catch my train?"

"That's Senator Steve Brown--State Senator. Thought you knew him."

"No. I just met him to-day."

The operator slumped down in his chair.

Bartley strode to the door and blinked in the Arizona sunshine. "By
George!" he murmured, "I always thought they wore those big Stetsons for
show. But all day in this sun--guess I'll have to have one."






CHAPTER IV

"A LITTLE GREEN RIVER"


To suddenly stop off at a cow-town station, without baggage or definite
itinerary, was unconventional, to say the least. Bartley was amused and
interested. Hitherto he had written more or less conventional
stuff--acceptable stories of the subway, the slums, the docks, and the
streets of Eastern cities. But now, as he strode over to the saloon, he
forgot that he was a writer of stories. A boyish longing possessed him
to see much of the life roundabout, even to the farthest, faint range of
hills--and beyond.