The Project Gutenberg eBook of Buffalo Bill's Weird Warning, by Colonel Prentiss Ingraham This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title: Buffalo Bill's Weird Warning Dauntless Dell's Rival Author: Colonel Prentiss Ingraham Release Date: February 23, 2021 [eBook #64613] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 Produced by: David Edwards, Susan Carr and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net *** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BUFFALO BILL'S WEIRD WARNING *** Buffalo Bill’s Weird Warning OR, Dauntless Dell’s Rival BY Colonel Prentiss Ingraham Author of the celebrated “Buffalo Bill” stories published in the Border Stories. For other titles see catalogue. Colophon STREET & SMITH CORPORATION PUBLISHERS 79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York Copyright 1908 By STREET & SMITH Buffalo Bill’s Weird Warning (Printed in the United States of America) All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian. CONTENTS PAGE IN APPRECIATION OF WILLIAM F. CODY 1 I. MYSTERIOUS DOINGS. 5 II. ANOTHER STRANGER IN CAMP. 18 III. CAPTAIN LAWLESS. 30 IV. THE INDIAN GIRL. 37 V. WAH-COO-TAH AGAIN. 50 VI. AT THE FORTY THIEVES MINE. 63 VII. LAYING THE “GHOST.” 78 VIII. THE FIGHT AT THE ORE-DUMP. 89 IX. DELL AND CAYUSE ALSO DELAYED. 95 X. THE STRANGER AND THE STEER. 107 XI. A GIFT WITH A STRING TO IT. 119 XII. THE “FORTY THIEVES MINE.” 131 XIII. DELL AND WAH-COO-TAH. 144 XIV. LITTLE CAYUSE ON GUARD. 163 XV. THE RESCUE OF NOMAD AND WILD BILL. 176 XVI. THE CURTAIN-ROCK. 183 XVII. THE TURN OF FORTUNE’S WHEEL. 195 XVIII. THE ROUND-UP AT SPANGLER’S. 202 XIX. THE STAGE FROM MONTEGORDO. 209 XX. DOUBLE-CROSSED. 222 XXI. BUFFALO BILL AND GENTLEMAN JIM. 234 XXII. LETTER, RING, AND LOCKET. 241 XXIII. PICTURE-WRITING. 253 XXIV. ON THE WAY TO MEDICINE BLUFF. 260 XXV. A COWED OUTLAW. 273 XXVI. CHAVORTA GORGE AND PIMA. 280 XXVII. A BUSY TIME FOR CAYUSE. 293 XXVIII. A HAPPY REUNION. 300 XXIX. CONCLUSION. 309 IN APPRECIATION OF WILLIAM F. CODY (BUFFALO BILL). It is now some generations since Josh Billings, Ned Buntline, and Colonel Prentiss Ingraham, intimate friends of Colonel William F. Cody, used to forgather in the office of Francis S. Smith, then proprietor of the New York Weekly. It was a dingy little office on Rose Street, New York, but the breath of the great outdoors stirred there when these old- timers got together. As a result of these conversations, Colonel Ingraham and Ned Buntline began to write of the adventures of Buffalo Bill for Street & Smith. Colonel Cody was born in Scott County, Iowa, February 26, 1846. Before he had reached his teens, his father, Isaac Cody, with his mother and two sisters, migrated to Kansas, which at that time was little more than a wilderness. When the elder Cody was killed shortly afterward in the Kansas “Border War,” young Bill assumed the difficult rôle of family breadwinner. During 1860, and until the outbreak of the Civil War, Cody lived the arduous life of a pony- express rider. Cody volunteered his services as government scout and guide and served throughout the Civil War with Generals McNeil and A. J. Smith. He was a distinguished member of the Seventh Kansas Cavalry. During the Civil War, while riding through the streets of St. Louis, Cody rescued a frightened schoolgirl from a band of annoyers. In true romantic style, Cody and Louisa Federci, the girl, were married March 6, 1866. In 1867 Cody was employed to furnish a specified amount of buffalo meat to the construction men at work on the Kansas Pacific Railroad. It was in this period that he received the sobriquet “Buffalo Bill.” In 1868 and for four years thereafter Colonel Cody served as scout and guide in campaigns against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. It was General Sheridan who conferred on Cody the honor of chief of scouts of the command. After completing a period of service in the Nebraska legislature, Cody joined the Fifth Cavalry in 1876, and was again appointed chief of scouts. Colonel Cody’s fame had reached the East long before, and a great many New Yorkers went out to see him and join in his buffalo hunts, including such men as August Belmont, James Gordon Bennett, Anson Stager, and J. G. Heckscher. In entertaining these visitors at Fort McPherson, Cody was accustomed to arrange wild-West exhibitions. In return his friends invited him to visit New York. It was upon seeing his first play in the metropolis that Cody conceived the idea of going into the show business. Assisted by Ned Buntline, novelist, and Colonel Ingraham, he started his “Wild West” show, which later developed and expanded into “A Congress of the Rough Riders of the World,” first presented at Omaha, Nebraska. In time it became a familiar yearly entertainment in the great cities of this country and Europe. Many famous personages attended the performances, and became his warm friends, including Mr. Gladstone, the Marquis of Lorne, King Edward, Queen Victoria, and the Prince of Wales, now King of England. At the outbreak of the Sioux, in 1890 and 1891, Colonel Cody served at the head of the Nebraska National Guard. In 1895 Cody took up the development of Wyoming Valley by introducing irrigation. Not long afterward he became judge advocate general of the Wyoming National Guard. Colonel Cody (Buffalo Bill) died in Denver, Colorado, on January 10, 1917. His legacy to a grateful world was a large share in the development of the West, and a multitude of achievements in horsemanship, marksmanship, and endurance that will live for ages. His life will continue to be a leading example of the manliness, courage, and devotion to duty that belonged to a picturesque phase of American life now passed, like the great patriot whose career it typified, into the Great Beyond. [Pg 1] [2] BUFFALO BILL’S WEIRD WARNING. CHAPTER I. MYSTERIOUS DOINGS. “What was that, Crawling Bear?” “Ugh! Fire-gun