There was no exuberant¹ joy to meet this suggestion. McGuire had, as a matter of fact, made his territory practically crime-proof for so long that men had lost interest in planning adventures within the sphere of his authority. It seemed to the four men of Pollard's gang a peculiar² folly³ to cast a challenge in the teeth of the formidable sheriff himself. Even Pollard was shaken and looked to Denver. But that worthy⁴, who had returned from the door where he was stationed during the presence of the sheriff, remained in his place smiling down at his hands. He, for one, seemed oddly pleased.  
In the meantime Sandy was setting forth⁵ his second and particularly interesting news item.
 
"You-all know Lewison?" he asked.
 
"The sour old grouch," affirmed Phil Marvin. "Sure, we know him."
 
"I know him, too," said Sandy. "I worked for the tenderfoot that he skinned out of the ranch⁶. And then I worked for Lewison. If they's anything good about Lewison, you'd need a spyglass to find it, and then it wouldn't be fit to see. His wife couldn't live with him; he drove his son off and turned him into a drunk; and he's lived his life for his coin."
 
"Which he ain't got much to show for it," remarked Marvin. "He lives like a starved dog."
 
"And that's just why he's got the coin," said Sandy. "He lives on what would make a dog sick and his whole life he's been saving every cent he's made. He gives his wife one dress every three years till she died. That's how tight he is. But he's sure got the money. Told everybody his kid run off with all his savings⁷. That's a lie. His kid didn't have the guts⁸ or the sense to steal even what was coming to him for the work he done for the old miser⁹. Matter of fact, he's got enough coin saved—all gold—to break the back of a mule¹⁰. That's a fact! Never did no investing, but turned everything he made into gold and put it away."
 
"How do you know?" This from Denver.
 
"How does a buzzard smell a dead cow?" said Sandy inelegantly. "I ain't going to tell you how I smell out the facts about money. Wouldn't be any use to you if you knew the trick. The facts is these: he sold his ranch. You know that?"
 
"Sure, we know that."
 
"And you know he wouldn't take nothing but gold coin paid down at the house?"
 
"That so?"
 
"It sure is! Now the point's this. He had all his gold in his own private safe at home."
 
Denver groaned¹¹.
 
"I know, Denver," nodded Sandy. "Easy pickings for you; but I didn't find all this out till the other day. Never even knew he had a safe in his house. Not till he has 'em bring out a truck from town and he ships the safe and everything in it to the bank. You see, he sold out his own place and he's going to another that he bought down the river. Well, boys, here's the dodge¹². That safe of his is in the bank tonight, guarded by old Lewison himself and two gunmen he's hired for the job. Tomorrow he starts out down the river with the safe on a big wagon¹³, and he'll have half a dozen guards along with him. Boys, they's going to be forty thousand dollars in that safe! And the minute she gets out of the county—because old McGuire will guard it to the boundary line—we can lay back in the hills and—"
 
"You done enough planning, Sandy," broke in Joe Pollard. "You've smelled out the loot. Leave it to us to get it. Did you say forty thousand?"
 
And on every face around the table Terry saw the same hunger and the same yellow glint of the eyes. It would be a big haul, on............