Juniper Joe and his “wife” had also followed Ward; and they had killed him. After that, becoming frightened, they had tried to hide the body in a cañon, had thrown away the bags of nuggets, and had shaped their course to get out of the country, sure that at last Buffalo Bill had discovered the truth and was after them hotfooted. Juniper Joe bitterly denied the statements of Vera Bright, raving thunderously in making his denials; he was a much-abused and injured man, he declared, of good intentions and wholly innocent of wrongdoing. Some proof against him was found when the mine was again gone over by Buffalo Bill and the local officers, and a thorough search brought out of various hiding places the whole of the gold shipments which the Wells Fargo had tried to send across the hills by the prospectors. This was good evidence that Juniper Joe had been concerned in that hold-up, and that when John Ward attacked the occupants of the cabin he found but a small part of the treasure. As for Juniper Joe’s mine, it was a “fake.” The indications showed that no rich pockets had ever been struck in it; so that it was apparent that the nuggets which Juniper Joe pretended he had dug out had been obtained in hold-ups. CHAPTER XI. THE FOOL OF FOLLY MOUNTAIN. Finding the trailing difficult, old Nomad returned to Blossom Range that evening, having accomplished nothing. He was tremendously excited, when he learned the story told by Vera Bright. “Waugh! Thet was a ringer!” he cried, commenting on the clever manner in which Tim Benson and Juniper Joe had deceived everybody with their “jubilee.” Buffalo Bill got out and reread Juniper Joe’s unique invitation to attend the “wedding.” “I vonder vot Vhite-eyed Moses iss t’inking now?” said the baron. “Oh, waal, he got paid fer his fiddlin’,” said Nomad; “so what does he keer? I should say thet Jedge Abercrombie Morris, who performed the weddin’ ceremony, was about the wu’st fooled man in town.” Buffalo Bill laughed. “Do you think he was fooled any worse,” he said, “than Buffalo Bill, Nick Nomad, and Baron von Schnitzenhauser? It seems to me not.” “Say, thet was shore the plum limit, wan’t it?” the trapper whooped. “I t’ink dhose two men shouldt be called Vera Bright, insteadt uff dot voman,” the baron punned. “I am admitting dot idt vos too mooch vor Schnitzenhauser.” “Waugh! Ther same hyar. We was all fooled complete.” It was likely that the town would have “the laugh on itself” for a long time, whenever Juniper Joe’s jubilee was mentioned. The next day, Buffalo Bill and his pards tried to pick up the trail of Tim Benson. But the clever little rascal had a good start; and in the hills north of the town he had so blinded his trail that they could do nothing with it.