THE SETTLERS' BRIDGE 

 A Profit of Nearly S20,000 Was Made on This Bridge, which Cost, Originally, about S500 



And this is not all. ]\lost of these 

 homesteaders located in the vicinity 

 left their claims during the severe win- 

 ters, and sought residence in the sur- 

 rounding towns. But Cascade Bill re- 

 mained on his claim all winter, for 

 there was money in it. About once 

 a month, he dictated a letter to nearly 

 every settler, informing him or her, 

 that a storm had damaged the bridge 

 to such an extent that it would have 

 to be repaired immediately. 



He explained that each man or wom- 

 an's share of the expense would be 

 about $5. It is said that, in the fifteen 

 years he practiced this scheme, he 

 collected about $8,000 for repairs to a 

 bridge, which people in Index told me 

 never was damaged but twice in that 

 time, and then was repaired in a half 

 day at a cost of about $50. 



But Cascade Bill soon met his 

 Waterloo, as murder came out. He 

 came home fearfully intoxicated one 

 night in December, kicked his faith- 

 ful spouse out of doors, locked her 

 in the woodshed, and threw in after 

 her the bones his dog had not touched 

 that night. The next morning he 

 temporarily disappeared, and one of 

 our rangers found the woman in a half- 

 dead condition from cold and hunger, 

 two days later, attracted by her pitiful 



584 



cries for help, as he passed near the 

 claim to a ranger station close by. 



\\^e took the woman in charge, and 

 after she had fully recovered, she told 

 us one of the most heart-rending sto- 

 ries of abuse that I have ever listened 

 to. A complete separation and divorce 

 followed, and on the condition that she 

 would testify against her husband in 

 land matters, I agreed not to ])ush the 

 poison case against her. 



The shadow of prison walls hover 

 grimly over the wasted form of Cas- 

 cafle Bill to-day, and his dreams can 

 only be of the ill-gotten gold he took 

 from the ignorant poor who trusted 

 and listened to him. The guards say 

 that he turns restlessly in his sleep, and 

 mutters something about "fine loca- 

 tion." and a "fee of $325." In a dis- 

 tant northern city his wife, old and 

 gray, is toiling out her few remaining 

 years over a sewing machine, and shed- 

 ding a tear now and then for the man 

 who came to her many years ago in the 

 excellence of his young and promising 

 manhood, and asked her to be his wife. 

 She can only live over in her memory 

 again a few happy years before he be- 

 gan his downward course, and who en- 

 vies this isolated woman the little com- 

 fort she may gain from a few stray 

 golden thoughts of the buried past? 



