“This is important. Give me the whole of it.”
The trapper went into details, leaving out nothing that had the slightest bearing on the peculiar situation.
Little Cayuse likewise added his testimony, explaining how he had discovered that the scout and the baron had been lowered into the old shaft.
“So far,” applauded the scout, “this little drama has been a two-star performance, with Nomad and Cayuse occupying the center of the stage. Nick, you and Cayuse have done mighty well. By acting on this information you two have collected, we’ll be able to run out this trail of McGowan’s in short order.
“Bascomb and the redskins, unless I misread the signs are going to storm the Three-ply camp to-morrow, after the amalgam has been scraped off the mill-plates, and make ’way with it.
“I have suspected Bernritter and Jacobs ever since I saw them in the sheriff’s office. What do you think of them for a pair of contemptible, scheming scoundrels? McGowan has all the confidence in the world in Bernritter, and the super has taken advantage of that confidence to rob his employer systematically.
“I know, now, just as well as I know I am sitting here, that those rascals contrived to put that bar into the baron’s saddle-bag, solely for the purpose of bringing our Dutch pard under suspicion and sidetracking McGowan’s distrust until the mill clean-up could be stolen and rushed away.
“We’ll nip this pretty plot in the bud, but we shall have to go about it carefully. Bascomb and his Indians think the baron and I are holed up in that shaft. We’ll let them continue to think so, and will so mask our movements that they will not know we’re at large until we show ourselves to frustrate their designs on the Three-ply gold. Give me a saddle-blanket, one of you fellows.”
Nomad was puzzled by this request, but he immediately loosened his saddle-cinches and drew out the blanket. Then the scout dropped the riata into the shaft once more and let himself down.