CHAPTER X
Nevada’s Biggest Plot
THE fight between Dago and Gallagher was one of the shortest fights Cowboy Nevada had ever witnessed, for the G-man was strong, capable, possessed of dynamite in either fist, and showed a willingness to mix in. Neither the super-criminal himself nor the swarthy henchman knew, of course, that they had a man there trained for just such emergencies. Cowboy only knew that here was a man who could fight and was therefore something to be desired as a personal bodyguard. And Dago knew very little until he was brought to by a pan of water expertly thrown upon him by bland Wan Ho Din.
From the moment Cowboy had given the order to “Get going!” Mr. Sandborn had waded in, fencing through flailing arms as Dago strove to knock him out, then, with the first hint of a good opening, letting the surprised opponent have a sound crack on the jaw which took lots of fight out of him. Staggered, Dago blundered by trying a hay-maker, and Gallagher let him have another full on the jaw. Two of those punches were quite enough and Dago collapsed.
“That was well done, Gallagher,” said Cowboy. “A very neat job. Guess you better take Dago’s place from now on. Unless—you ain’t interested!”
“Take Dago’s place? Be the big shot next to you, Nevada? Lead me to it!” Gallagher cried. “Have you gotta comb? I mussed my hair. Don’t generally have so much trouble with these tough guys.”
Dago, silent and glaring, shook the water from his head as a trace of a smile came over Wan Ho Din’s face, and went off. That he would spare no chance to even the score with Gallagher, none there doubted.
Dinner was shortly to be served and, in the dining room of the cabin, Gallagher was formally introduced to some dozen men, mostly young men hard of face and steely eyed and all inclined to excessive cigarette smoking as if their nerves were constantly on edge. There were chairs set for a dozen more at the long table though food was not placed there.
“Some of the boys is away on business, Gallagher,” explained Cowboy, indicating the empty seats. “And some ain’t never going to be here anymore. Them’s the ones that’s had—accidents——”
A particularly young man near the end of the table rose to his feet with a grating laugh which rose in crescendo and pitch as he stood now trembling and white.
“Sit down!” said Cowboy; “you got nothing to worry about, Gagnon.”
Gagnon turned staring eyes towards Cowboy.
“Nothing to worry about?” demanded Gagnon. “With the Feds on our trails and the heat ready to turn on? What about Hegarty? You——”
“Steady, Gagnon,” whispered the man next to him.
“Steady? What for? I’m liable to get plugged to-night for all I know. I’m——”
Then, something in Cowboy’s eyes conveying a terrible warning, Gagnon seated himself, his cigarette dropping from his fingers while he buried his face in his hands. Mr. Sandborn had a pretty good idea what the trouble was, in fact, he was certain that he could piece together the story back of Gagnon.
Gagnon was probably like thousands of others buried in crime. Lured in his recent youth by rich rewards that crime could offer, easy money, and good times, he had first stolen odds and ends to sell to some “fence” of the underworld, gone on from that to spare-hand with a petty gang in an easy robbery or two, proved himself nervy and willing and been put “on the payroll” of the vast syndicate headed by Cowboy. Being bright, good-looking, and skillful with a gun, Gagnon had undoubtedly worked his way from the bottom of the syndicate ladder to his present spot at the long table of a cabin on Porpoise Island.
He’d enjoyed good food, merry company, and a carefree existence between the days of “work” for this syndicate but he had not been happy. Always he had to be battling the law and even when the law had been tied by Cowboy’s money and influence, there was always the chance of G-man “heat.” He could not go out on a street in any town or city without the chance of being mowed down by rival gang-fire or being picked up by some unbribed law agency. Not all the easy money he had earned could give him peace of mind, for his conscience troubled him, and a thousand forms of death awaited their chance to strike. Cowboy had lived to mature age, in spite of a life of crime, but Cowboy had been extremely lucky. Gagnon knew that nine out of ten of the Gagnons in the crime world would be laid out on cold marble slabs in morgues before they had reached twenty-four! Gagnon was nearing that age now though his years of crime had robbed his eyes of their youth and left care and worry imprinted there.
