He did more of
the planning than Bowie did. Claiborne Bushyager was about my own age;
while Forrest was older than Bowie. He was always able to convince
people that he was not a member of the gang, and now, an old
white-haired, soft-spoken man, still owns the original Bushyager farm,
with two hundred acres added, where I must confess he has always made
enough money by good farming to account for all the property he has.
These men were an important factor in the history of Monterey County for
many years, and I knew all of them well; but had they known that I saw
them that morning in the grove I guess I should not have lived to write
this history; though it was years before the people came to believing
such things of them. The third man in the grove I never saw again.
Judging from what we learned afterward, I think it is safe to say that
this Unknown was one of the celebrated Bunker gang of bandits, whose
headquarters were on the Iowa River somewhere between Eldora and
Steamboat Rock, in Hardin County. He was a small man with light hair and
eyes, and kept both the Bushyagers on one side of him all the time I had
them in view. When he spoke it was almost in a whisper, and he kept
darting sharp glances from side to side all the time, and especially at
the Bushyagers. When they left he rode the black horse and led one of
the grays. I know, because I crept back to my own camp, took my
breakfast with Virginia, and then spied on the Bushyagers until
dinner-time.
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