CHAPTER VII.LAYING PLANS.
Little Cayuse was entirely successful in his errand to the Three-ply camp. It was not long before he returned to the scout, bringing McGowan with him.
“Faith,” said McGowan, sizing up the scout and his pards in the faint light, “I wasn’t expecting this.”
“I told you,” laughed the scout, “that you would probably hear from us when you least expected to.”
“You were right in that, Buffalo Bill. But why don’t you and your pards come down to the camp? I can make you comfortable there, and——”
“It won’t do,” interrupted the scout. “We don’t want any of your men to know that we’re anywhere near the camp.”
“Why is that?”
“Because the bullion thieves are planning to get away with your clean-up to-morrow, and we can back-cap them to better advantage if they don’t know we’re anywhere around.”
“What!” gasped McGowan. “You must be mistaken, Buffalo Bill.”
“You’re going to have a mill clean-up to-morrow, aren’t you, McGowan?”
“Yes. As soon as the night-shift knocks off work in the mill we’ll hang up the stamps and the day-shift will begin the clean-up.”
“How long will it take?”
“By two o’clock the amalgam ought to be ready for retorting,but it will probably be day after to-morrow before Jacobs gets the bullion refined and run into bars.”
“What do you do with the amalgam?”
“It is kept in the mill until it is ready for Jacobs; then it is taken over to the laboratory by the tanks and Jacobs gets to work on it.”
“It will be taken to the laboratory about two o’clock?”
“Yes.”
“Who’s with Jacobs while he’s refining and running out the bullion?”
“I am, usually, and so is Bernritter.”
“You will be with him to-morrow?”
“Yes.”
“Armed?”
“Of course. But why all this questioning?”
“I want to collect information for our work to-morrow, that’s all. Shortly after two o’clock, McGowan, you may look for an attack on the laboratory.”
McGowan started.
“An attack? From whom?”
“From a gang of stray Apaches led by a white scoundrel named Bascomb; and from Bernritter and Jacobs.”
“An attack from Bernritter? You’re wide of your trail, Cody. Bernritter is loyalty itself. There’s not a dishonest hair in Bernritter’s head.”
“You’re mistaken. Bernritter is a contemptible scoundrel.”
“I’ll not believe it.”
“He’ll prove it to you. Do as I say and you’ll see him caught red-handed to-morrow.”
McGowan seemed dazed. For a moment he was silent.
“Then Indians are mixed up in this?” he asked finally.
“Yes. There are a dozen or more of them. They intend to swoop down on the Three-ply to-morrow afternoon, steal the amalgam from that clean-up, stand off any of your miners and millmen who show fight, and escape into Mexico.”
“I’m willing to take your word about the intended robbery, but I can’t think that Bernritter has anything to do with it. Why, man, that fellow has worked for me five years. He’s—he’s engaged to marry my daughter, Annie, who is away visiting in ’Frisco. I can’t think he’d do me dirt like that!”
“It’s hard, I know,” said the scout, in a kindly tone, “to have your confidence betrayed by a man like Bernritter. Still, the facts are sometimes brutal, McGowan. It is far and away better for you to find out what sort of a fellow Bernritter is now than after his marriage to your daughter.”
McGowan, greatly shaken, bowed his head thoughtfully.
“The night is wearing to a close,” went on the scout briskly, “and we must have our plans all laid before morning. How many men have you in the camp on whom you can absolutely rely?”
“I thought I could rely on all of them,” was the slow answer, “with the possible exception of Jacobs. The cyanid expert has only been here for a few months, and I never liked him. He’s a good workman, however, and I’ve kept him solely for that reason.”
“How many men are on the night-shift in the mine?”
“Eleven.”
“They will be in the bunk-house to-morrow afternoon?”
“Yes.”
“How many are on the day-shift in the mill?”
“A batteryman, two amalgamators, and an engineer. The engineer and the batteryman will help the amalgamators make the clean-up, since the fires will be banked and the stamps hung up.”
“Then there will be four in the mill?”
“Yes.”
“How many Mexicans are working about the cyanid-tanks?”
“Six. Their foreman is a white man, Andy O’Connell—as game and honest a man as ever walked.”
“Can you depend on all the men who are to be in the bunk-house, in the mill, and around the tanks to-morrow afternoon?”
“I don’t know about the Mexicans, but I can bank on the rest.”