make um big ‘boom.’” “It was a fire-gun, all right, but where did the report come from? That’s what I’m trying to figure out.” Two horsemen were riding along a bleak, desolate-looking cañon, on route to the mining-camp known as Sun Dance. One was a white man, and the other an Indian. The white rider was William Hickok, of Laramie, better known as “Wild Bill,” and his companion was a Ponca warrior. Both Wild Bill and Crawling Bear had keen ears, and the muffled report of the rifle came to them distinctly—not from right or left, from ahead or behind, or above, but seemingly from the ground under their horses’ hoofs. Another report reached them, coming from the same place as the first, and Wild Bill, with a puzzled look, drew rein and rubbed his hand over his forehead. “Am I locoed, or what?” he muttered. “It’s a trick of the echoes, I reckon. Somebody is having a little gun-play in this vicinity, and the bottom of the gulch picks up the sound and throws it back to us.” The Indian made no response, although from his actions it seemed quite clear that he did not accept the white man’s explanation. Wild Bill rode on, and a sharp turn in the cañon brought him upon something which led to a revision of his theory concerning the rifle-shots. What he saw was an ore-dump, off at one side of the cañon. The mound of broken rocks was surmounted by a plank platform. Five horses were hitched to bushes, not far from the ore-dump, but their riders were not in evidence. Wild Bill halted his horse, once more, and looked from the ore-dump to the horses, and then around the cañon. While his eyes were busy, there came a third rifle-shot. “By gorry!” he exclaimed, and gave a low laugh. “This thing begins to clear up a little, Crawling Bear. There’s a mine here, and probably the mine has a drift running down the gulch. The shots we heard really came from under us, but they came from the bottom of the mine.” “Ugh!” grunted the Ponca. “Why Yellow Eyes make um shoot in mine? No got um game in mine.” “Now you’re shouting, my redskin friend. What there is to shoot at, in that mine, is a conundrum that your Uncle William is going to work out. Maybe there’s no game to shoot at down there, but there’s a game being pulled off that needs looking into.” Wild Bill tossed his bridle-reins to the Ponca and slipped down from the saddle. “You go down in mine, huh?” queried Crawling Bear. “That’s my intention,” was the answer. “Five ponies, five Yellow Eyes down in mine. Mebbyso Crawling Bear better go with Wild Bill.” A smile curled about Wild Bill’s lips. “Any old day the odds of five to one make me take a back seat,” said he, “I hope some friend will hand me a good one and tell me to wake up. I’m going to hide my hand, Crawling Bear. This is a case of find out what’s doing, and then make a get-away on the q. t.—in case I can’t help some unfortunate in distress. You look out for the horses; and, if I can’t take care of myself, then I’m ready to be planted, for it will be high time.” With that, Wild Bill stepped to the foot of the ore-dump and climbed carefully to the plank platform. An empty ox-hide bucket stood on the platform, off to one side, but there was no windlass for hoisting the bucket, and there did not seem to be any ladders for getting down into the shaft. All this contributed still further to Wild Bill’s perplexity, and at the same time increased his determination to investigate. But, if there were no ladders for getting into the mine, there was a rope. The upper end of the rope was made fast to the edge of the opening in the middle of the platform. The Laramie man peered down into the shaft. The blackness was intense, and he could see nothing, not even the gleam of a candle. “Can’t tell whether the shaft is fifty feet deep or five hundred,” he muttered, “but it’s a cinch that none of the men who came here on those five horses are anywheres around the foot of the shaft. If they were, they’d jump a piece of lead at me. With my head over the hole, like this, I’m a good target. Now to go down.” [5] [6] [7] For an instant Wild Bill sat on the platform, his feet dangling over the abyss; then, slowly letting himself down, he grabbed the rope and began to slide. The shooting continued, the echoes booming louder in Wild Bill’s ears and increasing his curiosity. Wild Bill was down fifty feet before he touched bottom. The shaft was not so deep, after all. Leaving the lower end of the rope, he groped his way around the shaft wall until he found the opening of the level. In traversing the level, he dropped to his hands and knees, and crawled. The level crooked to right and left, and, after Wild Bill had covered something like fifty feet of it, he began to hear voices, and to see a glow of light in the distance. Pushing his head and shoulders around a turn, he suddenly beheld a queer scene, right at the end of the level. Five men were there, and four of them carried lighted candles. The fifth man had no candle, but was armed with a shotgun. The men had all the earmarks of scoundrels, and each was heeled with a brace of six-shooters. The fellow with the shotgun had a belt about his waist, above his revolver-belt, filled with brass shells. Just as Wild Bill came within sight of the group, the man with the shotgun was “breaking” the piece at the breach, ejecting an empty shell and replacing it with one that was loaded. Having finished the loading, the man threw the gun to his shoulder and shot the charge into the breast of the level. “We’re blowin’ a hull lot o’ good stuff inter this bloomin’ country rock, Clancy,” growled a man with a candle. “Ain’t ye done enough?” “I started in with fifteen shells,” replied Clancy, the rascal with the gun, “an’ thar’s five left. We might jest as well close up the rock with what we’ve still got.” “How do ye know ther feller’ll take his samples from the place ye’re puttin’ them loads?” “He’ll git his samples from the