Buffalo Bill's death message or, In the face of doom
“The name was given to me. I did not take it myself. It was given to me
because, when I had a contract to furnish beef to the men who were
building the Union Pacific Railroad, I killed more buffaloes than any
other man of the border ever killed before. It’s not a record I’m
particularly proud of, though the work was necessary at the time. Now,
why are you Klamath John, and what do you want with me?”
“I took the name because the town here suggested it,” was the man’s
answer. “That’s the only reason. As to what I wanted—you saw the letters
I left sticking on your door?”
“I saw them, but they didn’t explain anything. I wasn’t sure but they
paved the way for a trap. That’s why I didn’t respond very promptly to
them.”
This seemed to please Klamath John, for he chuckled.
“Why didn’t you call on me at my hotel, instead of taking that singular
way to get in communication with me?” Buffalo Bill now demanded.
“I had my reasons, Cody; I wanted to test you.”
“In what manner?”
“Well, the purpose was to see if you could be aroused to a proper
interest in this thing.”
“I’m in the dark, you know, as to what it is you want of me.”
“I’ll come to it right off. You remember the gruesome stick pins I
used?”
“Yes. I have them with me.”
“They’re not gold, of course, but——”
“I beg your pardon, they’re pure gold!”
“What?”
“Just as I say, they’re pure gold. I had one of them tested.”
“Gr-reat governor! Is that so?” His astonishment was too natural to be
assumed. “I thought they were just brass, washed over with gold,” he
declared. “So they’re pure gold? Then it becomes even more interesting.”
“Just remember that I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Well, I’ll come right to it. I found the pins, and there was a letter
lying with them. I’ve got it here, and I’ll show it to you in a minute.
The letter is signed, ‘Red Reynard, the Fox.’”
“Ah!”
“That interests you, does it?”
“Yes, very much.”
“Just in what way?”
“I think I’ll hear your story before I say in what way such a letter
interests me.”
“Well, this Red Reynard is said to be a highwayman and desperado. I’ve
been trailing him. But it was luck got me that letter. It seems to have
been dropped accidentally, and the pins with it.”
“You are an officer?” the scout asked.
“No, not at present.”
“You have been?”
“No.”
“Well, go on.”
“I found out, by that letter, that Red Reynard and a lot more are in the
Golconda Cup, and they’ve found gold there.”
“But nobody can get into the Golconda Cup!”
“That’s what everybody thinks. But _they_ got in. And they went by the
way of Lost River. Golconda Cup, you know, is supposed to be a big, wide
valley, or basin, walled in by cliffs so steep and high on all sides
that they can’t be scaled. It’s said that a few men have climbed to the
top of the outer walls, and have looked over into the basin, but no man
has ever been able to get down the inner walls; or, if he did, he was
never able to climb ’em and get back to tell what he’d discovered.
That’s the story.”
“Yes.”
“You’ve seen those walls?”
“I climbed to the top of them, on the south, once, a couple of years
ago.”
“Jerusalem! You did? Well, I tried it, and quit soon enough. I don’t see
how you did it.”
“Ropes and patience,” said the scout.
“But you couldn’t get down on the inside?”
“No. And I could see no place where any one could get down. The walls
have a thousand feet drop and are as steep as the sides of a house, with
not a crevice showing in them, and not a bush, nor anything that would
give foothold or a place to hang a rope.”
“Yet this Red Reynard is in there now, and he and his men are taking out
the gold.”
“Just a fairy story,” said the scout.
“They went in by the way of Lost River,” Klamath John continued, without
heeding this comment. “It’s said that no man ever descended that river,
that it runs into a black cañon, and then on into a tunnel-like hole,
and then down into the very bowels of the earth. Two men were caught in
it, in a canoe, and they were sucked down into the hole and never were
seen again.”
“I’ve heard that.”
“You wouldn’t want to try that route?”
“I should think twice before trying it.”
“Well, I’ve been along the top wall of the cañon there, and I believe it
can be done. You see, a thing not generally known is, that after the
stream gets close down under the outer walls of Golconda Cup, it splits
into two parts. One is Lost River, or the continuation of it, the other
simply shoots through a big hole in the walls and flows into the Cup,
where it’s as gentle as a mill pond.”
“But you’ve no good proof that it does?”
“I’ll show you a letter. I’ve got a candle here, which I brought for the
purpose, hoping you’d come and would want to see it, and talk this thing
over. Cody, you’re the man to help in this, if I can get you
interested.”
Klamath John lighted his candle and produced the letter.
By the light of the candle the scout read it.
It was as follows:
“MY DEAR BAT: You can get into Golconda Cup without any
trouble, if you’ve got a little nerve and don’t scare too
easy. Take a canoe at the head of the cañon where Lost River
flows into it. Then when you get well down toward the walls
of the Cup, you’ll find where the stream branches. One of
the branches is Lost River proper, the other shoots through
a dark tunnel, and then out into the Cup, where it flows
along as quiet as you please. There’s plenty of room over
your head when you go through that tunnel, and you needn’t
be afraid.
“It’s a lucky thing for us that the entrance looks so scary,
for it keeps people out, and makes them believe that
Golconda Cup can’t be got into at all. But it’s dead easy.
