Long Buck Sanderson lived in the country south of the road which is the main artery through the reservation. By his advice I returned along this road until we came again to Kanawauke Lakes where the Scout Headquarters are located. Here he directed me into a country road which ran south and we followed this for two or three miles till we came to a sort of hamlet with a tiny primitive schoolhouse and a horrible gasoline station. Of all the atrocities committed by the automobile, the killing of children, the maiming of pedestrians, this was the worst. It would have been the quaintest little hamlet in the world, but for that ungodly gas station. Sandyfield is the name on the schoolhouse. This place was Buck Sanderson’s market town. He lived in a remote suburb, as one might say, and that was at a place another couple of miles south called Rattlesnake Gulch. To reach Rattlesnake Gulch you must leave your car to the tender mercies of Sandyfield, but you could almost carry Sandyfield away in a Ford. From this sequestered hamlet you have to hit the trail southwest for Rattlesnake Gulch. There is really no visible trail most of the way. And Rattlesnake Gulch has no other habitations except the primitive cabin of Buck Sanderson; or rather, I should say, _had_ none, for even that homely abode is no more. We had almost reached Sandyfield and I was preparing to part from my chance acquaintance when it jumped into my head to ask him what he had meant by saying that if he had what really belonged to him he might own one of them contraptions--meaning an automobile. “I reckon three thousand would buy one,” he said. “It would certainly buy a better one than mine,” I observed. “Did somebody cheat you out of three thousand dollars?” I asked. For I suspected that he might have had some differences with the government in the matter of taking over his property in the public interest, though to be sure his real estate holdings in Rattlesnake Gulch could not have been worth three hundred dollars, to say nothing of three thousand. I should say three dollars would have been a fair price. “You come ’long daown ter my cabin, mister,” he said, “and I’ll tell yer, an’ show yer. Mebbe yer kin tell me along ’baout my little gal. Guess yer a lawyer, mebbe, huh?” I told him no, I was an author, but that if he had anything interesting to show or tell me, I would be glad to follow him. He did not vouchsafe me any further information but started down into the woods, and after making sure that my car would be safe I followed him. I have often wondered why I did this upon such slight provocation and with a destination elsewhere. I suppose there is a little of the spirit of adventure left in me. For one thing the old man captivated me. Perhaps also the name of Rattlesnake Gulch fascinated me. At all events, I was in for it before I knew it and the machinery of the weirdest chain of happenings I have ever heard of was set going.