Nothing had ever happened in Pinnacle City that caused as much excitement as the robbery of the bank. It was something that affected nearly everybody in the Tumbling River country. As Uncle Hozie expressed it—
“There’s a lot of ⸺ flat pocketbooks right now.”
The news spread swiftly, and by noon of the following day the town was filled with range-folk. The sheriff came in for the usual amount of criticism, and a number of the cattlemen sat in his office, trying to help him devise ways and means of putting a stop to Joe Rich’s activities. A wire had been received from Old Man Ludlow, the president of the bank, who was on his way back to Pinnacle.
Uncle Hozie mourned the loss of eight thousand dollars, while Ed Merrick swore himself red in the face over half that amount. He had drawn out five thousand to lend to Jim Wheeler, thus cutting down his bank deposit.
But they were all losers; some of them more so than others, and Joe Rich’s latest robbery bid fair to make times rather hard in Tumbling River. It was a privately owned bank, and they knew that Ludlow could not make good their losses.
William H. Cates took the first train out of town. The sheriff had hauled him out of the hearse and put him to bed. The following morning he was filled with remorse over it all, but strangely enough he was unable to tell just whom he had been with. He told the sheriff to do his little best and boarded a train for the north.
An examination of the vault disclosed the fact that the robber had taken every cent of money, but had not bothered with any papers. Warner refused even to make a guess at how much money was in the vault, but admitted that it was more than was usually carried. The bank remained closed.
Hashknife, Sleepy and Honey came back to town that forenoon, but the Heavenly Triplets did not show up. Merrick talked with Hashknife about the robbery. Hashknife was not interested to any great extent.
A little later on Hashknife was talking with Kelsey, when the depot agent came to Kelsey.
“Here’s a funny thing,” said the agent. “Remember the night the bridge caught fire?”