Take the right fork where it branches, and you’re safe
enough.
“We’ve got a cinch down here—gold to talk about. I never saw
the like of it, the river sand is full of it, and there are
slivers to be picked up that are bigger than a toothpick.
Yesterday I got a pure nugget that was worth at least a
thousand dollars. We’re cleaning up more than a thousand
dollars a day, and some days we clean up twice that much.
But this thing wants to be kept on the strict q. t.
“I’m hiding out here, you know, and so are the other boys,
and the officers are simply up against it. They couldn’t
find us in a thousand years. For everybody believes that the
Golconda Cup can’t be got into. We got into it dead easy;
and we get in and out just as easy as we got in. I’ll show
you if you come. The gold we’re carrying to Frisco, and
stacking it in the banks there. The Frisco bankers think
we’re working in Death Valley, and we let it go at that, and
they don’t know where the gold is coming from. We let Poker
Pete take it in for us. Pete’s a shrewd guy, and they
haven’t got wise to him yet. And they’ll never get wise to
Golconda Cup. The thing is so easy I laugh whenever I think
of it.
“Crimp up your nerve, and come along.
“Your old pal,
“RED REYNARD, THE FOX.”
Buffalo Bill was surprised as much by the fact that he knew the
handwriting as he was by the contents.
“What do you think of it?” said Klamath John, when he saw that the scout
had finished reading.
“It’s the handwriting of Red Reynard.”
“Not a forgery?”
“No, I know his handwriting too well. I’ve got some of it right here.”
He dived into his pocket and produced a folded paper.
When he opened it, Klamath John saw that the handwriting was the same.
Thus ran the note produced by Buffalo Bill:
“DEAR BAT: Look out. Buffalo Bill is on our track. He came
near roping me in Glendive yesterday, but I threw sand in
his eyes and got away. I’m off for another and healthier
climate quick as I can go. Keep your eyes open, or you’ll be
into something hard.
“Your old pal,
“RED REYNARD, THE FOX.”
The scout spoke, while Klamath John was looking this over.
“Whoever you are, or are not, I’m willing for you to see that note, to
compare it with the other,” he said. “Red Reynard knows I’ve been
following him, so that it can’t hurt to tell you, or anybody.”
Klamath John looked up quickly.
“You think mebbe I’m in with that devil?”
“I don’t know anything about you, so I’ve no thoughts on the subject at
present; but if you were Red Reynard himself, it would be nothing new
for me to make openly the statement that I’ve been following him. He
knows it already, and he has known it for a long time.”
“Yes, this note shows that.”
Klamath John laid the letter and the note side by side on his knee, and
held the candle so that they could be seen and compared.
“The same handwriting,” he declared. “Cody, this proves to you that I
don’t lie, not about that letter, anyhow. And I haven’t lied about
anything else. I want to go into the Golconda Cup, and I want you to go
with me. There’s gold there, worlds of it, and I want to see it, and
mebbe handle some of it. I thought mebbe if you knowed Red Reynard was
in there, you’d jump at what I’ve told you—I mean at the chance of
getting in there and at him. And if what the letter says is true, and I
believe it is, it will be easy to get in and dead easy to get out
again.”
---------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER III.
BUFFALO BILL DECIDES.
The scout put his fingers to his lips and blew a signal.
Instantly there was a cracking of the bushes not far off, and then
Mickey Flynn appeared, running with Cudjo right behind him.
Klamath John jumped to his feet, pulling a revolver as he did so.
“Sit down!” said the scout. “One of them is my negro servant, and the
other is a friend.”
“You had ’em out there watching?”
“Yes. I didn’t intend to be trapped, you see, without having some one
near to come to my help if I needed it.”
Klamath John dropped back to his seat by the poplar.
“Yes, I see,” he said. “That was right and proper. You couldn’t be
expected to do anything else. Only, I didn’t think of it.”
He looked curiously at the Irishman and the negro when they came up.
“Mr. John Langstrath,” said the scout, introducing him to Flynn, and
then to Cudjo.
“An’ there’s to be no fight at all,” said the Irishman, with a humorous
show of regret. “An’ it’s me that’s been gettin’ ready for the fray f’r
the last tin minutes. It’s a disapp’intmint I’m rec’avin’, to be shure.”
Flynn was shown the letter exhibited by Klamath John.
“Come up to my hotel, Langstrath,” the scout invited, “and there we’ll
talk this thing over at our leisure. I’ll admit that I’m interested.”
“Will you make a try for that gold?” said Klamath John.
“I may, and I may not, but I’d like to get my fingers on Red Reynard.
I’ve been wanting to for a good while.”
But Klamath John refused to visit the hotel, though he said he would
again meet the scout at any other place outside of the town.
“I’ve good reasons for not wanting to be seen there,” he declared, and
he refused to explain further.
Buffalo Bill was permitted to retain the letter which bore the name of
“Red Reynard, the Fox.” He re-examined it in his room at the hotel,
comparing it again with the undoubtedly genuine one he had in his
possession. He submitted it to the tests used by handwriting experts,
which included a close scrutiny with a magnifying glass. In the end he
was sure it had been written by Red Reynard.