“A fine howdy-do!” he remarked savagely. “Gosh knows what them birds dug up from under this bridge! Buried treasure, likely, or mebbe a body! But more probably gold, or some other kind o’ loot--mebbe smuggled stuff from the border--an’ they didn’t leave a blamed clew either! A nice mess, folks, I’ll say! Shorty, what do yuh make o’ it all?”

Shorty stared around blankly.

“I dunno,” he said, “it looks kinda funny, doesn’t it?”

The “buried box” mystery forthwith became the great sensation of the San Luis Valley. There were all kinds of rumors afloat instantly, of course, and everybody had his or her pet explanation of the mystery. There were many who thought that a body had been exhumed from beneath the end of the bridge. There were as many others who firmly believed that a fortune in smuggled jewels or contraband narcotics from the border had been dug up and carried away. And there were many odd explanations, too.

“I maintains that it was Injun treasure,” insisted old Grandpa McMeel hotly, “an’ I blame myself fer not goin’ right down thar when I saw them two ruffians workin’ thar an’ stretchin’ ’em out cold with my cane! I could o’ done it, too, ef I had jus’ been sure I saw ’em like I thought! I had them two toddies up to Pappy Stewart’s house just afore an’--an’--waal, I weren’t sure I did see them two fellers thar----”

“I could ’a’ reached out an’ poked a stick at ’em an’ made ’em put up their hands!” said Fred Speers. “I was that close to ’em, but my gal friend was scared to death! An’ I didn’t dare take no chances! O ’course, I could o’ licked ’em both in a rough-an’-tumble fight, big as thev was; but waal--it weren’t no time or place to start a lot o’ cussin’ an’ trouble.”

Sheriff Cook was worried. As soon as he got back to the office, trailed by the sad-looking Manuel Perez, he slumped into a chair and sighed in despair.

“Ef it ain’t one thing it’s another, with this job, Manuel,” he explained. “Did yuh notice whar that feller Shorty disappeared to?”

“He say he look fer clews,” answered Perez.

“Oh,” said the sheriff. “Yes, I remember, so he did. Waal, I looked an’ thar wasn’t any, Perez. What do yuh think about it, eh? Somebody had somethin’ valuable hid thar?”

“Si,” said Perez. “Mebbe some robbers long time ago hide stuff thar, who knows? Whar I was--in de beeg house, sheriff--I hear often those robbers speak o’ buryin’ their loot.”

The sheriff nodded.

“That’s the answer, Perez, in my mind; it might have been some o’ that Alamosa bank loot that was stolen eight years ago; or mebbe some o’ that Como stage gold bullion that was taken twelve years ago. I’ll have to look up them old jobs--an’ speakin’ o’ jobs, I’ll call up about yuhrs right now, son!”

The sheriff was successful. On the third call Jack Quinn, a sheep rancher on Larimer Creek, agreed to take on Perez, the ex-convict, provided the sheriff thought he would go straight. The sheriff said he did think so, and the deal was made, after which the sheriff lectured Perez again, got that honest fellow’s sworn promise to be good, and started him on his way with a loan of two dollars for grub en route. Perez was bubbling over with gratitude.

“Gracias, sheriff!” he exclaimed. “I go Señor Quinn’s at once. Mebbe some day Manuel Perez able to pay sheriff back for kindness. Watch an’ see! Adios, señor!”

When Shorty reported, some hours later, that he had been unable to find a single clew in the vicinity of the Third Street bridge, the sheriff was not at all surprised. He had not expected Shorty to find any. He said so. He also pointed out to his disappointed deputy that he himself had searched the scene rather thoroughly while making his first investigation of the place and had not found anything. It looked like a hopeless proposition.

“Not a danged clew,” said the sheriff. “But I got my mind made up as to what it was, Shorty. It wasn’t nobody business. It was loot buried thar from the Alamosa bank robbery eight years ago. They never caught the crooks, an’ never found trace o’ the dough. It was that or else the loot from the Como stage robbery twelve years ago, or from some other job. We ain’t got a chance in ten million o’ landin’ them guys, despite the description Speers got. We kin check on the descriptions we got at the time o’ them Alamosa an’ Como stage robbers an’ see ef they coincides with Speer’s descriptions o’ the men last night, but outside o’ that----”

“I’ll check on ’em,” said Shorty, moving toward the door.

