Beth came back with Jim to see Heyes off, while Charlie Homer went to bid farewell to his long-suffering wife. It was becoming more and more evident to Heyes that Charlie Homer had a lot more experience with western adventures than one would have expected from a college mathematics professor. Heyes hoped to be able to give similar revelations to students of his own one day, although he hoped he would never be springing their cousins from jail!

Jim was bouncing off the walls with excitement. He was getting to go along on a real Heyes and Kid adventure out West! "Wow, Heyes, d-d-do you have a g-g-gun I c-c-can b-b-borrow? C-C-Can't wait t-t-to g-g-get there, g-g-get st-st-started!"His part in the one the previous Christmas had been much too small for his own taste. And no, Heyes did not have an extra gun for him. Professor Homer had his own gun, and what's more he had a holster and bullets for it, too.

But Beth looked very serious, as did Heyes. She knew that this was life or death and that Jim's joking around was annoying Heyes when he needed to concentrate on planning.

"Heyes," said Beth, "I know that you have to do this. I know a lot better than to try to stop you, and I know I'd just get in the way if I went along. But what can I do to help? What story do you want me to put around on why you have to be away?"

Heyes had been thinking about this while he packed his clothes and gear. "Since I would be holed up here studying all this coming week, if you can make it appear that I am still here for a few days, that will help to disassociate my absence with Charlie Homer's. Charlie's going to say there's been a death in his family back in Wyoming. Why don't we have me in the hospital with an infection in that injured hip? The doctor at the hospital and Dr. Leutze can help make that look real, as can you."

Beth nodded, "Since you're still limping some, so it would make sense to your friends. But they'll want to come visit you if it's just an infected hip – maybe you should have something catching instead?"

Heyes grinned, "You should have been an outlaw, Beth. You have a great head for it!"

"Well, thank you very much!" Beth sounded offended, but only mock offended. She smiled at her man, the famously devious former outlaw. "What about pneumonia, since no one outside your little circle of insiders knows you really already had it?"

"Sounds good to me. If you would talk to the doctor at the hospital where I was, and work out all the details, I'd be really grateful." Heyes stopped grinning and now did sound serious.

"You know I'll do anything I possibly can, Heyes! I know you'll be as careful as you can, right? And do your best to keep in touch with me?"

"I don't know if we'll be able to keep in touch, Beth, honey. I just don't know much about what we'll find there. I think we'll be staying with a friend of Charlie's – Theron Wiseman. He works at a ranch near there – the Crazy N, official address in Lodge Grass, but really a good ten miles outside it. At least we'll be there at first, Charlie thinks. We can't communicate with the man, so we're taking a whole lot on Charlie's faith. But that means we won't be within reach of telegraphs – which is why we can't find out if it will really work. And I'll be having to stay pretty far underground no matter what, since I'm back in the papers. We guess that whoever is behind this will be looking out for me specially. That's why I'm letting Charlie and Jim go along at all – I may not be able to work directly at all. It's a damn pain having my being me be such a problem, and not just for me! If only I could go back and do it all over again!"

Beth put her arms around Heyes and he gave her a long, deep kiss. "You can't go back, Heyes," she whispered, "so you just have to go forward!"

As the trio of rescuers set off, Beth looked out the window at their retreating forms in the gathering dusk. She sighed and whispered to herself, "Oh honey, why can't you lead a quiet life? I guess it's just not in your nature, and I love your nature. But sometimes I sure do wish we could just settle down and make babies!"

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo

That night an oddly assorted but very close trio took a train west – one distinguished professor in his sixties, one clinic assistant in his twenties burdened with a bad stutter, and one brilliant former outlaw in his thirties who had turned mathematics student and was worried sick about his partner. They all three had a hard time getting to sleep as the train rattled on and on to the west. It seemed as if the train stopped every hour to take on more passengers who were unfailingly noisy.

The next day the trio of rescuers had an even harder time waking up than they had had falling asleep, but they had to eat breakfast and gather their assorted luggage. A little later in the day they transferred to a much smaller railroad line, with many fewer passengers, headed north and west towards Montana and Wyoming and points west.

Heyes looked around the new train carefully and nodded his head with satisfaction. He maneuvered his newly formed little gang into a car that everyone else had avoided. A single sleeping man was in the far end of the car. Judging from the extremely nasty smell, he was sleeping it off after a prodigious bender which had included a certain amount of throwing up and peeing on himself without any personal hygiene to mitigate the effects. Therefore people tended to avoid the car. If Heyes and company kept their voices low, covered by the rattle of the rather badly kept train they could consult together at the other end of the car with a fair degree of privacy.

