"I'm well acquainted with President Good of this road, and I know you can't get anything this way; and if you take my advice you'll go back to work: and tell him your troubles afterward. Now, boys, that's all I've got to say, and I reckon if you listen to it you'll come out a good deal better than if you listen to one or two men that for some reason of their own are trying to stir up a lot of trouble, and will be in jail before night, as like as not."
Captain Bill went down on the street and the crowd soon followed. A good many came to him and expressed willingness to go to work. Here and there he talked to a little group in his friendly, earnest way. The strike at Wichita Falls was over.
From Wichita Falls McDonald went over to Fort Worth, where there was similar trouble, but learned that a more serious situation existed at the Thurber coal-mines, in Erath County. The miners were of many nationalities—ignorant and brutish—and they were swayed by anarchical leaders. The Ranger Captain was urged to take his men to Thurber, but decided to go alone.
Arriving at Thurber, he hunted up the mine officials, for consultation. Colonel Hunter, President of the mines, looked at Captain Bill—bent over from his wounds and battered up from illness and exposure—and shook his head.
"You should have brought your men," he said. "You can't do anything with a gang like ours, alone."
"Well, Colonel, I'm using my men in other places. I'll look around a little and do what I can, anyway."
Loitering about the town, he discovered that a number of kegs of beer were going out to a high hill, beyond the outskirts—headquarters of the striking miners. He learned that there was to be a sort of mass meeting there that night, when the leaders and chief agitators would be on hand. He decided to be present.
It was well after dark when he set out, and a good crowd had assembled when he reached the place. It was out on a mountain where the timber had been cut off, about half a mile from Thurber, and there was no light except from a misty moon. At one place there was a big log, used by the speakers to stand on, and about this the crowd and the beer-kegs were gathered. Captain Bill, unnoticed, blended with the outer edges.
It was near eleven o'clock, and a speaker had come to the conclusion that the crowd was in the proper condition to take some good radical advice—which might be followed by prompt action—so he proceeded to give it. He told them how they had been mistreated and what they should do. They were to begin by blowing up the mines and the superintendent's office, and he told them which mine to blow up first. Then he told them what they were to do to "Old Hunter," and it was clear from the faces and the muttering of the listeners that they were ready to do these things.
Captain Bill worked his way through the crowd until he was close to the speaker's log. When the agitator reached what seemed a good stopping place, the Ranger Captain suddenly stepped up beside him. The speaker stopped dead still, in his surprise. It was Captain Bill's turn.