Wilkins sprang to his feet, he was so excited, and began to walk about the room.
“Cody, you’ve always been an honorable man, but you know about these things! I’m a gambler; I seem to be a slave to cards. Barlow is another, but he’s shrewder than I am, and I think he is tricky. We played, and I got in debt to him. I owe him five thousand dollars. I can never pay it, of course, and he knows I can’t; for I haven’t five thousand cents, and he knows that, too.
“Well, just because I owed him so much he began to get me to do little favors for him. At first they were all square. Later they have begun to be crooked, and I was too weak to refuse to do them, because of that debt.
“The last has to do with you—with you, Buffalo Bill!”
“With me?”
“Yes. You know that nugget you gave to Colonel Montrose—the nugget with the strange marks on it?”
“Ah, yes, I recall that nugget. I gave it to him not long since. And a strange nugget it is. I’ll tell you about it some time.”
“Well, that nugget comes into my story—holds first place there. For it was stolen from Colonel Montrose by Lieutenant Barlow, and——”
The scout came to his feet.
“Be sure you know just what you are talking about!” he warned. “What you charge Barlow with is a crime that will——”