The Project Gutenberg eBook, Copper Streak Trail, by Eugene Manlove Rhodes

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Title: Copper Streak Trail

Author: Eugene Manlove Rhodes

Release Date: December 31, 2004 [eBook #14545]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COPPER STREAK TRAIL***

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COPPER STREAK TRAIL

by

EUGENE MANLOVE RHODES

Author of _Stepsons Of Light_, _Good Men And True_, _West Is West_, etc.

1917

TO THE READER OF THIS BOOK FROM ONE WHO SAW LIFE UNSTEADILY AND IN PART

CHAPTER I

The stage line swung aside in a huge half-circle, rounding the northern
end of the Comobabi Range and swinging far out to skirt the foothills.
Mr. Peter Johnson had never been to Silverbell: his own country lay far
to the north, beyond the Gila. But he knew that Silverbell was somewhere
east of the Comobabi, not north; and confidently struck out to find a
short cut through the hills. From Silverbell a spur of railroad ran down
to Redrock. Mr. Johnson's thought was to entrain himself for Tucson.

The Midnight horse reached along in a brisk, swinging walk, an optimistic
walk, good for four miles an hour. He had held that gait since three
o'clock in the morning, with an hour off for water and breakfast at
Smith's Wells, the first stage station out from Cobre; it was now
hot noon by a conscientious sun--thirty-six miles. But Midnight did not
care. For hours their way had been through a trackless plain of uncropped
salt grass, or grama, on the rising slopes: now they were in a country of
worn and freshly traveled trails: wise Midnight knew there would be water
and nooning soon. Already they had seen little bands of horses peering
down at them from the high knolls on their right.

Midnight wondered if they were to find sweet water or alkali. Sweet,
likely, since it was in the hills; Midnight was sure he hoped so. The
best of these wells in the plains were salt and brackish. Privately,
Midnight preferred the Forest Reserve. It was a pleasant, soft life in
these