r condition and all under a year old. Vaca was
short of pasture this year, hence, he declared, forced to sell at a
bargain. Howard nodded gravely, considered briefly, and in ten minutes
bought the herd, agreeing to take them at ten per cent. less than
Tony's bargain price provided they were delivered in Desert Valley
within a week.

Now all of his business of buying and selling was done and there
remained but to go home or to look further for Courtot. He rode back
into Las Palmas and breakfasted at the lunch counter. There he learned
that Courtot had probably gone on up to Quigley, another twenty-five
miles to the north-east. And, very largely because of the geographical
location of Quigley, Howard decided on the instant to continue at least
that far his quest. For, coming the way he had from his ranch, he had
described a wide arc, almost a semicircle, and by the same trail,
should he retrace it, was a hundred and fifty miles from Desert Valley.
But, if he went on to Quigley, a mining-town in the bare mountains, he
would be at the mouth of Quigley Pass, which led to a little-used trail
through the mountains and almost in a straight line across the arm of
the desert known locally as the Bad Lands. Though he had never crossed
these weary, empty miles, and though there were no towns and few
water-holes within their blistered scope, Howard judged that he could
save close to fifty miles of the return trip. So he slipped his foot
into the stirrup and swung out toward Quigley, hopeful of finding
Courtot and confident of a short cut home.

Chapter XII

The Desert Supreme

Considerably to his surprise Howard found absolutely no trace of
Courtot in Quigley. He inquired at the pool room, at the restaurant,
at the stable. No one had seen the gambler for several months. It
struck the cattleman as strange that a man should have ridden out of
Las Palmas, taking the Quigley trail, and not have come to Quigley.
Where else could a man go? On the west lay the desert, on the east the
Lava Mountains and beyond the desert again, and it was a far call to
any settlement or habitation. Even the sheepmen did not come up this
way; only the Quigley mines brought men here, and yet Courtot had not
come to Quigley.

'He turned out somewhere,' mused Howard, 'the Lord knows what for or
where. But it's his business, and I'm going home.'

He gave his horse an hour in the stable while he himself made ready for
his short cut acr