SPRINGING THE TRAP.
Tim Benson and Juniper Joe wanted to get out of the country, but they
yearned for more money before they went. They had become so much
frightened that not even the offer of a hiding place in Uncle Sam’s
cabin could reassure them. Seeing more clearly every hour that Gopher
Gabe thought more of his own safety than he did of that of any member
of the gang, they were resolved to cut loose from him, but to hide
their intention until after they had pulled off another “job.”
That job was no less than the cracking of the safe of the Blossom
Range bank, which they knew was stuffed with money and gold. The
express company had refused to carry either money or treasure over
its route until times bettered. So the prudent people of the town had
rushed their wealth to the bank, where guards were mounted over it
day and night.
The question of how it could be cracked with safety, under these
conditions, was an important one. Benson wanted to get the personal
aid of Gopher Gabe and White-eyed Moses, both of them once experts
in that line, though latterly they had taken to pathways that they
reckoned more secure.
They refused to do the dangerous work; but agreed to meet Benson and
Juniper Joe that night, with others, at the cabin of the Fool of
Folly Mountain, there to talk the matter over privately. They would
look about during the day, they said; so would be in position to
give advice, if nothing else.
Strolling into Gopher Gabe’s establishment that day, the Fool of
Folly Mountain was asked by Gopher Gabe to come into the back room,
where a “talk” could be had.
Back there the miner found both Juniper Joe and Tim Benson; also
White-eyed Moses, and another all-round bad man, called Williams.
They conferred with him about the matter in hand, after cautiously
“sounding” him.
He thought it was a good scheme, he said, if it could be worked; and
he agreed to a meeting of the “gang” at his cabin that night.
“I don’t think I care to try the safe-crackin’ job myself jest yet,”
he told them; “though maybe I’ll come to it by and by; but I want you
fellers to do it, so that you can sure cinch onto enough money so
that I won’t have any trouble in gettin’ my little thousand a week.
You see, I’m lookin’ out for Number One, the same as you are.”
They asked him about the prisoners; and were assured that they were
“all right.”
“Cody is gettin’ ready to raid this place,” Gopher Gabe told him. “I
got it straight. But he won’t find a thing when he does it.”
The night was dark and late when Gopher Gabe and his friends came to
the cabin on the mountain. With the saloon keeper were Tim Benson,
Juniper Joe, White-eyed Moses, and the scoundrel called Williams.
The Fool of Folly Mountain met them at the door and let them in. The
place was as dark as the night outside.
“I’ll light my lamp as soon as you get inside,” he said to them.
“You see, if it was lit now the light would shine out when the door
is open, and somebody might see you comin’ in; I don’t care for that.
I’ve got to look out for my own health, gents.”
He laughed in his easy way; then told them to stand still while he
made sure the curtains were all drawn tight, and he could light his
lamp.
“You might crack some of my valuable furniture, if you should bark
yer shins ag’inst it,” he explained further, laughing.
The only furniture to be seen when the lamp was lighted were the
stools and bed and the few belongings of the cabin.
“How’s the prisoners?” was Gopher Gabe’s first question, when he was
seated on one of the stools.
“Fine as a fiddle--even Moses’ fiddle!”
“I didn’t know but the Dutchman would rave round some.”
“Well, he did, at first; but I argued the thing out with him.”
“He didn’t seem to be open to argument?”
“He changed his mind, when I told him if he wouldn’t take my argument
any other way I’d open a hole in his head with a bullet and so get
it in. That weakened him. Improved much in your marksmanship lately,
Moses?” the Fool asked airily.
“Ah, drop it!” the fiddler growled.
“I ain’t heard that you have killed Buffalo Bill yet!”
“That’s all righdt. But ve ditn’t come here for shoking.”
“No?”
“We come hyer to talk business,” said Gopher Gabe. “But first I’d
like to look at them prisoners.”
“Doubt my word, eh?”
“No; I just want to see ’em.”
“Right this way, then.”
He took up the lamp.
“Unless some of you gents have got the stub of a candle in your
pockets, you will have to sit here in the dark,” he said, “or foller
the procession.”
They preferred to follow the procession.
In the back room Uncle Sam stopped, and, with interest, showed them
his furnace, blowpipe, and other things; also a lump of gold which he
had laid on a shelf.
