the woman cried, shaken with the agitation of
sudden fear.
“I guess we’ll have to loaf round out in the hall while we continue
this talk,” the scout said to Nomad. “It’s a thing we ought to have
done before.”
“Wonder who the skunk was?” puffed the sheriff.
“Some one who had a good reason for wanting to know what was being
said in here, you may be certain,” the scout told him.
“Vale, he vor shure heardt vot you vos saying apoudt putting somepoty
in der blace uff one uff dose vaiters,” the baron reminded.
“Yes, I reckon he must have heard that,” admitted Shepard.
“Which means that we’ll not be able to do it now,” said the scout.
“If he was a friend of Gopher Gabe, which seems likely, of course
Gabe would be looking for a trick of that kind now, and block it
promptly.”
The scout saw that the woman still seemed frightened.
“I was going to make a request of you, and I shall still make it,” he
said, “though what has happened may cause you to think the thing will
be dangerous. I take it for granted that you want to get even with
Tim Benson for killing Ward.”
Her courage seemed to come back with a bound.
“It seems to me,” she said, with her first show of emotion, “that I
would be willing to give my life for that!”
“You will not have to give your life, I am sure; yet you will have
to assume some risk in doing what I suggest. That is that you rejoin
the show company you were with, which is still at the Casino. I think
that would put you in a position where you could do some spying on
Gopher Gabe’s place to good advantage.”
“That certainly would be at the risk of my life, after what that
eavesdropper must have heard,” she told him.
“But are you willing to try it?”
She drew a deep breath; then for a moment or so was silent.
“Yes,” she said, “I will try it; I’ll rejoin the company, if the
manager will take me back.”
“I think he will do that. If he isn’t willing, a little money given
to him quietly will work it. Yet I hardly need to say to you that
in my opinion he will consider that you are worth more to him now
than ever. You understand what I mean. Everybody has been talking
about your supposed connection with the road agents. Could there be a
better advertisement, from the manager’s standpoint?”
Shepard slapped his knee.
“Jest the ticket!” he said. “If the lady will consent to it.”
She was silent again, as if thinking this over.
“I can try it,” she declared quietly, rising. “But don’t forget that
what I came here for was to ask you to watch Gopher Gabe’s. I will do
what I can, from the Casino side, if I get the chance; but you men
ought to be able to do a good deal more from the outside.”
The scout was on his feet as she turned to the door.
“Remember,” he said, “that while we are watching, we will take means
to protect you as far as we can. We are anxious to get Benson.”
“And mighty anxious to get Juniper Joe back in the jail,” added the
sheriff.
She stopped in the doorway, turning to the scout.
“I may want to communicate with you. I shall use the post office if I
do. I suppose _that_ can be trusted?”
Nomad had come back to the door, along the hall.
“Nothin’ kin be trusted in this hyer thievin’ town!” he declared.
She smiled on the old trapper with what must have been something of a
remnant of her vanished coquetry.
“Not even me?” she said.
Then she hurried along the hall and left the hotel, pulling her veil
down as she did so.
Nomad came on into the room, after a steady look at her back.
“Waugh!” he said, flinging himself into a chair. “Is she playin’ fa’r
er otherwise? Mebby so; I dunno.”
“Nomat, I am mit you,” declared the baron. “Vhen I rememper my vife,
vot was so sveet yoost pefore ve vos marriet, unt den vos a she-tiger
yoost afdher ve vos marriet, I ton’dt dake no stocks in enny vomans.”
Buffalo Bill laughed.
“She will play fair while it is to her interest to do so, and just
now she thinks it is to her interest.”
“Well,” drawled Shepard, “we can watch her while we’re watchin’ other
people. But I’d like to know who it was had his nose stuck under the
door hyer while we was talkin’.”
“It looked to me,” said Nomad, “like the back o’ White-eyed Moses.”