breast o’ the level, won’t he?” struck in another man with a candle. “By the time we’re done, thar won’t be a patchin’ he kin pick at but’ll hev its salt. Cap’n Lawless’ll land him, an’ thar’ll be a hundred thousand ter pass around. The ‘Forty Thieves’ Mine is a played-out propersition, but the Easterner won’t find that out until arter us fellers git our hooks on ther money. Then we’ll hike.” Clancy banged another load into the rocks. “Why in thunder ain’t Lawless hyer?” asked another of the candle-bearers. “He ort ter be helpin’ us, seems like.” “Don’t you fret none erbout Lawless, Tex,” replied Clancy. “He’ll be around afore long, ready ter do the fine work an’ land the lobster. We don’t need him fer this, an’ it’s a heap better fer him not ter show up in ther cañon while this job o’ salt is bein’ pulled off. If Lawless ain’t seen around hyer, he won’t be suspected o’ any crooked work.” “What’s Lawless doin’, anyways?” queried the man who had spoken first. “I dunno, but I reckon he’s watchin’ thet ole flash-light warrior, Buffler Bill. Ye see, Andy, Lawless ain’t anyways eager ter tangle up with Buffler Bill an’ his pards; not but what Lawless could put ther scout an’ his friends down an’ out —fer head-work, I backs Cap’n Lawless, o’ ther Forty Thieves, ag’inst all comers, bar none—but Lawless is jest startin’ inter this hyer profitable field, an’ he don’t want ter hev no interruptions.” “Buffler Bill is workin’ fer ther gov’ment,” said Tex. “He won’t bother none with the cap’n.” “Ye never kin tell about him, Tex,” averred Clancy. “Wharever Buffler scents any unlawful doin’s, he’s li’ble ter butt in; an’ we don’t want ter give him no chance ter git fracasin’ round with us.” “But if he does,” said Tex, “we’re goin’ ter do him up?” “We are,” declared Clancy; “him an’ his pards—Nomad an’ ther Injun kid, Leetle Cayuse. I’m close ter the last ca’tridge, Tex, an’ you an’ Andy better go up an’ have ther hosses ready. We won’t linger around ther ore-dump none, arter we come out.” Wild Bill, screened by the corner of rock, had heard every word of this talk. The mysterious doings, in the light of the conversation among the scoundrels, was now clearly explained. The five men were “salting” the worthless mine; that is, they had loaded the shotgun-shells with fine gold, and were blowing the gold into the breast of the level. When the intended victim came to take his samples of the vein, he would chip off pieces of the doctored rock, and when the rock was assayed, it would show the mine to be a heavy “gold- producer.” On this showing, unless the intended victim was warned, a hundred thousand dollars would change hands, and Captain Lawless, of the Forty Thieves, whoever he was, would be that much richer. “I’ll nip this little scheme in the bud,” thought Wild Bill, as he drew back and crouched against the wall for Tex and Andy to pass. The passing of the men, with their candles, was filled with considerable danger for Wild Bill. If the two ruffians saw him, there was bound to be a fight, for it would not do to let Wild Bill get away with the information he had discovered. Wild Bill drew his revolvers and made himself as small as possible. Had there been time, he would have hastened back to the shaft, along the level, and climbed the rope. But he knew he could not have gotten half-way up before Tex [8] [9] [10] [11] and Andy would have located him. It was better for Wild Bill to stay right where he was, and hope for the best. The whole affair, as Wild Bill had planned it, was reckless in the extreme; but he was daring by nature, and rarely counted the cost before making a leap in the dark. This must have been his evil day, and the beginning of a series of evil days, as will soon appear. Tex and Andy were stumbling past him, when the former, tripping on a stone that lay on the bottom of the level, fell sideways, dropping his candle and falling full on the man from Laramie. The candle was extinguished, but Tex, encountering the intruder, gave vent to a wild yell of alarm. Wild Bill’s fist shot out, and Tex crumpled flat along the floor of the level; the blow was followed by another, which landed on the point of Andy’s jaw, and threw him against the hanging wall. His candle also dropped, and Wild Bill set his foot on the sputtering flame. By then Clancy and the other three had started at a run to see what was the trouble. Wild Bill, berating his hard luck, rushed toward the shaft, but he was running in the dark—a circumstance which brought him many a bruise and bump. Behind him came three men with two candles, but Tex and Andy were temporarily out of the race. From time to time, as he stumbled onward, Wild Bill looked backward over his shoulder. Suddenly he saw Clancy halt, lift the shotgun, and shoot along the level. Quick as a flash, Wild Bill dropped flat. He had no desire to stop a charge from a brass shell, even though it was of gold. The fine yellow metal whistled over his head. As the echo of the shot clamored in the level, Wild Bill sprang up and forged onward with a reckless laugh. “They can’t salt me,” he muttered, “but I may be able to salt one of them with lead.” He paused long enough to chance a shot from his six-shooter. A yell of pain came from Clancy. The shotgun clattered to the rocks, and he grabbed at his right arm. The other two men thereupon began using their revolvers, accompanying their shooting with savage yells. Wild Bill, pushing flat against the foot wall, deliberately snuffed the two candles that remained alight. His wrist had been grazed by one of the ruffians’ bullets, but it was a small injury, and he gave it scant attention. As soon as the level was entirely plunged in darkness, he ran on to the shaft which, by then, was only a few feet away. The time had passed for fighting. It was up to him to retreat, and to see how quick he could get to the top of the shaft, and out of it. Jabbing his revolver back