Now his nerve was snapping. He knew if it gave way too much Cowboy would have him taken for a little ride because the unfortunate Gagnons of this world always “know too much!” And now his nerve had snapped!—far enough to leave him shaken to the core, nauseated——
Mr. Sandborn was thinking fast, preparing for a certain eventuality. Once before he had taken care of a gunman named Racira in a similar case——
The talk at the table now began, a good deal of serious discussion of ways and means to enlarge the syndicate, and some nervous jokes. On the whole these young men were far from carefree. They lived, breathed and ate crime as it were, and nothing is so luscious to look upon and so indigestible as crime! If, like Gagnon, these others realized how close their end was, they hid it well from themselves and, especially, from Cowboy.
Mr. Sandborn learned a great deal of very great value at that meal, things which would spell the doom of the thing as soon as the G-man could get his information out to the waiting Chief. The little tricks, the petty schemes, and the underlying rot of the system which Cowboy controlled showed clearer and clearer. Here was a system so thorough and so remorseless in its revenge upon squealers that hardly a store or place of business in the entire country was without a gambling device (just within the law, yet drawing money from fools who played the games), inferior manufactured products selling under well-known names, lotteries, “number games” and grosser things. Then there was bank robbery to be run, investment stunts, fake gold mines and other mines—so many forms of illegal gathering of money that the hardened G-man, veteran of war against crime for many years, was appalled at the power and ability of Cowboy Nevada. And what stunned him most was the realization that the man had his competitors, except for a few like Hegarty, helpless or dead, and his ambition was now driving him towards an inevitable goal, a goal so immense that law and order hardly gave such a scheme credence—a plan to overthrow the government of these United States and place Cowboy Nevada, ex-cowpuncher and bad-man, as dictator of the lives and property of the people!
After the meal Cowboy took his new right-hand man all about the place, disclosing the fact that the cove was surrounded by cleverly hidden machine gun emplacements and the cabin was a veritable arsenal and fort with metal-lined walls and secret sally ports.
“About those kids you spoke of, Cowboy,” Gallagher said, “you ain’t really bothered about them, are you? From what I hear that Hogan case was a fluke. The kids happened to stumble into it and the newspapers made more of it than really was there. The Feds got the mobs, and the boys was underfoot most of the time!”
Cowboy regarded Gallagher with a cold eye, slyly.
“Kids can get underfoot till you break your neck, Gallagher! They know too much already! I’ve got men watching the houses now where they live and every harbor for their boat. We’ll have ’em shortly and I aims fer you to take care of them!”
“What you want done?”
“Wait till we get ’em and I’ll tell you!”
So things went till evening, Mr. Sandborn learning all the ramifications of the stupendous system by which Cowboy Nevada was taking toll from the work of honest millions of people in the country and yet, till darkness that day, the man named “Gallagher” did not learn a word from Cowboy about the real source of the vast hoard of money by which the ex-western bad-man had got his start in the big-time rackets. It had taken a big sum to go so fast through the underworld, resources to be spent lavishly.
After supper that night Mr. Nevens took his new man on a strange boat ride, from the boat-house into the middle of Black Cove. A flat-bottomed scow, which had lain inshore, half-hidden by trees, now proved its usefulness. Anchored at the cove’s center this scow served as the landing platform from which interesting things took place, as Stan and John had seen it used at night. Mr. Sandborn acted very much surprised, however, at what took place. A diver was soon outfitted and sent down into the water, taking with him an enormous and powerful underwater light, special invention of the ingenious Mr. Nevens. While he was down, for a period of a half hour, the crime head told his story, a story almost incredible.
And at the end of a half hour during which the air pump had wheezed and men worked about the decks, keeping all lines open and free, the diver began his ascent. A little later, by the glare of a light, Mr. Sandborn gazed down at the deck upon a stout, heavy case. It bore, on the outside, the name of a famous brand of liquor!
Could it be that a boat-load of liquor had been the source of an income sufficient to set up Cowboy Nevada in racketeering? Mr. Sandborn looked at Nevada now and the glint in the man’s eyes was cold, calculating, triumphant.