gnificent; it deserved all the praise Barbara
Morgan had heaped upon it. From the low mountain range on the north to
the taller mountains southward, it was a virgin paradise in which reigned
a peace so profound that it brought a reverent awe into the soul of the
beholder.

It thrilled Harlan despite the certain blase, matter-of-fact attitude he
had for all of nature's phenomena; he found himself admiring the majestic
buttes that fringed it; there was a glint of appreciation in his eyes for
the colossal bigness of it--for the gigantic, sweeping curves which
seemed to make of it an oblong bowl, a cosmic hollow, boundless, hinting
of the infinite power of its builder.

The trail that ran through it, drawled to threadlike proportions by the
mightiness of the space through which it ran, was, for the greater part
of the distance traveled by Harlan, a mere scratch upon a low rock ridge.
And as he rode he could look down upon the floor of the valley, green and
inviting.

When he entered the timber at the edge of the grass level, he was
conscious of a stealthy sound behind him. He turned quickly in the
saddle, to see a man standing at the edge of some brush that fringed the
trail.

The man was big, a heavy black beard covered his chin and portions of his
cheeks; his hat was drawn well down over his forehead, partially
shielding his eyes.

A rifle in his hands was held loosely, and though it appeared that the
man did not intend to use the weapon immediately, Harlan could see that
his right forefinger was touching the trigger, and that the muzzle of the
weapon was suggestively toward him.

For the past few miles of his ride Harlan had been expecting an
apparition of this sort to appear, and so he now gave no sign of
surprise. Instead, he slowly raised both hands until they were on a level
with his shoulders--and, still twisted about in the saddle, he grinned
faintly at the man.

"From now on I'm to have company, eh?" he said.

The man smirked grimly at him.

"You've hit it," he answered. "You're Harlan, ain't you? 'Drag' Harlan,
the Pardo two-gun man?"

The man's eyes were glowing with interest--critical, almost cynical, and
they roved over Harlan with a probing intensity that left no doubt in
Harlan's mind that the man had heard of him and was examining him with
intent to discover what sort of a character he was.

Apparently satisfied--and also plainly impressed with what he saw, the
man grinned--this time almost g