The Mena weekly star., 1897-09-22
H EfAlner's StNrU BY ALFRED B. CALHOUN.
T7HERE were dozen of us--miners

| 'ttEhE were uOZen OI uS--mlnerS.
 prospectors and engineers sit ting about the camp fire one evening at the head of Granite creek, Arizona territory.
 Prescott, the capital of the terri tory, was at that time in its infancy, m annex, as it were, to Fort Whipple, just below it, on the creek.
 Cochise's Apaches were making things hot in that portion of the terri tory at the time, but even if there had been no hostile Indians in our vicinity, 1t is safe to say that all my companions would have gone armed to the teeth from sheer force of habit.
 The conversation ran on lynchers and road agents, and more than one story was told that combined all the elements of tragedy, given with broadly humorous manner that was ab- solutely grotesque.
 Did any of you fellers ever hear of Jake McCabe, as uster hang out round Tucson few years ago?" The man who asked the question knocked the ashes from his pipe and looked round on the lame-lit faces before filling up again. He was a tall, bronzed man of s5, with a slight drawl in his tones and a manner that was tantalizingly delib- crate.
 The men about the fire shook their heads. Except Abe Owens himself none of them were in Tucson at the time stated. Yet it was allowed" that they might have known Jake McCabe un- der another name, particularly if he didn't travel on the square"
 Just here it may be we'll to state that the vernacular of mining men is en- riched by the terms of their calling, which they apply in figurative sense that makes them unintelligible to the uninitiated. "Pan out" is one of these words. Men ''pan out" the gravel in the river beds for golden particles, and they pan out" men that they are study ing, or a horse doesn't pan out as well as the feller that sold him said" And so the term is used in a hundred curious ways that are seemingly for eign to its literal and original signifi- cation.
 Abe Owens wasn't much on chin
 
 for talking-but in response to the general demand he told all he knew about Jake McCabe. which ran as fol- lows.
 We shall not attempt to reproduce the quaint phraseology of Abe Owens.
 There had been a great many mail carriers, prospectors and ranchmen killed between Tucson and the Rio Gila, and for some time it was SUD- posed that the Indians were the per petrators of these crimes.
 But even those who were most ready to believe that an Indian is capable of any and every barbarity were forced to the conviction that the murderers were white men, and that plunder was the object. At first there was an attempt made to scalp the victims. but an old scout declared that 1t was not "Iniun work" and finally the bodies were left where they were shot down without any mutilation.
 As there was no law at that time that could be enforced in that section a sense of self-preseryation led to the formation of vigilance committee. every member of which was enioined to consider himself a special detective.
 But these precautions did not lessen the danger. One week after the yip- ilance committee had published it's purpose. mail carrier was found dead on the Fort Beryie trail. His horse was gone and the mail-bags rifed.
 Suspicion directed her finger at two men, who were unacquainted and as different in appearance and mode of life as it is possible to conceive.
 James Nesbitt was man of 30, with pale. serious face, and an abstracted manner. He associated with no one, and he had no business that the miners could see that would enable him to keep two good horses and black sery-