“She’s pulled everything we’ve struck, so far,” Rawley replied cheerfully. “Other cars make it, don’t they?” “Some do--and some holler for help. It’s a long, hard drag up the wash. And if you tackle it in the hot part of the day you’ll need plenty of water. And,” the storekeeper added with a whimsical half-smile, “the hot part of the day is any time between sunrise and dark. It does get _awful_ hot down in there! I don’t mean to knock my own district,” he added, “but I don’t like to see any one start down the canyon without knowing about what to expect. Then, if they want to go, that’s their business.” “That’s the way to look at it,” Rawley agreed. “I expect you’ve been here a good while, haven’t you?” The storekeeper wiped a fresh collection of beads from his forehead. He looked up and down the canyon rather wistfully. “About as many years as you are old,” he said quietly. “I came in here twenty-five years ago.” Rawley laughed. “I was about a year old when you landed. Seems a long while back, to me.” He stepped on the starter, waved his hand to the storekeeper and went grinding away down the steep trail through the loose sand. Johnny Buffalo, sitting beside him, lifted a hand and laid it on his arm. “Stop! He calls,” he said. Rawley stopped the car, his head tilted outward, looking back. The storekeeper was coming down the trail toward them. “I forgot to tell you there’s a bad Indian loose in the hills somewhere along the river,” he panted when he came up. “He’s waylaid a couple of prospectors that we know of. A blood feud against the whites, the Indians tell me. You may not run across him at all, but it will be just as well to keep an eye out.” “What’s his name?” Johnny Buffalo turned his head and stared hard at the other. “His name’s Queo. He’s middle-aged--somewhere in the late forties, I should say. Medium-sized and kind of stocky built. He’ll kill to get grub or tobacco. Seeing there’s two of you he might not try anything, but I’d be careful, if I were in your place. There’s a price on his head, so if he tries any tricks--” He waved his hand and grinned expressively as he turned back to the store. “He is older than that man thinks,” said Johnny Buffalo after a silence. “Queo has almost as many years as I have. When we were children we fought. He is bad. For him to kill is pleasure, but he is a coward.” “If there is a price on his head he has probably left the country,” Rawley remarked indifferently. “Old-timers are fine people, most of them. But they do like to tell it wild to tenderfeet. I suppose that’s human nature.”