into his belt, he laid hold of the rope and started aloft, hand over hand. Clancy and the rest, meanwhile, had not remained inactive. They must have been considerably in the dark as to the identity of their enemy, but they realized that he had caught them red-handed, and that the success of their whole plot might hang on their capturing him. Therefore they pushed forward desperately, Clancy in a rage because of his wound. Tex and Andy, having revived sufficiently from the sledge-hammer blows they had received, had joined the others. “Don’t strike any matches,” Wild Bill heard Clancy yell, “and don’t light no candles. We don’t want the whelp ter make targets o’ us. Ketch him, thet’s all! Consarn his picter! he’s given me a game arm. I want ter play even fer thet, anyhow.” Above him, Wild Bill could see a square patch of daylight as he climbed. His progress was slow, however, and he knew that when Clancy and the rest got to the shaft, they would see him swinging in mid-air between them and the lighted background. As Wild Bill looked up, he saw the head of Crawling Bear leaning over the opening and looking down. “Cover that hole, Crawling Bear!” roared Wild Bill. “They’re after me, the whole five of ’em. Look alive, now.” The Ponca was quick-witted, and must have realized the situation. His head vanished from the patch of light the instant Wild Bill ceased speaking. Climbing hand over hand was slow work. Wild Bill’s arms were strong, and he did his best, but his best did not carry him upward nearly so swiftly as he could have wished. Sounds of scrambling feet came from below him, followed by the voice of Tex. “Thar he is! See him squirm, will ye? Pepper him! Turn loose at him!” Just then the hole above suddenly darkened. Wild Bill was still a target, but not so plain. The shaft echoed with a patter of reports. A sharp, stinging blow struck the heel of Wild Bill’s boot, the broad brim of his hat shook, and he was raked along one side as by a red-hot iron. “Wow!” he muttered; “if they put a piece of lead into one of my arms——” And just then that is exactly what they did. It was Wild Bill’s left arm. The strength went out of the arm in a flash, and Wild Bill only saved himself from dropping back to the bottom of the shaft by a fierce grip on the rope with his right [12] [13] [14] hand. How could he climb now? The outlook was anything but reassuring. All this time the Laramie man felt a movement of the rope, as though Crawling Bear, at the top of the shaft, was tinkering with it under the cover he had placed over the opening. “I reckon he ain’t climbin’ no more,” roared the voice of Clancy, from the depths. “Lay holt, thar, Tex, an’ see if ye kain’t crawl up an’ haul ther whelp back. He’s winged, mebby, an’ kain’t climb.” This, as we know, was Wild Bill’s condition. He had twisted the rope about one of his legs, and was able to maintain his place, but, if he did not drop downward, neither could he move upward an inch. Tex, evidently, had grabbed the rope, for it tightened cruelly around Wild Bill’s leg. The Laramie man’s arm did not seem to have been very seriously injured. So far as he could judge, what the arm was suffering from, more than anything else, was the shock of the bullet. Twisting the arm about the rope, he drew his knife from its scabbard at his belt, and bent downward. A quick slash severed the rope in twain, and a heavy fall and a chorus of oaths came from the shaft’s bottom. Tex had dropped upon some of his companions, for the moment demoralizing them. This move of Wild Bill’s, while necessary for his safety, almost proved disastrous to him as well as to Tex. Wild Bill’s left arm was not to be depended upon. At the critical moment it gave with him; and, had he not dropped the knife and gripped the rope with his right hand, he would have followed Tex onto the heads of Clancy and the others. Before the disorder at the bottom of the shaft could be righted, and the scoundrels again begin their revolver-work, Wild Bill felt himself started upward with a jerk. Crawling Bear was taking a hand! Just what he had done Wild Bill did not know, but that his means, whatever they were, were effectual, was proved by the swiftness with which Wild Bill was hauled to the platform. In less than half a minute after Wild Bill started upward, his head struck against a blanket covering the mouth of the shaft, and he was snaked out onto the planks, and lay blinking in the sun. At the foot of the ore-dump stood the Ponca with a hand on the bridle of Wild Bill’s horse. The Laramie man saw in an instant what his red companion had done. After covering the mouth of the shaft with his blanket, he had secured the picket-rope from Wild Bill’s saddle and had tied one end to the horn; the other end he had secured to the rope leading down into the shaft, and had then cut the shaft-rope. By leading Wild Bill’s horse across the cañon from the foot of the ore-dump, the Ponca had been able to get his white companion to the surface by horse-power. “You’re all to the good, Crawling Bear!” declared Wild Bill, sitting up at the edge of the ore-dump and pulling off his coat. “I had a close call, down there, and I reckon those yaps would have got me if it hadn’t been for you.” Crawling Bear untied the rope from the saddle-horn and began coiling it in. When he had removed the rope spliced to the end of the picket-rope, he hung the coil in its proper place at Wild Bill’s saddle. “Wild Bill hurt, huh?” he asked, mounting the side of the dump. “A gouge through the fleshy part of the arm, that’s all,” the Laramie man answered, examining the injury. “The bullet flickered along the muscles and went on about its business.” Wild Bill had cut away the sleeve of his flannel shirt in order to examine the injury. Out of the bottom of the sleeve he improvised a bandage, and Crawling Bear helped him put it in place. When the arm was roughly bandaged, Wild Bill thrust