CHAPTER V.
THE SURPRISE AT JUNIPER JOE’S.
Buffalo Bill filled in the day by riding with Nick Nomad out to Eagle Gap, for the purpose of looking over the scene of the hold-up.
Baron von Schnitzenhauser, his curiosity fired by what the scout told him of the visit of Jackson Dane to the show girl called Vera Bright, had determined that he would shadow the Casino, instead.
So the baron donned again his prospector’s suit of clothing, discarded his little fore-and-aft cap for a miner’s slouch hat, and sallied forth. It was one of the baron’s peculiar delusions that he could disguise himself easily; it was a harmless impression, and sometimes it yielded no end of excitement. But any one familiar with the appearance of that round body and those pipe-stem legs did not need to wait for the baron to open his mouth to know who he was.
The body of Austin had been brought in by some of the citizens of Blossom Range; so there was nothing grewsome at Eagle Gap, when the scout and trapper reached it.
They found the spot readily enough, from the descriptions which had been furnished by the baron.
As said, it was a ragged crevice of rock, through which the winding mountain trail ran. Beside it was the ridge over which the baron had jumped, and the shaly slope down which his round body had plunged in search of safety.
Buffalo Bill and Nomad looked the place over pretty thoroughly. They found blood stains at the point where Austin had been killed and Brown had been wounded. Near by they picked up empty cartridge shells, apparently from the rifles of the outlaws. But they found nothing else of much interest. The rocky surface held no tracks, either of the men or the burros; so that trailing was out of the question. Any of the several gullies leading off from the main one might have taken the road agents away; yet which one, or whether they had gone straight along the winding path when they disappeared from the sight of Brown, could not be settled. The baron had not seen them depart.