“Wasn’t there something familiar about the voice of that robber, Pink?” asked Clancy. “Seems to me I have heard it somewhere before.”
“Come to think of it,” said Ballard, “the voice did have a familiar ring. Where the deuce have I heard it?”
Both lads racked their brains for a few moments. It was Clancy who finally recalled the owner of the voice.
“It was that pasty-faced Shoup!” he declared. “Lenning’s particular crony, Billy Shoup.”
“That’s right!” cried Ballard. “A job like this is about what we might expect of Shoup. But who was the other fellow? It’s so dark in here I couldn’t see much of either of them. The other fellow didn’t do any talking, did he?”
“No; neither of them wasted much time in talk. I wonder,” and Clancy drew a quick breath, “if that second fellow was Lenning?”
“Why, no!” exclaimed the startled Ballard. “Lenning is night watchman at the cyanide works.”
“That doesn’t cut any ice. He might have got the job as watchman just to make this robbery easier for him and Shoup.”
“Those two wouldn’t work together, Clan; that is, not after what happened in the gulch.”
“You wouldn’t think so, if they were any other fellows than Shoup and Lenning. But you never can tell what those chaps will do. They may have patched up their differences, and got together for this piece of lawless work.”