his hand into the breast of his shirt. “I’m worth a dozen dead men yet,” he went on, “but that outfit sure had it in for me. Don’t know as I can blame them, though, as they’ve got a hundred thousand at stake. I’m going to fool them out of that hundred thousand—watch my smoke.” He looked at the bullet-hole through the brim of his hat, then at his left boot, from which the heel was missing, and finally at the place where a bullet had raked along the side of his clothes, after which he laughed grimly. “They had a good many chances at me, Crawling Bear,” he proceeded, “but they didn’t make good. We’ve got ’em bottled up in that mine now, and we’ll keep ’em there until I can get Pard Cody to Sun Dance. I’ve got a notion he’ll enjoy meeting that gang of trouble-makers.” The Ponca picked up his blanket from the platform and threw it over his shoulders. “Yellow Eyes?” he queried. “You bet! They’re white tinhorns, every last man of them. It’s up to you and me to call their little game. It’s a salting proposition, with a tenderfoot standing to lose a hundred thousand in good, hard money. Let’s ride for Sun Dance and get there as quick as we can.” “What about um five caballos?” asked the Ponca, his small, beady eyes gloating over the five horses belonging to Clancy and his outfit. [15] [16] [17] “Oh, we’ll leave them. Haven’t time to bother with ’em, anyhow.” Wild Bill descended the slope lamely and climbed into his saddle. A few moments later, he and the Ponca were continuing on along the cañon toward Sun Dance. CHAPTER II. ANOTHER STRANGER IN CAMP. Sun Dance was a very small mining-camp, perched on a shelf up the side of Sun Dance Cañon. “Six ’dobies stuck on a side hill,” was the trite and not very elegant way the camp was often described. The sort of mining indulged in was both quartz and placer—placer-mining in the gulch and quartz-mining in the neighboring hills. Only the placer-miners lived in the camp; the quartz-miners had camps of their own, and only came to Sun Dance for supplies. The camp could be reached in two ways: From the bottom of the cañon by a steep climb, and from the top by a stiff descent. The stage from Montegordo reached camp by way of the cañon’s rim, which was its only feasible route; but Wild Bill and Crawling Bear came from below, and gained the settlement by spurring their horses up the slope. Just where the trail crawled over the edge of the flat, there was a sign-board with the rudely lettered words: “No Shootin’ Aloud in Sun Dance.” As an indication of how seriously the sign was taken, it may be mentioned that the lettering could hardly be read for bullet-holes. By day the camp was practically dead, all the miners being at work on their placers, and only storekeepers, gamblers, resort proprietors, and the man who “ran” the hotel being visible. For the most part, these worthies smoked their pipes and cigarettes during the day, or played cards among themselves merely to pass the time. With night everything changed. The camp became a boisterous, rollicking place. Miners flocked in, bet their yellow dust on the turn of a card or a whirl of the wheel, sampled the camp’s “red-eye,” and very often forgot the warning of the sign, and indulged in shooting that was very loud and occasionally fatal. The name of the one hotel in the camp was the “Lucky Strike.” The proprietor was one Abijah Spangler, a leviathan measuring six foot ten, up and down, and ten foot six—or so it was said—east and west at his girth-line. Anyway, Abijah Spangler weighed 300 pounds, and when he sat down it took two chairs to hold him. When Wild Bill and Crawling Bear halted in front of the Lucky Strike, Bije Spangler was sitting down, dripping with perspiration and agitating the air with a ragged palm-leaf fan. “You the boss of this hangout?” inquired Wild Bill, surveying Spangler’s huge bulk with much interest. “I run it, you bet,” answered Spangler, ruffling his double-chin and wondering at the red handkerchief about Wild Bill’s arm. “Got accommodations for two?” queried the Laramie man. “Fer two whites, yes—meals, four bits, and a bed, a dollar. But”—and here Bije Spangler cast a disapproving eye on the Ponca—“I don’t feed or house Injuns fer no money. Not meanin’ any disrespect fer yerself, neighbor,” added Spangler hastily, noting the glint that rose in Wild Bill’s eye, “but I couldn’t keep open house fer reds without sp’ilin’ the repertation o’ my hotel.” The Ponca sat up stiff and straight on his horse. “Where I stay, he stays,” averred Wild Bill; “what’s good enough for him is good enough for me. He’s plum white, all but his skin.” “So’s a Greaser,” grunted Spangler, “or a Chink. Sorry to appear disobligin’, ’specially as you-all seems to have run inter trouble somewheres. You’re welcome to stop, but the Injun’ll have ter camp out in the chaparral.” Wild Bill was in no mood for arguing the case, and he was about to ride on, when the Ponca leaned forward and stopped him. “You want um Ponca take paper-talk to Pa-e-has-ka, hey?” he asked. “Sure I do, Crawling Bear,” replied Wild Bill, “but I don’t want you to start for Sill until you have rested yourself and your horse.” “Ugh! no want um rest. Feel plenty fine. Me take um paper-talk now.” Wild Bill saw that Crawling Bear meant what he said. The camp not appearing to be a very safe place for a red man, anyhow, the Laramie man decided to let his companion have his way. “Got a place where I can write?” inquired Wild Bill. “Go through the office an’ inter the bar,” replied Spangler. “You can write on one of the tables, an’ I reckon the barkeep can skeer up a patchin’ o’ paper and a lead-pencil.” Leaving his horse with the Ponca, Wild Bill went into the barroom, and had soon written a few words to Buffalo Bill, asking him to come to Sun Dance as soon as possible. Returning to Crawling Bear, Wild Bill handed him the folded note and a dozen silver dollars. “Why you give um Ponca