With these words she fell back into bed and expired!
CHAPTER LXII.
CAPTAIN JACK AND THE “BAKER’S DOZEN” ARE LODGED IN GAOL, AND AWAIT THE JUDGMENT OF THE LAW.
If, during his whole lifetime, Wildfire Ned had done nothing more, the successful capture of Captain Jack and his noted gang was more than enough to bring his name prominently before the world, with honourable mention for deeds of daring in the cause of the public good.
For a long time the public knew but little of the doings of the “Baker’s Dozen,” as the gang was called, but after their apprehension so many things came to light to prove their villany that all good people shuddered when they heard of them.
Old Bates and Captain Jack had long been before the world in the character of “thief-takers,” but as we have already seen in the pages of this story, they themselves were the greatest rascals left unhung.
And well did Colonel Blood know it.
But Blood, like a wicked, designing man as he really was, never breathed a single syllable of their doings, so long as they payed him well for his silence, or proved of any use to him in his own nefarious practices.
But now that Captain Jack and his companions were in prison, Colonel Blood drew up a report of their doings and mode of proceeding, which, in brief, was as follows:—