The room into which Dingwell had stepped was as large as a public dance-hall.  Scattered in one part or another of it, singly or in groups, were fifty or sixty men.  In front, to the right, was the bar, where some cowmen and prospectors were lined up before a counter upon which were bottles and glasses.  A bartender in a white linen jacket was polishing the walnut top with a cloth.

Dave shook his head in answer to the invitation to drink that came to him at once.  Casually he chatted with acquaintances as he worked his way toward the rear.  This part of the room was a gambling resort.  Among the various methods of separating the prodigal from his money were roulette, faro, keno, chuckaluck, and poker tables.  Around these a motley assemblage was gathered.  Rich cattlemen brushed shoulders with the outlaws who were rustling their calves.  Mexicans without a nickel stood side by side with Eastern consumptives out for their health.  Chinese laundrymen played the wheel beside miners and cowpunchers.  Stolid, wooden-faced Indians in blankets from the reservation watched the turbid life of the Southwest as it eddied around them.  The new West was jostling the old West into the background, but here the vivid life of the frontier was making its last stand.

By the time that Dave had made a tour of two thirds of the room he knew that Sheriff Sweeney was not among those present.  His inquiries brought out the fact that he must have just left.  Dingwell sauntered toward the door, intending to follow him, but what he saw there changed his mind.  Buck Rutherford and Slim Sanders were lounging together at one end of the bar.  It took no detective to understand that they were watching the door.  A glance to the rear showed Dave two more Rutherfords at the back exit.  That he would have company in case he left was a safe guess.

The cattleman chuckled.  The little devils of mischief already mentioned danced in his eyes.  If they were waiting for him to go, he would see that they had a long session of it.  Dave was in no hurry.  The night was young yet, and in any case the Legal Tender never closed.  The key had been thrown away ten years before.  He could sit it out as long as the Rutherfords could.

Dingwell was confident no move would be made against him in public.  The sentiment of the community had developed since that distant day when the Rutherford gang had shot down Jack Beaudry in open daylight.  Deviltry had to be done under cover now.  Moreover, Dave was in the peculiar situation of advantage that the outlaws could not kill him until they knew where he had hidden the gold.  So far as the Rutherfords went, he was just now the goose that laid the golden egg.