“Then here is what you must do: Contrive in some way to have the men in the bunk-house and in the mill armed with six-shooters. Arm O’Connell, too, but don’t arm the Mexicans. Do this at noon, and don’t let either Bernritter or Jacobs know that you do it.”
“That will take a lot of guns, Buffalo Bill, and I haven’t so many. Most of the men, however, have weapons of their own.”
“If you can’t arm all of them with guns, arm them with iron drills, axes, picks—anything that comes handiest. My Dutch pard and I would also like a six-shooter apiece—we had the misfortune to be stripped of our own hardware. Is there any place, near the laboratory and the cyanid-tanks, where you could hide Nomad and the baron and me?”
“There’s an old powder-house at the rear of the laboratory,” said McGowan. “It isn’t used for storinghigh-explosives any more, and you might hang out in there.”
“At noon,” proceeded the scout, “when you arm your men tell your mill-engineer to keep a lookout in the direction of the cyanid-tanks. The moment he sees a man there waving a handkerchief, tell him to blow the whistle as long as he can. That will be the signal for your men to get busy. I presume there will be steam enough in the boiler for that?”
“Yes. The mill starts up again when the night-shift goes on. I’ll tell the engineer. Nevertheless, this may be a case of all cry and no wool, Buffalo Bill.”
“I hope it will prove to be, but I am positive it will not. Will you carry out instructions, McGowan?”
“Certainly! I’d be a fool if I didn’t. I can’t afford to lose forty thousand dollars’ worth of bullion. But you’re wrong about Bernritter.”
“Why, Bernritter has been stealing you blind for the last two weeks!”
“Can you prove that?”
“I wouldn’t make such an assertion if I couldn’t prove it. Didn’t you tell me that you and Bernritter have been in the mill almost every night since you have been missing gold?”
“Yes.”
“And that you watched the body of the mill while Bernritter kept behind the battery-boxes?”
“That was the way of it.”
“Nomad,” said the scout, “dump those war-bags here, in front of McGowan.”
The war-bags were brought and emptied of their contents.
“Amalgam!” cried McGowan, starting back with one of the silver balls in his hand.
“Exactly,” returned the scout; “amalgam taken from the Three-ply Mine. It was stored in an abandoned shaft, not far from here and close to the Black Cañon trail.”
“But—but how was it taken?” gulped McGowan.
The scout took from under his coat two sets of copper wires. From each set of wires dangled flat pieces of copper.
“You see these contrivances?” the scout asked, striking a match to afford McGowan a better view of the wires and the dangling pieces of copper. “Bernritter strung those in the battery-boxes, and the copper pieces captured all your best gold before it ever reached the mill-plates. At the proper time the wires were removed from the boxes, replaced with others, and the amalgam cleaned from the copper pieces at Bernritter’s leisure, or at Jacobs’. The stolen amalgam was then conveyed to that old shaft and stored away until it could be marketed. I found those wires,” the scout added, “under the pile of amalgam balls, in the deserted shaft.”
McGowan was thunderstruck at the case made out by Buffalo Bill. Then, as he realized how audaciously he had been robbed, his anger began to mount.
“By thunder,” he cried, smiting his hands fiercely together, “I’ll have the scalps of the men who did this, no matter who they are! Buffalo Bill, you have done great work! In one night you have unraveled a mystery that has bothered the life out of me for two weeks. I’ll remember you for this.”
“You’ll have to thank my two pards, Nick Nomad and Little Cayuse,” said the scout, “for what has been accomplished.They have done the bulk of the work so far. But,” he broke off abruptly, pointing to the glimmer of dawn in the east, “morning is coming, and Nomad, the baron, and I must get into that powder-house. Cayuse,” and the scout turned to the boy, “you will take charge of the horses. We can’t take them into the camp, for Bernritter or Jacobs would see them, and suspect something. Keep them out here in the hills. We’ll help you carry the amalgam to the camp, McGowan,” he finished, facing the mine-owner, “and when you get it there, see that you stow it away where Bernritter won’t see it.”
The amalgam was put back into the war-bags. The scout took one sack of rations from his horse, told Cayuse to use the other sack for himself, and then the scout, Nomad, and the baron climbed the hill with McGowan and descended into the still quiet camp.
Buffalo Bill’s plans had been cleverly laid. If nothing went wrong with them, there would be hot times at the Three-ply during the day to come.