CHAPTER XVII.

THE DOUBLE BANK ROBBERY.

For a moment the sheriff stood like a man stricken suddenly dumb. Jesse faced him with a mocking smile on his face.

"You--you are--Get out of here! Vamoose quicker'n a streak of greased lightning. Don't you know I'm an officer of the law?" exclaimed the gamey little sheriff suddenly turning his back on Jesse and Frank. And the latter two with a laugh walked from the scene of carnage and disappeared in the night.

"Well," snarled Frank, "you have put your foot in it this time everlastingly."

"Oh, I don't know. We'll see," was his laconic answer.

The two men walked across a vacant lot, picked up their horses, mounted and rode out to a mountain gulch nearby, where they joined their fellows. It was no unusual thing for horsemen to be seen on the streets of Silver City, and therefore it excited no comment when seven men rode in from different directions on the following morning. The uniform quality of their horseflesh, however, did attract the attention of the mountaineers, but though each carried a Winchester in his saddle holster, the men excited no more than ordinary interest.

So changed in appearance were the notorious outlaw and his brother that it would have been a keen eye indeed, that would have been able to discover, under their disguises, the men whose guns had done such deadly work in the Golden Arrow on the previous evening.

None of the newcomers appeared to be traveling together. Now and then one would drop from his horse and visit a saloon, two visited the postoffice and others took in a general store below in which was the second bank.

But had one been suspicious he might have noted a certain method in the actions of these newcomers who seemed to be everywhere at once, and yet acting without any apparent motive.

After a time the band seemed to have formed in two sections--one at the north end of the main street and the other at the south, the latter section consisting of fewer men than the northern group.

On the north might have been found the great outlaw, his brother having cast his lot with the band to the south.

Jesse sauntered carelessly into the postoffice and asked if there was any mail for Jim Howard.

While the postmaster was looking over his letters Wild Bill slipped behind the case and dealt the postmaster a terrific blow with the butt of his revolver.

While the act was in plain view of the street through the large front window, there chanced to be no one passing at the moment, and neither was the brutal assault observable to those in the bank on the other side of the partition.

"Who are you?" demanded Jesse as a fellow, hideous in his hunchbacked deformity leered up into his face.

"I reckon I don't know you either?" was the enigmatical reply.

"You're Jake Fowler. I know you."

"But you ain't Sagebrush Sam. What do you want here?"

"S-h-h," whispered Jesse. "He sent me here. How many men are over there behind the counter of the bank?"

"Two, the owner and the cashier," informed the other, his eye twinkling with intelligence.

"Call them over here. Tell them the postmaster has been hurt. They won't see me, but my pard here will cover them the minute they get behind the case, and we'll hold you in here till we get through. No tricks or I'll shoot you full of holes," hissed the desperado, dropping behind a barrel and motioning to Bill to make himself scarce, as Jake ran to the bank counter in great excitement.

"Come quick!" cried Jake. "The postmaster has been hurt or else he's fallen in a fit."

"What--where?" cried the two bankers excitedly.

"Over here. Hurry."

Jake was playing his part as if he had been studying it for months and Jesse grinned approvingly.

The three had stooped to raise the body of the prostrate man when they were startled by the sudden command:

"Move an inch and you're both dead men."

The owner of the bank started to utter an exclamation, but the words froze in his mouth as looking sideways he found himself gazing along the black, menacing barrel of a heavy "Colt's."

Jesse, not wasting the time to go around into the enclosure, had leaped the counter and was down on his knees in front of the large open safe whose doors were swung wide, displaying their glittering contents to his avaricious gaze.

Gold, bills, little sacks of precious dust were swept with ruthless hand into the yawning gunny sack like meal from a miller's hopper.

Meanwhile two mounted men in front had dismounted and were busily engaged in tightening their saddle girths, apparently oblivious to anything that was going on around them.

Not a soul save those directly connected with the daring robbery had been disturbed.

With a sweeping glance around him, Jesse, observed with a grin that the coast was clear, and came around the counter with the bag of precious loot in his hand.

