Some one passed an open window with a lighted lamp, the rays of which fell upon two men conversing in whispers not twenty feet from him. Hickok recognized one of the men as the sheriff of the county, and the other, he felt quite sure, was the man who had been pointed out as the local Indian agent. Wild Bill was curious to know what their private confab was about, for he had intuition that it concerned the arrival of Buffalo Bill and his pards. Hickok glanced about him for means of getting closer to the pair. Near him was a door opening into the corner of the building which seemed to be some sort of a low warehouse,. He tried the door, and it opened readily at his touch; then he stepped inside and softly closed the door behind him. He felt like a burglar, and had no means of knowing what sort of a place it was, because it would not do to strike a match. The windows were uncurtained, and he had noticed that the two men stood close to one of them. Once more the lamp passed a window in the adjoining building and revealed enough of Hickok’s surroundings to enable him to proceed. He was in a hallway that led to a room in the back and a stair to the story above. Along the corridor next the stairs were tiered barrels of flour, sugar, and pork, but next the outer wall a passage had been left to the room in the rear of the building. The man from Laramie approached the window near which the men were talking, and, crouching there, could see their heads above the sill clearly outlined against the light of a stable lantern far down the street. Hickok was wondering how he could raise the window within a foot of the heads of the men without their detecting him, when he discovered that he could hear their whisperings plainly. A pane of glass was gone, and he wondered why they had not heard him. The first words Hickok distinguished were: “Of course you’ll have to go through the performance of investigating the case, but don’t ring me in, and Dave was dead drunk all through it.” “Yes, I’ll have to hold some o’ the boys for witnesses, but I ain’t goin’ in till I think all them that knows anything about it has got away.” “Say, Rus, do you know what Cody is here for?” “No; that’s what I’ve been trying to find out.” “Well, he’s after me first, and Dave, and you, and anybody he can find who is mixed up in this Indian graft. I got a wire from Reynolds to be on my guard.” The sheriff whistled softly. “Does he know you yet?” he asked. “No; he arrived at the wrong time. The trial has brought in so many strangers that it is pretty hard work telling who from which.” “He must have been sent here by Washington authorities. How did they git wise?” “Somebody has leaked to make political capital.” “What’s goin’ to be done?” “If we could get Buffalo Bill out of the way without direct suspicion, we would be safe for a long time--but how to get rid of him is the problem.” “Couldn’t we get him outside on some pretext and have him ambushed by Indians?”