“Kind o’ keerless, to lay gold round that way,” said Williams, eying
the chunk greedily.
“Mebby so. But we’re bound to be honest among ourselves, if not with
other people; you see, I’m trustin’ you, in showin’ it.”
“Where’d you git it--out of the rocky dirt back there?” asked Gopher
Gabe, with a hoarse laugh.
“That’s the result of the last hold-up I manipulated,” said Uncle
Sam, with apparent pride. “There’s some nuggets, some gold dust, and
the gold from four watches, melted down into that. As soon as the
express office people git over their scare, I’m goin’ to ship it to
my sister in ’Frisco, and tell the express people I got it out of my
mine by my famous secret process.”
“I reckon you ain’t got no sister!” said Williams.
“I see that our friend Williams is inclined to be a scoffer; and
scoffers never come to any good end. Get over it, Williams.”
When he had shown them around the apartment and talked learnedly of
his “secret process,” he was ready to go into the hidden room with
them; the place that held his “mine.”
“That talk is my regular stock in trade, that I hand out to all
the inquisitive people who come up here askin’ fool questions,” he
explained; “you ain’t expected to understand it; nobody can. I don’t
understand it myself; but it sounds good.”
Tim Benson smiled. Such work was of a kind that _he_ could appreciate.
“Throw anything that seems to be high-browed at the average man,” he
said, “and he’s ready to think that you know everything.”
“Same as you did to Matt Shepard, eh?” said Uncle Sam. “There was
nerve for you, gents--the clear, wire-coated, fibrous article. I
think I have some nerve myself; but Benson seems to hold the medal
right now.”
Benson was flattered, and smiled.
The blond-haired man pushed on the hidden panel, and swung open the
door leading into the black hole; then he took up his lamp again, and
led the way into it.
“Right at my heels, gents. There’s nothin’ in here to bite ye.”
They crowded in after him, and he closed the door; then led the way
to where, at one side of the room, the baron lay tied hand and foot.
At the other side was the woman, tied in the same way.
“The Dutchman was ragin’ round so at one time that I had to anchor
him to the wall, as you can see,” he said. “Trust me, gents, to keep
him; I’ll do it if I have to kill him!”
A rope passed round the baron’s rotund body held him to the wall.
“Ach!” he spat at them as the light was flashed in his face. “Go
avay!”
“How are ye feelin’, Dutchy?” asked the man of the blond hair,
laughing down upon him.
“Uff I effer gidt dese t’ings off uff my handts, I vill keel you!”
the baron howled at him.
“You see how gentle and tame he is, gents!” said Uncle Sam. “I don’t
know but I’ll have to put a gag in his mouth, to keep him from biting
himself.”
“Vhen I gidt oudt uff dhis,” the baron snarled, “I vill shoodt you
yoost so full uff holes dot you vondt holdt vhisky any longker.”
“Wow! He thinks, Gabie, that I’m a steady patron of your bar. You
might disabuse his mind of so unflattering an idea.”
The men stood looking at the baron.
“Go avay!” he shouted at them.
They moved over to the side of the woman, though not because he had
ordered them off.
Under the light of the lamp she looked pale and worn; but perhaps
that was largely because the paint had come off her face.
“The light hurts my eyes,” she urged.
Gopher Gabe turned on his heel.
“Oh, they’re all right,” he said. “We’ll go back into the house and
have a talk now.”
“You wouldn’t want to see where I’ve cached some of the gold I’ve
been gettin’ by my secret process?” asked the Fool.
Williams perked up his head, showing his thieving interest; but the
others, particularly Gopher Gabe, did not seem so interested.
“I think I won’t show it--now,” said Uncle Sam. “Williams looks as if
he’d like to steal it.”
“Is that an insult?” asked Williams, bristling.
“Only the truth, Williams.”
“Oh, come on!” Gopher Gabe growled. “We’ve got something to do, other
than fightin’ this night, if that bank business is to be pulled off.
That’s what we want to talk about; so, come on!”
The Fool of Folly Mountain led the way back into the cabin, lamp in
hand. This time he did not close the sliding door behind him; but it
was a thing not noticed.