Heyes friends got an assignment from the criminal master mind to keep them busy. Research, Heyes called it. Meanwhile Heyes soon had his feet up and his eyes closed, saying that he needed privacy to think. While Heyes "thought," Jim and the Professor patrolled the dusty train cars in search of newspapers from Montana and Wyoming and the wider region. This seemed at first like a fools' errand, since the New York trains they were used to riding in were neatly kept and any stray old newspapers were soon cleared away. On this small and neglected rail line's car, however, Jim and Charlie soon began to strike pay dirt. They found old newspapers stuck behind and under seats, stuffed into badly fitting windows, shoved to the back of luggage racks, and neglected under stacks of luggage. Many of the dozens of newspapers they found were damp or torn or stained, but Heyes wanted them all.

When the newspapers had been gathered, Jim and Charlie brought them back to Heyes. His "thinking" had developed into something pretty calm that involved snoring. The Professor cleared his throat tactfully and Heyes woke with a start. Though Jim rolled his eyes at his former roommate in irritation, Heyes was entirely unfazed at literally being caught napping. He smiled when he saw the stack of bedraggled newspapers. He and his companions now went to work unfolding their findings and looking through them carefully. They were, of course, in search any mention of Lodge Grass, Montana, and vicinity. They looked for anything about events there involving a stage robbery last November, Hannibal Heyes, Kid Curry, or any arrests or other suspicious activity at any date whatsoever.

There turned out to be very little news that mentioned Lodge Grass at all. Now and then there was a cowboy from a Lodge Grass ranch arrested for drunk and disorderly someplace, but other than that, the place seemed to exist utterly without incident. That is, until about a half and a half previous to their current date of May 2nd. In a little paper, the South Montana Bugle, dated April 28, citing the Lodge Grass Trumpet as the source of the text, was the headline "Curry Fears Lynching." The tiny article read, "Notorious outlaw Kid Curry, who was recently arrested in Lodge Grass on charges of armed robbery and murder now fears he may be lynched. The streets of Lodge Grass are filled with an angry mob muttering against the outlaw, who was formerly known for avoiding committing murder. Now, however, that he is charged in the murder of personable local stage coach driver Jethro Mudge, Curry has entirely lost his popularity. Local Sheriff Herman Pohank has thus far kept his charge safe. However the sheriff, with only a single deputy at his command and a poorly built and equipped small office, fears that he may be unable to keep order for long."

Heyes read the article over and over, seeming to find far more significance in the short piece than anyone else did.

Then in a nasty, stained old paper they found an article from the Daily Yellowstone Journal, dated April 25th, again citing that it came from the Lodge Grass Trumpet. The Headline, rather larger than the later one they had just read, said "Kid Curry Arrested in Lodge Grass." The article stated, "Today Sheriff Herman Pohank of Lodge Grass, Montana, heroically brought in notorious outlaw Kid Curry. Pohank had been in search of Curry and his partner Hannibal Heyes since last November 13th, when the pair was described by a witness as having robbed the local stage, which was carrying a mine payroll. Popular local stagecoach driver Jethro Mudge was murdered during the robbery and passenger Harriet Cruces was tied up and very frightened but unharmed. Curry came quietly after the local sheriff outdrew the famous gunman, who had evidently returned to the scene of the crime fearing that he had left some evidence behind."

"Out d-d-drew him?" exclaimed Jim in astonishment.

Heyes and Charlie hissed at Jim to keep quiet, but the drunk at the other end of the car snored on serenely and no one else was near enough to have heard the outburst.

"Doesn't seem possible, does it, Jim?" said Heyes, shaking his head, "But here it is in black and white. Must be a young sheriff. Fast draw is a young man's game and the Kid's 32 now. It's been years since anyone claimed he was the fastest gun in the West. As you saw, Jim, he's still damn fast. But I guess they're men who're faster. I haven't met 'em, but then I've never met this Pohank. Never heard of him, either."

After searching through a number of rather nasty old newspapers, they finally found one more relevant one, dated April 23rd. It was from the Daily Yellowstone Journal, and again cited the Lodge Grass Trumpet as its source. The headline read, "Curry-Heyes Robbery Witness Found." The article said that "Harriet Cruces, the lone surviving witness of the Curry-Heyes stagecoach robbery outside of Lodge Grass, Montana, had vanished not long after the November 13th robbery. She has recently been found and is now in Lodge Grass being questioned. She had reportedly been suffering from amnesia and had forgotten her own name after she had been struck on the head during the robbery. She has now recovered her memory."

