“You think he stole the body, eh?” put in Buffalo Bill. “So do I.”
“Of course he is the thief. And I’ll bet a hat I know how he worked the snap. When I was in Taos gathering the facts about the murder of Jared Holmes, I learned that Holmes—he went under another name then—had been seen colleaguing with Tom Darke, the man who did the actual killing.”
“What of it?” broke in the agitated young man. “How could this talk in Taos, months ago, refer to the case of Myra Wilton?”
“Easy, friend Henson,” returned Wild Bill amiably. “Give me time and I’ll make the connection. I learned something else. Rixton Holmes was a druggist in the early part of his career. He worked at the business in St. Louis; had to leave the town between two days because he played a cunning fraud on an insurance company.”
The four friends were now walking out of the village toward the point where the horses had been stationed.
Wild Bill, without interruption, continued his statement. “The case was a peculiar one. A woman, no matter what her station in life was, had her life insured. She was a friend of Rixton Holmes. A month after the issuing of the policy she died; at least, that was the opinion of the doctor who signed the death certificate. The money was paid to Holmes, who was named as the beneficiary. Six months later, the woman turned up alive, and gave the snap away to the district attorney. She wanted revenge. Holmes had agreed to whack up, and he failed to do so. There was no original intent to cheat her, but faro got the money, and he simply couldn’t make good with her.
“It appears that the plot was concocted by Holmes, who said he knew of a drug that, after being taken, would produce the semblance of death, sufficient to deceive an ordinary physician; and, by the way, it was a very ordinary one who attended her in what was supposed to be her last illness.”
“I begin to see,” exclaimed Henson, as Wild Bill paused and looked at the young man with a meaning smile. “Holmes induced Myra to take the drug, and when she was under its influence he stole into the tepee and carried her off.”
“You’re partly right and partly wrong,” replied Wild Bill. “She took the drug, all right, but she did not know that it came from her bitter enemy. Holmes never saw her, and never gave the drug into her hands. I believe she took the stuff in the belief that it came from her friends.”
Buffalo Bill now had something to say. “I am inclined to think that Hickok is right about the drug. I now call to mind that there was a peculiar drug-store odor about the tepee when I entered it. But Rixton Holmes, as Hickok says, never personally induced the girl to take the drug. There is mystery about that part of the affair that won’t likely be solved until we rescue Miss Wilton and catch the villain who carried her off. It was a bold thing to do. The time selected for the abduction was the best possible. By George! I have it. Holmes followed us from the vicinity of the flat. He must have seen us soon after he stole Crow-killer’s pony, and, as his aim was to get the girl, he followed us to the village, and permitted me to act as his cat’s-paw, hang him.”