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Software Testing An ISTQB ISEB Foundation Guide
Peter Morgan Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Peter Morgan, Angelina Samaroo, Brian Hambling
ISBN(s): 9781906124762, 1906124760
Edition: New
File Details: PDF, 1.36 MB
Year: 2010
Language: english
 Software Testing
SOFTWARE

Brian Hambling (Editor)

An ISTQB–ISEB Foundation Guide

TESTING
Second Edition
Brian Hambling (Editor), Peter Morgan, Angelina Samaroo,
Geoff Thompson and Peter Williams

This bestselling software testing title is the official textbook

of the ISTQB–ISEB Foundation Certificate in Software Testing.
Invaluable for anyone An ISTQB–ISEB
It covers the 2010 update to the exam syllabus and is ideal for
those with some experience of software testing who wish to
involved in testing and
would lift the game of Foundation Guide
Second Edition
cement their knowledge with industry-recognised techniques most VV&T staff
and theory. The book includes self-assessment exercises,
sample examination questions and worked examples. (including designers
doing their ‘informal’

Software Testing: An ISTQB - ISEB Foundation Guide

• The bestselling software testing title
• The official textbook of the ISTQB–ISEB Foundation reviews and tests) and
Certificate in Software Testing
• Complete overview of tools and techniques
their project managers. Brian Hambling (Editor)
It is succinctly and
About the Authors clearly written with
The authors are all experienced ISEB examination setters and no nonsense. An
markers and know the ISTQB–ISEB syllabus in depth. The editor
Brian Hambling has experienced software development from unreserved 5 for
a developer’s, a project manager’s and a quality manager’s value for money.
perspective in a career spanning over 30 years.
IT Training Magazine
(review of previous edition)
You might also be interested in:

Software Testing: An ISEB Intermediate Certificate

Brian Hambling and Angelina Samaroo

Information Technology

SoftwareTesting_layout_4.indd 1 20/9/10 16:22:45

Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page x
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page i

SOFTWARE TESTING
An ISTQB–ISEB Foundation Guide
Second Edition
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page ii

BCS THE CHARTERED INSTITUTE FOR IT

Our mission as BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, is to enable the information
society. We promote wider social and economic progress through the advancement
of information technology, science and practice. We bring together industry,
academics, practitioners and government to share knowledge, promote new
thinking, inform the design of new curricula, shape public policy and inform
the public.

Our vision is to be a world-class organisation for IT. Our 70,000 strong membership
includes practitioners, businesses, academics and students in the UK and
internationally. We deliver a range of professional development tools for practitioners
and employees. As leading IT qualification body, we offer a range of widely recognised
qualifications.

Further Information
BCS The Chartered Institute for IT,
First Floor, Block D,
North Star House, North Star Avenue,
Swindon, SN2 1FA, United Kingdom.
T +44 (0) 1793 417 424
F +44 (0) 1793 417 444
www.bcs.org/contactus
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page iii

SOFTWARE TESTING
An ISTQB–ISEB Foundation Guide
Second Edition
Brian Hambling (Editor), Peter Morgan, Angelina
Samaroo, Geoff Thompson and Peter Williams
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page iv

© 2010 British Informatics Society Limited

The right of Brian Hambling, Peter Morgan, Angelina Samaroo, Geoff Thompson and Peter Williams to be
identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or
review, as permitted by the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988, no part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, except with the prior permission in writing
of the publisher, or in the case of reprographic reproduction, in accordance with the terms of the licences
issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries for permission to reproduce material outside those
terms should be directed to the publisher.

All trade marks, registered names etc. acknowledged in this publication are the property of their respective
owners. BCS and the BCS logo are the registered trade marks of the British Computer Society charity
number 292786 (BCS).

Published by British Informatics Society Limited (BISL), a wholly owned subsidiary of BCS, The Chartered
Institute for IT, First Floor, Block D, North Star House, North Star Avenue, Swindon, SN2 1FA, UK.
www.bcs.org

ISBN 978-1-906124-76-2

British Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available at the British Library.

Disclaimer:
The views expressed in this book are of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of BCS or BISL
except where explicitly stated as such. Although every care has been taken by the authors and BISL in the
preparation of the publication, no warranty is given by the authors or BISL as publisher as to the accuracy or
completeness of the information contained within it and neither the authors nor BISL shall be responsible or
liable for any loss or damage whatsoever arising by virtue of such information or any instructions or advice
contained within this publication or by any of the aforementioned.

Typeset by Lapiz Digital Services, Chennai, India.