Heyes whistled. "Well, well! That's a dramatic story. Maybe it's why our mutual friend, as Lom calls him, decided he needed to go up there and fast."

"Sure does sound suggestive," agreed the Professor in a low voice, with a careful glance at the still sleeping drunk. "But I thought he had better sense."

"I did, too, but I've heard it said more than once that neither one of us is long on good sense," Heyes admitted. "They have been known to have a point there. But what makes me wonder is that it's in the newspaper. That kind of information ought to be kept secret until the trial!"

"That's true," the professor agreed, "but these small town courts and small town papers, I guess do some unprofessional things sometimes."

Heyes shrugged, but looked skeptical.

The next day, the trio got off the train in Montana, as near to Lodge Grass as they were going to get. They bought five horses at the local livery stable, and four saddles. They packed their gear on the fifth horse, and packed the food on the fourth, but hoped it would find a rider before their mission was over.

"I surely do wish, Professor, that you had been able to get in contact with your friend the poet before we got together to ride all the way out to the Crazy N to stay with him. He might not take kindly to me, or he might have left the ranch, or be sick, or any kind of thing. But I guess we've got no choice but to go on."

The Professor maintained stoutly, "If Theron Wiseman is alive and well, or even not so well, he'll take us in. You can count on him, boys. He lives in a little cabin on the outskirts of the Crazy N where no one goes but him, so he can keep us a pretty good secret. But it's a good thing we brought gear and food, cause he won't be counting on three or four extra men to keep."

Heyes and his two friends rode as hard as they could, for all none of them was in great shape for riding. They weren't following a road, but went cross county through the low grasses over the rugged hills. It was beautiful country, but as worried as they were, they didn't enjoy it as much as they might have. As they pulled up for a light early supper and a chance to rest their aching legs for a moment, the professor was staring at Heyes. Heyes was trying to grow a beard as a form of disguise, but in the few days that had passed since he used a razor, he hadn't made much progress. Cat had been right – the beard was growing in with a lot of grey and even some pale reddish hairs. If it had been long enough to be seen at more than a pace or two, though, it might have made more difference.

Homer looked at his advisee and shook his head. "You still look like Hannibal Heyes to me," he said.

"Of course I look like Hannibal Heyes. I am Hannibal Heyes!" said Heyes, who was a bit exasperated with his mentor. "I've got a disguise, but I don't want to use it yet."

"In c-c-case it looks st-st-stupid," said Jim with a smart-aleck grin.

"In case I need to change looks after we spring the Kid, you damn city boy," Heyes was exasperated with Jim, too. "That disguise has gotten me past more than one sheriff." He hated the process of earning the respect of a new gang. Jim seemed to think Heyes was too serious and needed some comic relief. What Heyes was was worried sick.

They got back in their saddles feeling very down. They were all mighty saddle sore when, past sunset, they pulled up to a tiny lone cabin with a single light showing.

A lean figure stepped out of the cabin with a rifle pointed at the newcomers in the fast fading light.

"Theron?" called the Professor, "It's me, Charlie Homer!"

"Charlie?" cried a deep baritone voice back. He seemed to peer at Charlie Homer as his eyes adjusted to the post-sunset dimness. "It is you! What in tarnation you doin' way out here? And who's these folks with you?"

Homer's voice sounded tired, "It's kind of a long story, Wiseman, but I'll vouch for my friends. Can we come in and talk?"

There was a nervous pause. "Alright, Charlie. If you rode all this way with 'em, I guess I can trust 'em, too. You boys come in and bring your saddles and gear. I'll put the horses in the corral with my ride." He opened a nearby fence and added the five tired horses to his own dozen. A windmill kept the watering trough full for the animals – the five who had been ridden all day made good use of it.

When all four men were in the small cabin, sitting on the cabin's two chairs and two cut log stools around an open fire, Theron Wiseman brought them some coffee. The newcomers shared with him their supplies, so he soon had more coffee brewing and some biscuits baking in the oven next to his fireplace.

"Well, whoever you are, you're right welcome," said the lean, grey-haired and grey-bearded cowboy poet. He looked all cowboy at the moment, with his weathered face and battered old hat and boots.

"Let me introduce my friends," said Charlie. "This is Jim Smith, who's from New York City." The old man and the young shook hands.

"Gl-gl-glad t-t-to m-m-meet you, Mr. Wiseman," said Jim, trying to keep a big grin off his face. He was openly thrilled to meet a cowboy poet. The poet didn't turn a hair at the scar-faced young man with his intense stutter, made worse by nervousness and weariness.

