A man named Fred Tague pushed to the front. He kept a feed corral near the edge of town. "I can tell you one man who mushed out before five o'clock this morning--and that's Gid Holt."
The eyes of Macdonald, cold and hard as jade, fastened to the man. "How do you know?"
"That dog team he bought from Tim Ryan--Well, he's been keeping it in my corral. When I got there this morning it was gone. The snow hadn't wiped out the tracks of the runners yet, so he couldn't have left more than fifteen minutes before."
"What time was it when you reached the corral?"
"Might have been six--maybe a little later."
"You don't know that Holt took the team himself?"
"Come to that, I don't. But he had a key to the barn where the sled was. Holt has been putting up at the hotel. I reckon it is easy to find out if he's still there."
Macdonald's keen brain followed the facts as the nose of a bloodhound does a trail. Holt, an open enemy of his, had reached town only two days before. He had bought one of the best and swiftest dog teams in the North and had let slip before witnesses the remark that Macdonald would soon find out what he wanted with the outfit. The bank had been robbed after midnight. To file open the grill and to blow up the safe must have taken several hours. Before morning the dogs of Holt had taken the trail. If their owner were with them, it was a safe bet that the sled carried forty thousand dollars in Alaska gold dust.
So far the mind of the Scotchman followed the probabilities logically, but at this point it made a jump. There were at least two robbers. He was morally sure of that, for this was not a one-man job. Now, if Holt had with him a companion, who of all those in Kusiak was the most likely man? He was a friendless, crabbed old fellow. Since coming to Kusiak old Gideon had been seen constantly with one man. Together they had driven out the day before and tried his new team. They had been with each other at dinner and had later left the hotel together. The name of the man who had been so friendly with old Holt was Gordon Elliot--and Elliot not only was another enemy of Macdonald, but had very good reasons for getting out of the country just now.
The strong jaw of the mine-owner stood out saliently as he gave short, sharp orders to men in the crowd. One was to get the coroner, a second Wally Selfridge, another the United States District Attorney. He divided the rest into squads to guard the roads leading out of town and to see that nobody passed for the present.