dinero?” asked the Indian. [18] [19] [20] [21] “That’s for carrying the message to Buffalo Bill,” said the Laramie man. “Buffalo Bill?” wheezed Spangler, stirring a little in his chair. “You a friend of Buffalo Bill’s?” “Yes,” answered Wild Bill, whirling on the fat man. “My name’s Hickok.” “Wild Bill!” muttered Spangler. “Say, that’s different. Any Injun friend o’ Wild Bill’s can stop with me. I’ll break my rules for you, and——” Hoofs clattered. Crawling Bear, not waiting further, was off for the edge of the “flat” on his return journey to Sill. “You’re too late,” said Wild Bill curtly. “What’s your label.” “Spangler is my handle.” “Any strangers in town, Spangler?” “Only you.” “When’s the next stage due from Montegordo?” “To-morrow afternoon.” “Well, I’m going to stay with you until to-morrow afternoon, anyhow. Call some one to take care of my horse; and if I can have a room all to myself, I want it.” “That’ll cost extry,” said Spangler. “If ye’re goin’ to throw on style with a private room, you’ll have to bleed ten dollars’ worth.” “That’s the size of my stack. Hustle, now. I’m fagged, and want to lie down.” Spangler lifted his voice and gave a husky yell. In answer to the signal, a Mexican showed himself around the corner of the house, who took Wild Bill’s horse. Then once more Spangler indulged in a wheezy shout. This was the signal for a Chinaman to present himself. After a few words with Spangler, the Chinaman led Wild Bill into the house, through the office and the drinking-part of the establishment, and into a small, corner room, with a window looking out upon the street. There was a cot in the room, and Wild Bill flung himself down wearily upon it. In a few minutes he was fast asleep. He awoke in time for supper, put a fresh bandage around his arm, and went out into the hotel dining-room. Everything about the Lucky Strike was exceedingly primitive, and the table, the service, and the food were about what one would expect in a pioneer mining-camp. Wild Bill, however, was used to such accommodations and fare. Following the meal, he smoked a couple of pipes in front of the hotel, saying nothing to anybody, but keeping up a lot of thinking. The Forty Thieves—so ran the current of his thoughts—was a played-out mine. Those five men, under orders from one Captain Lawless, were salting it. The name of the mine was suggestive, and so was the name of the man who was engineering the salting operations. “Captain Lawless, of the Forty Thieves!” said Wild Bill to himself. “That has sure got a regular rough-house sound. When Pard Cody hears it, I’ll bet money it will ruffle his hair the wrong way. Crawling Bear will get that paper-talk through some time to-night, and Cody will be here to-morrow afternoon. When he arrives, we’ll prance out to the Forty Thieves and snake those five trouble-makers out of that hole in the ground; then, if Captain Lawless wants to take a whack at us, he’s welcome.” Wild Bill took no part in the hilarious doings of the camp that night. By 10 o’clock he had locked himself in his room and got into bed. His arm was a bit painful, so that he was an hour or more in getting to sleep. When he was once asleep, however, he did not wake until morning. His arm felt better. He could use his hand as well as usual. There was some pain in the arm, but it was not severe. Following breakfast, he went to one of the general stores and bought a new flannel shirt, a pair of boots, and a bowie, to take the place of the one he had lost in the mine. After that, he sat in front of the Lucky Strike and smoked until dinner-time; and, after dinner, he smoked until four- thirty, when the stage pulled over the rim of the cañon and slid down the slope with the hind wheels tied. The stage drew up in front of the hotel, and a mail-bag was thrown off. There was one passenger, a man in a linen duster, and clearly a stranger. “He’s the one,” said Wild Bill to himself, knocking the ashes out of his pipe and getting out of his chair. “The chap doesn’t look much like an easy mark, though. I wonder if he has any notion he’s taking long chances with that hundred thousand of his?” Just then Wild Bill experienced something like a jolt. A man rode up along the trail that led from the cañon bottom, drew rein in front of the hotel, dismounted, dropped his bridle-reins over a hitching-post, and followed the stranger into the Lucky Strike. The man had his right arm in a sling, and it didn’t take two looks to inform Wild Bill that the fellow was none other than Clancy! Clancy, the man who had been blowing gold into the Forty Thieves with a shotgun! Clancy, the man Wild [22] [23] [24] Bill had left, with four others, bottled up in the Forty Thieves’ shaft! Clancy did not pay any attention to Wild Bill. It seemed very probable that neither Clancy, nor any of those with him in the mine, had been able to see Wild Bill distinctly enough to recognize him in another place and in broad day. Then, too, the Laramie man had a new shirt of a different color from the blue one he had worn in the mine, and he showed no sign of injury. All this would help to keep Clancy from recognizing him, even if he had got a tolerably good look at him in the Forty Thieves. Reassured on this point, Wild Bill fell to canvassing another. How had Clancy managed to escape from the shaft? Clancy and the rest must have had help. Some other member of the gang must have been abroad in the cañon, and no doubt happened along and gave his aid. Wild Bill was disappointed. He had hoped the five would be kept in the Forty Thieves until Buffalo Bill reached Sun Dance. Strolling into the office of the hotel, Wild Bill saw Clancy in close conversation with the man in the linen duster. They were off by themselves in one corner, and were conversing in low, animated tones. “Clancy is going to hold the man until this Captain Lawless shows up,” thought Wild Bill. “I must have a word with