Bill Dale knew rock. He had spent two years, more or less, prospecting on the southern slope of Parowan, because there was a "break" running across, and because, in the lower end of a wash that had many feeders wrinkled into the mountainside, he had picked up a few pieces of "float" carrying free gold in such quantity that it would mean a real bonanza if he found it "in place," which means in a continuous vein leading to the main body that produced it. As a bystander he had observed the boom at Goldfield, Tonopah, and at other lesser points. His father had been rich in a boom town for a few weeks. Then he had been a broken, old pauper until he died. Wherefore, Bill Dale did not want a premature boom, nor any boom at all. He wanted to find the ledge or vein that had produced that float, so that he would have something tangible to offer Doris Hunter,--in case he ever found courage enough to offer her anything. He knew that he was liked by the Hunters; but he also knew that as a prospective husband for Doris he was never for one moment seriously considered. Don Hunter, her father, was a stockman. He did not believe much in mines, and he looked askance, from a business viewpoint, at any man who spent good, working days in prospecting the desert. It was the most insidious, the most hopeless form of gambling, according to Don Hunter. He would rather see a man sit down to poker and play for a living than to see him wallowing around like a badger, digging holes in a sidehill looking for wealth. Bill had done a great deal of pecking and prying, up this wash and that. He believed he knew where the float had come from, but there seemed to be an overburden of soil, probably the result of some beating storm and consequent slide, which had covered the ledge that had at one time been an outcropping. It was slow, tedious work, but Bill was a patient man. Prospectors have to learn patience, or quit the game. Flaunting desert lilies, dainty blue bells, the deep magenta bloom of the cacti gave way to the tiny pink and pale lavender blossoms that cling close to the arid soil. The sky was brazen with heat, or it turned deep shades of slate as the thunderheads poked over Parowan and rumbled warningly at the desert. Bill worked on through the hot days and practised scales and simple melodies in the evening, and quarreled with Luella and confided to her many things which he would not want repeated. One sultry evening he brought into camp several pieces of rock and held them where Luella could gaze upon certain telltale, yellow specks. Bill's perspiring face glowed. His eyes were dancing with something akin to mirth.