Produced by David T. Jones, Al Haines & the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net [Illustration: He packed an emergency camp outfit on Wise One, and set out quite happily, walking beside Doris. FRONTISPIECE. _See page 103._] The Parowan Bonanza BY B. M. BOWER AUTHOR OF CHIP OF THE FLYING U, THE TRAIL OF THE WHITE MULE, STARR OF THE DESERT, Etc. FRONTISPIECE BY FRANK TENNEY JOHNSON [Illustration] NEW YORK GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS Made in the United States of America _Copyright, 1923_, By Little, Brown, and Company. _All rights reserved_ Published August, 1923 Reprinted November, 1923 Printed in the United States of America CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I Hopeful Bill Dale 3 II Music Hath Charms 16 III Luella Announces 29 IV Good, Lively Prospect 41 V Strangers in Camp 50 VI Bill Grows Sentimental 65 VII What Drives Prospectors Crazy 74 VIII "Monte Cristo Would Enjoy This!" 86 IX A "Hint" from Doris 96 X "We're Rich, Bill, Dear" 108 XI Mr. Rayfield Gives Advice 119 XII A Man Shouldn't Mix Business with Love 130 XIII Bill Learns About Women from 'er 146 XIV Baker Cole 159 XV "Mary's Going to Have a Home!" 171 XVI So Bill Goes Back 180 XVII Bill Gives the Public Mind a Lift 191 XVIII The Yarn Al Freeman Told 205 XIX "There'll Be More to Come of It" 219 XX Luella Entertains 229 XXI Bill and the Tame Bandits 240 XXII Bill Buys Parowan 255 XXIII Bill is Back Where He Started 269 XXIV The Town That Was 282 XXV Hopeless Bill Dale 291 XXVI Bill Acquires a Cook 295 THE PAROWAN BONANZA CHAPTER ONE HOPEFUL BILL DALE To those who do not know the desert, the word usually conjures a picture of hot, waterless wastes of sand made desolate by sparse, withered gray sage more depressing than no growth at all; blighted by rattlesnakes and scorpions and the bleached bones of men from which lean coyotes go skulking away in the brazen heat that comes with the dawn; a place where men go mad with thirst and die horribly, babbling the while of mountain brooks and the cool blur of lakes shining blue in the distance, painted treacherously there by the desert mirage.