“What has he to do with it?” inquired Tom. “Doesn’t he want them to be arrested?”
“Not just yet; not until he has recovered two stolen guns Matt has in his possession,” answered the superintendent. “That is a matter of dollars and cents to both the hotels at the lake, for if those guns are not restored to their owners the landlords will be ruined.”
“Perhaps if he were shut up for a while he would lose heart, and tell where the guns could be found,” suggested Tom.
“Swan and the other guides who know him think differently. That was my idea, and I urged it upon the guides, for I wanted that villain and all his tribe out of my way. But Swan says Matt is a man who can’t be driven. However, Rube has his eye on him, and perhaps he will discover something one of these days.”
“Our watchman. He used to be one of Hanson’s guides; but he proved too lazy for the business, so Hanson induced us to bring him down here to watch the hatchery and act as spy upon Matt’s movements at the same time. When Swan and his friends destroyed Matt’s camp Rube took him into his house. He and his family are there now, and Rube is trying the best he knows how to get into their confidence so that they will tell him where these guns are concealed. I ought, perhaps, to say that three members of the family are at Rube’s house now. Where the other is no one seems to know. Yesterday morning the sheriff made an attempt to arrest Jake, but the family got warning in time, took to the woods, and Jake hasn’t come back yet.”
“What had he been doing?” inquired Tom, who was much more interested in this than he was in the science of fish-culture.
“You heard about the Irvington bank robbery, didn’t you? Well, every thing goes to prove that the six thousand dollars the thieves secured is now in Jake Coyle’s hands.”
This was the most astounding piece of news that Tom Bigden had ever listened to. “How did Jake get hold of it?” he asked.
“Well, the sheriff summoned a posse, caught the robbers after a short chase, and they told him that the boy they hired to ferry them over the lake, and who was robbing a cellar when they first spoke to him, capsized them on purpose and spilled the money out into the water. You see Jake caught a glimpse of the money when one of the robbers opened his valise to pay him the five dollars he demanded for ferrying them over, and made up his mind to have it for his own.”