"Let Mr. Willis----" began Miss Donovan.

"Mind your own business, Stella," commanded Farriss, "and see that your
hat's on straight. Because within half an hour you're going to draw on
the night cashier for five hundred dollars and pack your little
portmanteau for Haskell."

Willis's face fell. "Can't I go, too?" he began, but Farriss silenced
him on the instant.

"Kid," he said sharply but kindly, "you're too good a hound for the
desert. The city needs you here--and, dammit, you keep on sniffing."

Turning to the unsettled girl beside him, he went on briskly:

"Work guardedly; query us when you have to; be sure of your facts, and
consign your soul to God. Do I see you moving?"

And when Farriss looked again he did.




CHAPTER VII: MISS DONOVAN ARRIVES

When the long overland train paused a moment before the ancient box car
that served as the depot for the town of Haskell, nestled in the gulch
half a mile away, it deposited Miss Stella Donovan almost in the arms
of Carson, the station-agent, and he, wary of the wiles of women and