that tenderfoot and show him how he is going to be gold-bricked. I’d hate myself to death if I ever allowed that gang of robbers to get away with his hundred thousand.” Wild Bill, having settled the situation in his mind, strolled out to the front of the hotel, filled his pipe again, and seated himself in the chair he had occupied for most of the day. He was waiting for the stranger, and he had not long to wait. Clancy came out, unhitched his horse, climbed into the saddle, and clattered back toward the bottom of the cañon. A few minutes later the stranger followed, pulled up a chair a few feet from Wild Bill’s, and seated himself. “Howdy,” said Wild Bill, with a friendly nod, by way of breaking the ice. “How do you do, sir?” answered the stranger, with all the elaborate courtesy of an Easterner. “Will you try one of these?” He offered Wild Bill a cigar, and the latter accepted it amiably. “Stranger, I take it?” pursued Wild Bill. “Well, yes,” answered the other. “I came in on the afternoon stage from Montegordo.” “Looking up the mines?” A suspicious look crossed the stranger’s face. “Figuring on examining the Forty Thieves,” pursued Wild Bill, “with the intention of handing out one hundred thousand cold plunks for the same?” The stranger laughed. “You seem to be pretty well informed,” he remarked. “I haven’t told a soul about my business here, but you reel it right off, first clatter out of the box.” “Steer wide of the Forty Thieves, pilgrim,” said Wild Bill earnestly. “That proposition is a trap for the unwary. I know. It cost me some trouble to find out what I’m telling you, but you take my word for it, and let the property alone.” “Who are you?” inquired the stranger, with sudden interest. “My name’s Hickok, William Hickok.” The stranger hitched restlessly in his chair. “The man I’ve heard so much about under the sobriquet of Wild Bill?” he asked. “Tally! That’s the time you got your bean on the right number.” The stranger fell silent for a space. “My name is Smith,” said he finally; “J. Algernon Smith, of Chicago, and what you tell me is mighty surprising.” He drew his chair closer. “Would you mind telling me just what you have found out?” “Sure I wouldn’t mind. I’m hungry to cut into this game, and even up with the pack of tinhorns that gave me a hot half-hour yesterday.” And thereupon Wild Bill began telling what he had seen and heard in the level of the Forty Thieves. When he had finished, J. Algernon Smith was wide-eyed and staring. “Really,” he managed to gasp, “this is most astounding.” “I reckon it’s all that,” mildly answered Wild Bill. “The very name of that mine, though, is enough to make a man think some. Who’s the fellow you’re going to deal with?” “His name, I believe, is James Lawless.” [25] [26] “That’s another name that’s bad medicine.” “I’d never thought of the names in that light.” “That fellow that was talking with you, right after you got out of the stage, was Clancy, the scoundrel that was blowing gold into the rock with a shotgun. What did he want?” “Why, he was telling me that Lawless hadn’t got here yet, and he was warning me not to say anything to anybody about my business in Sun Dance.” “You couldn’t blame him for that,” remarked Wild Bill dryly. “He asked me to meet him at the foot of the slope, in the bottom of the cañon, immediately after supper,” went on the stranger, “so we could have a quiet talk.” “You can see how they’re working it, can’t you?” returned Wild Bill. “They’re trying to keep this business dark until Lawless shows up, and meanwhile Clancy is going to keep your interest at fever-heat by all kinds of stringing. Any objection to my going along with you when you meet Clancy?” “No, indeed, Wild Bill. I was about to suggest that myself. I am sure I’m very much obliged to you for your interest in me, and——” “Stow that,” interrupted Wild Bill. “It isn’t my interest in you, particularly, that leads me to take a hand, but it’s more a desire to see every man get what’s coming to him. Sabe?” At that moment the Chinaman came out in front of the hotel and pounded on a gong. “Suppa leddy!” he announced. The stranger did not remove his linen duster. It covered him from his neck to his heels, and Wild Bill thought he kept it on so as not to soil his Eastern clothes. He and the Laramie man sat at the same table, and next to each other. When the meal was over, J. Algernon Smith excused himself for a minute, and said he would rejoin Wild Bill in front of the hotel, and they would at once take their way down the slope to the bottom of the cañon. Wild Bill waited for five minutes before J. Algernon Smith rejoined him, and they started across the “flat” toward the top of the slope. “A tenderfoot has got to keep his eyes skinned,” said Wild Bill, “or he’ll collide with more trouble, in this western country, than he ever dreamed was turned loose.” “I presume you are right,” said J. Algernon Smith. “Only fancy blowing gold into a mine with a shotgun!” He laughed a little. “If they knew that, back in Chicago, they’d make game of me,” he added. “You haven’t told any one about this, have you?” “Not a soul but you.” “I’m glad of that, I can tell you. I’d hate to have the business get out. Of course, I hadn’t bought the mine yet. I was going to take samples, you know, and have them assayed; then, if the assays showed up well, the deal would have been made.” It was very dark, at that hour, on the slope leading down into the cañon. Bushes fringed the horse-trail, in places, and there was quite a patch of chaparral at the foot of the slope. Here Wild Bill and J. Algernon Smith came to a halt. “Clancy doesn’t seem to be around,” said Wild Bill. “Maybe you’d better tune up with a whistle, or a yell, so that he’ll know where you are.” J. Algernon Smith stared into the depths of a thicket. “It looks to me as though there was a man in there,” said he. “Can you see any one, Mr. Hickok?” Wild Bill took a