Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1909-06-08
CHAPTER XVI.
Williams Cache.


Ed Banks had been recalled before
daybreak from the middle pass. Two
OF the men wanted were now known
to have crossed the creek, which
meant they muse work out of the coun-
try through Williams Cache.
III you will take your best two men,
Ed" said Whispering Smith, sitting
down with Banks at breakfast, "and
strike straight for Canadian pass to
help Gene and Bob Johnson, I'll under
take to ride in and talk to Rebstock
while Kennedy and Bob Scott watch
Deep creek. The boy gives a good de-
scription, and the two men that did
the job here are Du Sang and Flat
Nose. Did tell you how we picked
up the trail yesterday? Magpies. They
shot scrub horse that gave out on
them and skinned the brand. It
fastened the banquet, but we got there
before the birds were all seated. Great
luck, wasn't It? And it gave us a
beautiful trail. One of the party
crossed the Goose river at American
fork. and Brill Young and Reed fol-
lowed him. Four came through the
Mission mountains: that is q cinch and
they are In the Cache-and IL they get
out II is our fault personally, Ed, and
not the Lords"
Williams Cache lies in the form OF
q great horn, with a narrow entrance
at the lower end known as the Door,
and rock fissure at the upper end
leading into Canadian pass; but this
6ssure Is SO narrow that a man with
rifle could withstand regiment. For
100 miles east and west rise the gran
lite walls of the Mission range, broken
nowhere save by the formation known
as the Cache. Even this does not pen
crate the range; 1t is a pocket, and
runs not over halfway into it and out
again. But no man really knows the
Cache; the most that may be said is
that the main valley Is known, and it
Is known as the toughest mountain
assure between the Spanish sinks and
the Mantrap country. Williams Cache
lies between walls 1000 feet high, and
within it is small labyrinth Of can
yons. A generation ago, when Medi-
cine Bend for one winter was the
terminus Of the overland railroad. vigi-
lantes mercilessly cleaned out the
town, and the few outlaws that es-
capped the shotgun and the moose at
Medicine Bend found refuge in a far
away and unknown mountain gorge
once named by French trappers the
Cache. Years after these outcasts had
come to infest it came one desperate
more ferocious than all that had gone
before. He made a frontier retreat of
the Cache, and left to 1t the legacy of
his evil name, Williams. Since his
day It has served, as it served before.
for the haunt of outlawed men. No
honest man lives In Williams Cache.
and few men Of any sort live there
long, since their lives are lives of VIC.
lence: neither the law nor q woman
crosses Deep creek. But from the day
Of Williams to this day the Cache has
had it's ruler. and when Whispering
Smith rode with little party through
the Door into the Cache the morning
after the murder in Mission valley he
sent an envoy to Rebstock, whose sue
cess as cattle thief had brought it's
inevitable penalty. It had made
Rebstock man Of consequence and
Of property and q man subject to the
anxieties and annoyances Of such re-
sponsibility.
Sitting once in the Three Horses
at Medicine Bend, Rebstock had talked
with Whispering Smith. Il used to
have good time" he growled. when
I was rustling little bunch Of steers.
Just small bunch all by myself. and
hadn't q cent In the world, no place to
slsep and nothing to eat, / had good
time. Now ! have to keep my money
In the bank: that amt pleassnt-you
know that. Every man that brings 3
bunch Of cattle across Deep creek has
stale 'em. and expects me 70 buy .em
or lsnd him moosy. I'm busy WITH IN.
spsctors Al the time. deviiiDg With
brands. standing on The stock associa.
t3on and II kinds q trouble. I've rot
10 many COMA too much mon1y. I'm
aAsld somsbely viii shoot No Il / 20
q saapp, q poison me- II 1 take :
d1lnk Whispestag eDnath: "a IKE q
gtvs you : halt-intsrsst "a ~ busl.
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