"And this, Theron," said Homer, indicating Heyes, "is the finest mathematics student I've taught in all my years in the classroom. He goes around as Joshua Smith and he'd thank you to use that name whenever you're in company."

"You can thank me all you like, but whether I'll take your advice depends upon you're tellin' me what his real name is," said Theron Wiseman cautiously, with a wary look at this stranger Charlie had brought with him.

Heyes, with a perfectly steady but not at all casual look and voice said, "My name, Mr. Wiseman, is Hannibal Heyes." He held out his hand toward his host.

There was a pregnant pause while Wiseman looked Heyes up and down. "If Charlie says I can trust you, then you're welcome here, Mr. Heyes."

"You can trust him – with your stock, your word, and your life," said Charles Homer firmly. Wiseman extended his weathered hand and Heyes took it gratefully.

"I appreciate that, Mr. Wiseman. I truly do," said Heyes gladly.

"You can pay me back by explaining how you came to study math with Charlie at Columbia, but I suspect there's other things you want to discuss first."

Heyes nodded. "I imagine you can guess why we're here."

"Then you imagine wrong, Heyes," answered Wiseman, "cause I got no idea."

The three newcomers exchanged surprised glances. "Have you been into town in the last couple of weeks, Theron, or heard word?" asked Homer.

"Sure have, Charlie. Got back from Lodge Grass just yesterday. And I spent a good few hours in the saloon listening to the gossip. Didn't hear no news about Heyes here, or the Kid neither, or any word of the Devil's Hole Bunch in any particular." Wiseman could tell that his words puzzled his listeners. They paused at that moment to share around some hot biscuits and all too small helpings of warmed over beef stew, since Wiseman hadn't been expecting company. They pieced out with some canned beans.

"You got me wondering, Theron," said the Professor. "We've read some newspapers said that Kid Curry was in jail in Lodge Grass about a robbery and shooting back in November. Said the local folks were all riled fit to lynch him. Are you tellin' me that isn't true?"

Wiseman looked startled at this information, "To the best of my knowledge, Charlie, it is utterly untrue. There's not a grumble in town and no hint of a word of the Kid. What paper you been reading?"

"The Daily Yellowstone Journal and the Southern Montana Bugle, but both citing the Lodge Grass Trumpet as gospel," said Heyes.

"The Lodge Grass Trumpet?" asked Wiseman, quizzically, "dated when exactly?"

"April 23rd, 24th, and 28th," answered Heyes with complete confidence. He had committed the names and dates to his capacious memory.

"The Lodge Grass Trumpet? You sure of that?" asked Wiseman.

"Yeah, I'm sure," asserted Heyes, "I got the papers in my saddle bags – you're welcome to look at 'em."

Wiseman chucked, "No, if you're Charlie's best student, then I trust your memory fine. But you got me puzzled a fair bit, cause there ain't no such animal as the Lodge Grass Trumpet – not no more. Went out of business two weeks ago yesterday."

"You sound sure of that, Mr. Wiseman," said Heyes.

And Wiseman did sound sure. "I am. Not many would be – they didn't publish but once or twice a week kind of irregular – didn't always make an issue all during a week. So folks would take a while to miss 'em. But I know – it's why I was in town. I used to publish with 'em right regular. Or, as I say, as regular as a man could with such an irregular little paper. And I notice that every date you cited occurs during those two weeks they been out of business. Even allowing for a day or two delay from when they were reprinted, those dates ain't possible."

Heyes looked at Charlie and Jim in concern. "Mr. Wiseman," Heyes asked, "you said you were one of the few people who would know that the Trumpet had gone under. Who would the others be?"

"Hmn. Let's see," said Wiseman thoughtfully, "the publisher and editor, Joshua Jeffers; the printer, Ted Jeffers, his son; Willkie Sorenson who supplies the paper; Ren MacAvoy, the guy who writes . . . wrote for 'em most regular; and Jimmy Worth, the boy who distributed the papers. And I guess Worth Hawes, the guy who runs the saloon where most of the papers always were – and the offices were upstairs in his building. I think that'd be about it. Oh – and Herm Pohank, the Sheriff. He's the best news source in town. Must have talked to Jeffers most every day."

"That's a pretty careful list, seems to me," said Heyes. "I'll bet there's a clue or two there somewhere to what's been going on. It's quite the mystery. But two things I know – somebody's publishing fiction as fact and the Kid ain't at home."

"So where is the K-K-Kid?" asked Jim, visibly upset.

"I don't rightly know, but I'd lay odds he's not in the Lodge Grass jail," said Heyes.