XIX. The Secret of Forlorn River
XX. Desert Gold




D E S E R T G O L D



PROLOGUE


I


A FACE haunted Cameron--a woman's face. It was there in the white
heart of the dying campfire; it hung in the shadows that hovered
over the flickering light; it drifted in the darkness beyond.

This hour, when the day had closed and the lonely desert night set
in with its dead silence, was one in which Cameron's mind was thronged
with memories of a time long past--of a home back in Peoria, of a
woman he had wronged and lost, and loved too late. He was a prospector
for gold, a hunter of solitude, a lover of the drear, rock-ribbed
infinitude, because he wanted to be alone to remember.

A sound disturbed Cameron's reflections. He bent his head listening.
A soft wind fanned the paling embers, blew sparks and white ashes
and thin smoke away into the enshrouding circle of blackness. His