Not a word was spoken as he passed around to the rear of the Postoffice case.

Raising his gun by the barrel he brought it down with terrific force, first on the head of one and then on the other of the bankers. They fell forward groaning.

"Follow me and guard the rear," announced Jesse to Wild Bill. "Here's a drunk for you baby," he added, tossing a thousand dollar bill to the hunch-back. "Better mosey or they'll be stringing you up before the sun is over the gulch. You'll get drunk and that'll be the end of you."

"Can't I go with you?" leered the outlaw. "I ain't no tenderfoot."

"Not unless you are ready to die," retorted Jesse

"Then I'll peach," was the sudden and unexpected reply.

A sudden rage leaped into the eyes of the outlaw.

Throwing his gun down on the horrible dwarf he pulled the trigger. "I guess that'll hold him a while," decided the outlaw with a cruel smile, as the dwarf fell over dead.

"Shall I get the money you gave 'im?" asked Bill

"No," snapped the desperado. "Jesse James does not rob dead men's pockets. It's his. Let him have it."

Strangely enough to the outlaws the shot had attracted no attention. And mounting they rode leisurely up the street toward the store where the second bank was located. He could see the remaining members of the band lounging recklessly about in the street in front of the place, and wondering at the delay.

"Something must have gone wrong," he muttered, urging his horse along a little faster.

Just then the ground under them was shaken by a dull heavy explosion. People came flocking from shop and saloon and curious scared faces appeared at the open windows of upper stories.

"Dynamite," he growled.

"It's the bank!" was the startling cry, taken up from mouth to mouth and passed along down the village street, as a shouting, gesticulating, yelling mob rushed to the store where the second bank was located.

The desperado saw his men coolly swing themselves into their saddles and face the mob with leveled Winchesters.

A rain of scattered shots began to patter about those in front of the bank. But the men held their fire, ordering the people back on the pain of instant death.

A thirty-two stung Comanche Tony in the cheek.

Throwing his Winchester to his shoulder he shot the man who had wounded him, dead.

The citizens answered with a volley. At that the desperadoes pumped their magazines, into the crowd, until they were emptied and then released their revolvers from their holsters began fanning the mad mob with deadly effect.

Jesse, having secured the gunny sack firmly to his saddle, and so that it might not impede his movements, rode still leisurely along.

Suddenly he espied Frank running down the steps of the store. Like his younger brother, Frank also bore a gunny sack and from the manner in which Frank was carrying it, Jesse understood that his brother had succeeded in his mission of plunder.

Frank swung into his saddle under a perfect storm of bullets.

With a wild whoop and a savage yell the great desperado and his immediate companions dug the rowels of their spurs into their horses and charged down on the crowd.

The mob taken suddenly by surprise at this attack on their flank, ceased firing and fell swiftly back.

"Forward!" roared the great desperado.

Frank and his men heard and understood.

Their horses sprang away under the pressure of the cruel spurs.

Now Jesse and his companions thundered down on the crowd in the wake of the first line of fleeing desperadoes.

All at once a slight, wiry figure sprang out into the middle of the street.

"Halt! I know you, Jesse James."

But the desperado threw himself suddenly forward on the neck of his horse as the sheriff's bullets sang over him so close to his head that he could feel the hair on the top of his head, slightly pulled back by the sudden suction of air from the leaden pellets.

Both his revolvers flashed up on either side of the horse's neck. They barked in unison and the sheriff fell dead.

The outlaw's horse leaping over the body of the fallen officer of the law, sped away.

Jesse rose in his saddle and sent a volley of shots from his Winchester into the crowd in his rear. Then he was obliged to cease firing because of the fear of hitting one of his own men, whose bodies were now between him and the mob. The men had swung half way round in their saddles, reins on their horses' necks, and were pumping lead into the mad mob with deadly effect.

Jesse fired a signal shot high into the air.

Their fusilade suddenly ceased.

With a wild, blood-curdling yell, the desperadoes dug their spurs deep into the sleek sides of the sensitive thoroughbreds and sped off like the wind headed for the protection of the mountain fastness.