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 checked. A large part of the loss was county funds. There was no insurance. Although the president did not say so, the paper made it plain that things looked father cloudy for the bank.

Forty men were out, raking the country for trace of the robbers, of whom there were believed to be five, including the one who joined them at McPacken. These searchers were spreading the news at every ranch and cow camp, their numbers increasing as they rode. The gang had an hour, or more, start of the posse at the beginning, their audacious blow had so completely stunned and disorganized the town.

While the Gazette was loud in praise of the sheriff's valor and competency, it was low in its hope of results. The robbers had headed south, making for No Man's Land, as the panhandle of what was then the Indian Territory was called. For many years neither territorial nor federal jurisdiction had been exercised over that narrow neck of country. An outlaw who could gain the cover of No Man's Land was safe from the reach of those on the outside, no matter what his perils from more desperate refugees within.

The editor of the paper was a careful man, yet he wanted to give all the news and put it as plainly as he could within the limits of libel in case circumstances might clear up and show public report to be wrong. He did not mention Tom Laylander by name, there fore, but referred to him as "a young Texas cowman who has been around here the past four or five weeks, lately employed on the section as a common laborer."