“Go ahead,” said the sheriff wearily, “an’ meanwhile I’ll stay here an’ do a little heavy thinkin’, Shorty. We kain’t afford to overlook no bets, ef thar are any bets. Yuh remember what Fred Speers said--big giants o’ fellers an’ one with light hair. It’s a purty meager description, but it’s all we got, Shorty!”

Sheriff Cook, however, had little time to do much heavy thinking, as he had put it. Shorty had not been gone more than thirty minutes when in came “Doc” Healey, and Eddie Owens, and Bert Clark, the county commissioners, and they were considerably excited. They got down to brass tacks immediately.

“Sheriff,” said Owens, “yuh ain’t forgot, I trusts, that this is the year o’ the spring elections in this county. Yuh’re up fer reelection ag’in, I presume, an’ so are we county commissioners. Yuh remembers that?”

“O’ course!”

“Waal, therefore, me an’ Doc Healey an’ Bert Clark figgered we’d better drap in on yuh an’ see what yuh think about this buried-box business. Everybody’s talkin’----”

“Sure they are!”

“It’s a sensation; it’s either good business or bad business fer all o’ us,” went on Owens sadly. “Ef yuh clears up the case, it’s a big help come election time; but ef yuh don’t an’ the other side makes political capital o’ yuhr failure, we’re all liable to sink together.”

The sheriff frowned.

“Yuh ain’t tellin’ me no news,” he snapped; “it’s jus’ one danged thing after another in this office. We no sooner gits one case cleared up than here comes another; but this one, gents, this one ain’t no cinch. We got no clews.”

Commissioner Bert Clark spoke up quickly.

“Waal, I’ll tell you one thing, yuh won’t get no clew settin’ thar in yuhr chair!”

After that remark the atmosphere became rather strained. The sheriff ignored Clark’s question as one far beneath his notice. The other two commissioners, not being as frank as Clark, said nothing more on the subject. They spoke on the spring wheat prospects, the weather, the new railroad that was coming in to Alamosa. They left, with awkward farewells, shortly after leaving a worried sheriff behind them. He growled as the door closed on them.

“I wouldn’t give ’em the satisfaction o’ arguin’ with ’em about whether I kin git clews settin’ here in my chair or not,” he grunted. “I wouldn’t dignify such a impudent question with an answer. Still, I reckon, mebbe I’d best.” He got up and slapped on his big black hat. “I’ll go down an’ look that place over ag’in!”

And he did. The crowd was gone now. Only a few boys hung around, thrilled with the very atmosphere of the place. The sheriff poked here and there. He followed the strange trail of the dragged box to the creek bank. He reassured himself that the trail did actually vanish in the creek bed. The bed was sandy--shifting sand that would cover any trail almost instantly. And there was nothing about the hole now but a million footprints. The sheriff shook his head mournfully.

“No use,” he muttered, “no use!”

He stared about, trying to think if he could be overlooking anything. It did not seem so. He glanced this way and that and a thought struck him. He wondered if Shorty had combed the dead weeds and the brush to both sides of the bridge end. It was hardly likely that it was worth while, still----

The sheriff went at the thing methodically enough. He strode back and forth, up and down, this way and that, covering all the weeded area on the south of the bridge without discovering anything other than old tin cans, pieces of wood, scraps of iron, and the other débris that one might expect to find along a creek bank. He finally crossed under the bridge to the north side and began his investigations there. He had not been at work ten minutes on that side when he stopped in his tracks with a surprised snort.

“By golly!” he exclaimed, and stooping over he picked up a rusty old black wallet. There was a rubber band around it. He snapped the band off and opened the wallet. Empty! Visions of greenbacks, calling cards, the owner’s name and address, perhaps--all faded away. Empty! But no, it wasn’t empty, after all! There was a newspaper clipping in one pocket of the old wallet, a clipping slightly yellowed with age. The sheriff took it out carefully, inspected it, held it closer to read:

FIND NO TRACE OF BANK ROBBERS ALAMOSA BANDITS FADE INTO THIN AIR

Clarion goes to press this Thursday no trace has been found of the three gunmen who entered the Alamosa bank last week and got away with eight thousand dollars in cash and five thousand six hundred dollars in negotiable securities. They have apparently disappeared into thin air. Sheriff Ralph Baird of Alamosa has worked tirelessly in an effort to trace the men, but without avail. The reward of one thousand dollars offered by the Colorado State-Bankers’ Association has so far borne no fruit. It is hoped, however, that----