He went steadily to the table in the middle of the room, set his lamp
on it, so that the room was brightly lighted; then put stools round
the table for the men to sit on.
When he had done this he stepped toward the back room; but stopped
near the doorway, and stamped his foot.
Attracted by this, and by a scraping of feet and a rustling sound,
Gopher Gabe and the men at the table looked around. What they saw
paralyzed them.
The Fool of Folly Mountain had two revolvers leveled, covering
them. Beside him, in the doorway, stood the baron, holding two more
revolvers. Out from one corner of the room had stepped Buffalo Bill,
with two more revolvers leveled; and out of another corner Nomad had
appeared, with still two more.
“The game is up!” said the Fool of Folly Mountain. “You can see that
I hold all the aces.”
Gopher Gabe tried to rise from his stool, but sank back, an
exclamation of bewildered amazement exploding from him.
“Tricked!” said Benson.
With one sweep of his hand he knocked the lamp from the table,
smashing it; then they heard him crash through the one little window.
Another man tried to follow him; when there was a flash and report,
and he rolled to the floor; the man was Williams.
“Hands up, everybody! The next who tries it will be shot down!”
The words were from Buffalo Bill.
“Cody, I’m the boss fool, after all; and deservin’ the name of the
Fool of Folly Mountain; if I hadn’t been, I wouldn’t have put the
lamp where it could have been knocked over. But you get by that
window and down the first critter that tries to go by you.”
“I’m by et now,” came in the voice of Nomad; “and you bet ther next
devil tries it he goes down, jest like this thing on the floor that
has swallered ther lead pill I sent at him. Gents, we’re hyer fer
clean bizness.”
The Fool of Folly Mountain got another lamp, from a stand near his
elbow, and lighted it; then, holding it over his head, he looked at
the table.
Gopher Gabe, White-eyed Moses, and Juniper Joe sat there, rigid and
scared; on the floor by the window, which had a ragged hole in it,
lay the body of Williams.
“Who in the devil’s name air you?” the saloon keeper howled at the
Fool, his tongue so thick he could hardly pronounce the words.
His face was white, his ratty eyes rolling, his pendulous lips were
apart, and his whole huge body quivered with fear.
“Yes,” said Juniper Joe, not less scared, “who air ye, anyhow?”
The man of the blond hair smiled.
“Wash off the stain that has turned my hair and mustache to golden,
and make a few other changes, and you might recognize me; for I’m
Cody’s old chum and side pardner, Wild Bill Hickok!”
The men at the table groaned.
“Shall I jump through the winder and try ter git that feller?” Nomad
asked. “He’s ther wust of ther lot.”
“He is,” the scout admitted; “Benson is the worst of the lot, but he
hasn’t escaped yet, even if he is out of this room. Better let him
go, right now, Nomad, unless you’re hankerin’ to get a bullet. Better
put in your time in tying these rascals here, while the rest of us
keep them covered.”
“Uff yoost vun uff dhem moves,” said the baron, “I am going to shoodt
him; I haf suffered so mooch dot it vouldt pe a bleasure.”
The white, scared face of the woman called Vera Bright appeared in
the doorway.
“You’ve got them?” she said, peering in.
“We will have,” Wild Bill told her, “just as soon as Nomad can
harness them up.”
She came on into the room.
“Idt vos a great drick, huh?” cried the German to her. “Aber I ton’dt
t’ought at one dime dot I gan standt idt to blay it to der endt.”
“So, you wasn’t tied at all back there?” said Gopher Gabe, boring the
baron with his ratlike eyes.
“Not so dot I feldt idt, eenyhow,” said the baron. “Ve vos der bait
for der rat drap, undil idt couldt pe sprung.”
Juniper Joe began to rave wildly, cursing the man he had known as the
Fool of Folly Mountain.
“Was it a fair deal?” he howled. “You went even into the road-agent
biz, jest to carry this thing through.”
“Which is where you’re mistaken, old boy,” Wild Bill told him; “I
only told you so, to get you to take me into the gang, so that I
could get on the inside of its schemes. See? And the thing seems to
have worked most beautifully.”
Nomad was tying the rascals, doing the work well and expeditiously.
He was enjoying it, too.
“Trapped!” snarled Gopher Gabe, as if the thought choked him.
“Trapped!”