“I’ve got to send out an alarm,” said Shepard, when he had swallowed the whisky. “It ain’t too late to round them fellers up, maybe. Where’s Buffalo Bill? Somebody jump down to the Eagle House and let him know. And git word to the mayor, somebody; thar’s got to be a reward offered. The Wells Fargo will want to give a reward, anyhow. Gee whittaker! Juniper Joe out of jail ag’in, and I done it! Gabe, give me another drink; this knocks me all out.” When Buffalo Bill came down to see the perspiring jailer, he asked a number of questions. “You were fooled neatly,” was his comment, when he had heard the story. “But--but,” stammered the jailer, “who was the brass-plated high brow that carried the job through?” “Tim Benson,” said the great scout quietly. Shepard fell back against the wall. “Benson!” he gasped. “Wow! The feller that played woman and fooled the whole town!” CHAPTER XIV. A WORRIED SHERIFF. The express office and Gopher Gabe’s saloon were robbed that night. Matt Shepard, sheriff and jailer, brought the news to Buffalo Bill, at the Eagle House. “I didn’t think they’d strike so soon,” he said. “That is, if it was them done it. But Benson has got nerve enough fer anything.” Shepard was “sore” over the way Benson had overreached him. “There has been other robberies, though--while Juniper Joe was in the jail; and of course them couldn’t be charged against _him_.” He had taken a seat in the scout’s room in his best chair, and now helped himself from the box of cigars on the table. Nomad was in the room, and so was the baron. “What do you think of this chap they call the Fool of Folly Mountain?” he asked abruptly. “What do _you_ think of him?” Buffalo Bill returned. “Well, it’s suspicious, the way he is doin’. There’s a whole lot of fellers in town ready to swear that he is up to road-agent tricks, and that what he’s doin’, er pretendin’ to do up there, is jest a blind. I dunno about it myself, but I’m watchin’ him. I was up there yesterday, after Juniper Joe got past me, lookin’ round.” Buffalo Bill seemed amused. “You didn’t find Juniper Joe there, of course?” “No. Hardly expected that I would; but I wanted a peek at the things that feller’s doin’. He’s rigged up a little place where he assays stuff frum his mine, so he says. I think it’s a bluff. I seen some of the gold he took down to the express office which he claimed he got out of his mine by some new and secret process; it was just gold fused together. He could hold up stages and travelers, git their gold ore, and turn it into solid pieces that way, couldn’t he?” “Easy enough, I should think,” the scout admitted. “So I’ve about arrive at the conclusion that’s what he’s doin’,” the sheriff averred, biting off a piece of his cigar. “I think I’ll have some men set to watch his cabin.” “Er, waugh!” Nomad snorted. The sheriff gave him a sharp look.