The bookkeeper almost missed him, at that. Bill was having his busy day. Before the bank employees quit buzzing, Bill was conferring with McGaran about cement and making time the essence of the contract, as lawyers say. From McGaran's office Bill went to a place said to be the Town-site Office,--just behind the bank, it was. And in fifteen minutes he was riding a hard-driven automobile over slopes which had furnished scant grazing for his burros not so long ago. For himself he would have built the house beside his tent, but for Doris that wouldn't do at all. The working class had crowded into that part of town, because it was close to the mine. Wherefore, Bill examined vacant plots far removed from the grime and the noise of money-getting. Before noon he had acquired personal title to a knoll not too far from the business section, nor so close that any part of the magnificent sweep of desert and distant mountains could ever be hidden from the windows and wide porches of his Mary's home. Laying aside his sentiment for his old camp ground, and trying to see all this with the eyes of Doris and, later, of his little Mary, Bill looked long and said to himself that he had done well. By then, all Parowan knew that Bill Dale had returned and meant to start immediately upon the building of a mansion. A new light shone in the eyes of certain men who had been looking anxiously for some sign in the heavens to tell them whether the prosperity of Parowan would break or hold. For this there was a reason. Other prospects had been exploited far beyond their deserts. Their little bubbles had glowed iridescent for a time, and were going the way of all bubbles. Parowan Consolidated was the only real mine behind the town, the one big industry that could hold prosperity upon the mountain side. Other small camps had appeared in near-by canyons, desert mushrooms more or less poisonous to the unwary. At first it had been believed that the gold Bill Dale had found would be uncovered elsewhere in the district. The promoters of Parowan had carefully fostered that belief, and even yet the men on the outside were unaware of the fact that certain other opulently named companies were riding precariously up the tail of Bill Dale's kite. They advertised their properties as being "adjoining the Parowan Consolidated properties," and sold stock on the strength of that statement rather than because of any particular value in their own claims. And the _Parowan Record_ was doing all that any boom-town newspaper could do to discourage discouragement and foster faith in the district. There was meaning in Rayfield's declaration that the passing of a dividend by Parowan Consolidated was unfortunate at that particular time, and that the coming of Bill was likely to prove a godsend to the town.