Buffalo Bill did not care to be held to testify in the pretended investigation which was bound to follow, so he and his friends slipped away. The report of the coroner would be the usual one: “Shot by an unknown in a volley by barroom crowd.”
Outside the scout awaited for a time the action of the town’s protectors. In half an hour the sheriff arrived, and in another half hour the Western coroner came to take charge of the remains.
Justice certainly did not move on the “hot foot” in that city of “courage juice” and bad men.
As the scout and his faithful negro and Indian pards were moving away there came a terrific explosion from the direction of the hotel. A moment later a red glare sprang up, and then hoarse shouts and screams of anguish rent the air.
“Must be a boiler explosion,” exclaimed the scout, hastening on, “and at or near the hotel,” he added.
His worst fears were realized. The disaster had occurred at the hotel, but it was not a boiler explosion. The entire wing in which Buffalo Bill and his pards had been assigned quarters had been blown up by some powerful explosive.
No other explanation was possible than that some one had placed a heavy explosive under the wing with malicious intent, the proprietor, who was soon found by Buffalo Bill, declared.
Hundreds of people flocked to the scene, and among them Buffalo Bill sought for his pard, Wild Bill Hickok, the man from Laramie, the hero of scores of daring exploits.
The wing was wrecked and the hotel burning, but the scout still hoped that by some miracle his partner had escaped.
The night wore away, and the fire was conquered only when the hotel was in ashes. Two other guests of the hotel were missing, and half a dozen had been more or less seriously injured.