“You see, speakin’ gin’rally, we figger that we’re workin’ ag’inst jest two men,” said the sheriff; “when, as a matter of fact, we don’t know how many we’re up ag’inst. Benson and Juniper Joe, in my opinion, has got scores of men who will help ’em, right hyer in this camp. I remember two months ago, when Benson was workin’ the road, we tried sendin’ through strong guards with the stages. There was _ten_ men on one stage that was held up in the cañon jest t’other side o’ Stag Mountain. But there was _twenty_ of the road agents that held it up. Five of the guards was shot dead in the fight, two more wounded, and the whole shipment was lost. They even took the stage horses. That’s the kind of men we’ve got to deal with.” He knocked the ashes from his cigar, swung one leg over the other, and went on: “Then there’s the Utes. They ain’t road agents, but they’re treacherous devils, and they hide the road agents. They do it because the agents supplies ’em with whisky and amm’nition. Old Iron Bow, the Ute chief, is as big a rascal as ever walked on two legs, and the most of his waryers air jest like him. “Three weeks ago, when I was after Jimmy Blood, I had a tip that he had hiked to Iron Bow and that the chief was hidin’ him. So I goes up there with a gang of my men at my back, and demands him. The chief he gives me the laugh; says ’t no white man ain’t been in that village for a month. I wanted to search the tepees, but he wouldn’t let me. I didn’t dare try it without his consent; I didn’t have men enough, in the first place, and, in the second, if I’d got the Utes started, there’d been a merry old party; it might ’a’ put ’em on the warpath, and I didn’t care to take that risk. Jimmy was there, I reckon; but he made a sneak afterwards, and got out of the country. He was heard of, anyway, over in Albuquerque.” He paused for breath. “So,” he added, “that’s the situation. If any one reckons that bein’ sheriff of this county is a snap, let him take another think. It’s plantin’ gray hairs in my head fast enough, I tell you; which is maybe because I try to play square and do my whole duty.” He was on the point of recurring to the subject of the possibility of apprehending Benson and Juniper Joe, when there was a tap on the door that stayed him. When Buffalo Bill opened the door in answer to the knock he saw a veiled woman. “May I come in?” she said, looking past him. But when she was inside and beheld the sheriff she seemed on the point of making a retreat. “I’ll go, madam,” said Shepard, rising, “if you think you can talk better without me bein’ here.” “No; stay!” she said, after hesitating. “Perhaps it is just as well that you should hear what I’ve come to say to Mr. Cody.” Buffalo Bill had put out a chair for her. When she took it she lifted her veil and revealed herself as Vera Bright. The woman looked about the room, then fixed her eyes on Buffalo Bill, though she gave a glance now and then in the direction of the sheriff.