step forward. His back was to his companion, and, while he was peering into the bushes, he heard a hasty step behind him. He started to turn; and, at that precise instant, a heavy blow, dealt with some hard instrument, landed on the back of his head. He staggered, but, with a fierce effort, rallied all his strength, and turned around. In the darkness he saw the yellow duster pressing upon him. It was Smith, and Smith was about to land another treacherous blow. Wild Bill’s head was reeling, but he had sense enough left to understand that he had made some sort of a mistake, and that Smith was other than he had seemed. Evading the blow aimed at him, the Laramie man gripped Smith by the throat. Ultimately, in spite of his unsteady condition, Wild Bill might have got the best of his antagonist had not Clancy taken a part in the struggle. The latter plunged through the bushes and assaulted Wild Bill from behind. At Clancy’s second blow, Wild Bill’s reason fled, and he dropped helplessly on the rocks. [27] [28] [29] CHAPTER III. CAPTAIN LAWLESS. How long Wild Bill remained unconscious he never knew, but it must have been a considerable time. He had been struck down at the foot of the rocky slope, and when he opened his eyes he was lying in the level of the Forty Thieves. Wild Bill had no difficulty in recognizing the level, for three or four candles were burning in niches of the rock, and lighted the place sufficiently for him to make observations. The Laramie man’s unconsciousness had lasted long enough for his captors to remove him from the slope four or five miles down the cañon and lower him into the mine. His hands and feet were bound, and a savage pain from his left arm, cramped around behind him, in no wise mitigated the discomforts of his situation. His head, too, was aching, and his brain was still dizzy. He was surrounded by seven men, all but one of whom he recognized. Clancy was one, Tex was another, and Andy was a third. The faces of two more he remembered to have seen in the level with Clancy the day before. Another of the men, of course, was J. Algernon Smith, in his linen duster. The seventh of the outfit was the fellow whose face was strange to Wild Bill. The prisoner lay snugly against the hanging wall of the level. He had made no stir when he opened his eyes, and his captors did not know that he had recovered his senses. They were talking, and Wild Bill was content to lie quietly and listen. “He got away from you,” Smith was saying, “and when he went he took the rope with him. How did you get out?” “We was in hyer all night, cap’n,” replied Clancy; “me with this game arm, an’ all the rest more er less knocked about an’ stove up. We didn’t hev no water, er grub, er nothin’, an’ I had about calculated that we’d starve ter death; then, jest as things were lookin’ mighty dark fer us, Seth, thar, happened erlong, and we heerd him hollerin’ down the shaft.” “I was left in Sun Dance,” spoke up Seth, who was the fellow Wild Bill had failed to recognize, “ter watch the stage an’ see if you, er Bingham, come in on it. Nothin’ came that arternoon, but the mail——” “It will be two or three days before Bingham arrives here,” interjected Smith. “Go on, Seth.” “As the night passed,” proceeded Seth, “an’ Clancy an’ the rest didn’t come back ter Sun Dance, I began ter feel anxious about ’em. Arter breakfast in the mornin’, I couldn’t stand the unsartinty any longer, so I saddled up an’ rode down the cañon. Seen the five hosses bunched tergether in the scrub, so I knowed the boys must be in the mine. When I climbed the ore-dump, I seen the rope layin’ on the platform, an’ I couldn’t savvy the layout, not noways. I got down on my knees, stuck my head inter the shaft, an’ let off a yell. The yell was answered, an’ it wasn’t long afore I knowed what had happened. I drapped a riata down, an’ spliced on the rope layin’ on the platform, an’ purty soon the boys was on top o’ ground.” “We all thort the game was up,” said Clancy, when Seth had finished. “The feller that had came nosin’ inter the mine had drapped his bowie, an’ we found the name, ‘Wild Bill,’ burned inter the handle. ‘Thunder!’ I says ter the boys; ‘if thet was Wild Bill we had down here, I ain’t wonderin’ none he got away. He’s a reg’lar tornader! The wonder is,’ I says, ‘thet some o’ us didn’t git killed.’ In the arternoon I rode ter Sun Dance ter meet the stage myself, an’ thet’s how I come ter meet ye, cap’n, an’ ter tell ye a leetle o’ what took place. But I reckon us fellers ain’t got any kick comin’ now.” Clancy gave a husky laugh. “Wild Bill drapped inter yore hands, cap’n, like er reg’lar tenderfoot. It was a slick play, yere bringin’ him along when ye come ter meet me at the foot o’ thet slope. The minit ye jumped at him I knowed somethin’ was up, an’ I wasn’t more’n a brace o’ shakes in takin’ a hand.” “It was a tight squeak,” said Smith. “We came within a hair’s breadth of having this whole story get out. If it had ever reached Bingham’s ears it would have cost this gang a cool hundred thousand.” “Ye’re sure Wild Bill didn’t do any talkin’?” “He says he didn’t, and I believe he told the truth.” “But thar was some ’un with him. He didn’t git out o’ the shaft without help.” “That man was a Ponca Indian. He didn’t stop in Sun Dance long, but was sent out of camp by Wild Bill, with a paper-talk for Buffalo Bill, at Fort Sill.” “Consarn it!” grunted Tex moodily. “Ain’t we goin’ ter work through this trick without hevin’ Buffler Bill mixed up in it?” A muttered oath escaped the lips of Smith. “If Buffler Bill mixes up in this,” said he, “we’ll take care of him, just as we’re going to take care of Wild Bill. There’s seven of us, and I’ve got the nerve to think I’m as good a man as Buffalo Bill.” “You’ve got nerve enough for anything, Smith,” spoke up Wild Bill, “but when you compare yourself with Cody, you’re a little bit wide of your trail.” [30] [31] [32] [33]