Printed at CPI Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, UK.

iv
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page v

CONTENTS

Figures and tables vii

Abbreviations ix
Authors xi

INTRODUCTION 1
Nature and purpose of the book 1
Purpose of Foundation 1
The Certified Tester Foundation Level syllabus 2
Relationship of the book to the syllabus 3
How to get the best out of this book 5

1 THE FUNDAMENTALS OF TESTING 7

Background 7
Introduction 7
Why software fails 10
Keeping software under control 12
What testing is and what testing does 14
General testing principles 16
Fundamental test process 20
The psychology of testing 25
Code of ethics 27
Summary 28
References 28

2 LIFE CYCLES 34
Introduction 34
Software development models 36
Test levels 41
Test types 49
Maintenance testing 51
Summary 52

3 STATIC TESTING 57
Introduction 57
Background to static techniques 59
Reviews and the test process 59
Static analysis by tools 68
Summary 70

v
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page vi

CONTENTS

4 TEST DESIGN TECHNIQUES 74

Introduction 74
The test development process 76
The idea of test coverage 80
Categories of test case design techniques 81
Specification-based (black-box) techniques 82
Structure-based (white-box) techniques 97
Experience-based techniques 118
Choosing test techniques 120
Summary 121

5 TEST MANAGEMENT 129

Introduction 129
Risk and testing 132
Test organisation 135
Test approaches (test strategies) 140
Test planning and estimation 142
Test progress monitoring and control 150
Incident management 156
Configuration management 159
Summary 160

6 TOOL SUPPORT FOR TESTING 167

Introduction 167
What Is a test tool? 169
Test tools 173
Introducing a tool into an organisation 204
Summary 208

7 THE EXAMINATION 215

The examination 215
Revision techniques 219
Review 220

Index 221

vi
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page vii

FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 0.1 Syllabus map 4

Figure 1.1 Effect of an error 11
Figure 1.2 Resources triangle 13
Figure 1.3 Effect of identification time on cost of errors 19
Figure 1.4 Fundamental test process 21
Figure 1.5 Iteration of activities 22
Figure 2.1 Waterfall model 36
Figure 2.2 V-model for software development 38
Figure 2.3 Iterative development 40
Figure 2.4 Top-down control structure 44
Figure 2.5 Bottom-up integration 45
Figure 3.1 Stages of a formal review 62
Figure 3.2 Formality of reviews 65
Figure 4.1 State transition diagram of the hill-walker’s watch 93
Figure 4.2 State transition diagram 95
Figure 4.3 Use case example 96
Figure 4.4 Flow chart for a sequential program 101
Figure 4.5 Flow chart for a selection (decision) structure 101
Figure 4.6 Flow chart for an iteration (loop) structure 101
Figure 4.7 Flow chart representation for Example 4.5 103
Figure 4.8 Control flow graph showing subgraphs as nodes 106
Figure 4.9 Control flow graph with subgraphs expanded 106
Figure 4.10 Flow chart for Program Coverage Example 109
Figure 4.11 The hybrid flow graph 109
Figure 4.12 Paths through the hybrid flow graph 110
Figure 4.13 Paths through the hybrid flow graph 112
Figure 4.14 Paths through the hybrid flow graph 116
Figure 4.15 Flow chart for Exercise 4.6 126
Figure 4.16 Control flow graph for Exercise 4.6 127
Figure 5.1 Levels of independent testing 136
Figure 5.2 Test plans in the V-model 143
Figure 5.3 iTesting Executive Dashboard 152
Figure 5.4 Incidents planned/raised 153
Figure 6.1 Test tool payback model 170
Figure 6.2 Hotel system architecture 172
Figure 6.3 An integrated set of tools 174
Figure 6.4 Test execution tools payback model 188
Figure 6.5 Test harness for middleware 189
Figure 6.6 Test tool implementation process 209

vii
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page viii

FIGURES AND TABLES

Table 1.1 Comparative cost to correct errors 18

Table 4.1 ST for the hill-walker’s watch 94
Table 5.1 Features of independent testing 137
Table 5.2 Test plan sections 144
Table 5.3 Test summary report outline 154
Table 5.4 Test incident report outline 158
Table 6.1 Configuration traceability 178
Table 6.2 Hotel system extract (20/10/2006) 184
Table 6.3 Hotel system extract (5/11/2006) 185
Table 6.4 Exit criteria 191
Table 6.5 Types of test tool 199

viii
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page ix

ABBREVIATIONS

AUT Application Under Test

BACS Bankers Automated Clearing Services
CASE Computer-Aided Software Engineering
CMMi Capability Maturity Model Integration
DLL Dynamic Link Library
FTP Fundamental Test Process
GUI Graphical User Interface
ISEB Information Systems Examination Board
ISTQB International Software Testing Qualications Board
MISRA Motor Industry Software Reliability Association
RAD Rapid Application Development
RUP Rational Unified Process
SDLC Software Development Life Cycle
SIGiST Special Interest Group in Software Testing
SQL Structured Query Language
ST State Table
TPI Test Process Improvement
UML Unified Modeling Language
XML Extensible Markup Language

ix
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Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page xi

AUTHORS

Brian Hambling has experienced software development from a developer’s,

project manager’s and quality manager’s perspective in a career spanning over
35 years. He has worked in areas as diverse as real-time avionics, legacy systems
maintenance and e-business strategies. He contributed to the development of
software quality standards while at the Ministry of Defence and later became the
head of systems and software engineering at The University of Greenwich. He
was technical director of ImagoQA and general manager of Microgen IQA, a spe-
cialist company providing consultancy in software testing and quality assurance
primarily to the financial services sector. He is now concentrating on writing.

Peter Morgan is a freelance testing practitioner. He has been working as a

hands-on tester for a number of years, often on projects with over 30 testers.
He has worked for organisations including Fujitsu Services, Nationwide Building
Society, Hutchison 3G and BT Syntegra. He is a member of the Information
Systems Examination Board (ISEB) software testing accreditation and examina-
tion panels, and has presented papers at several testing conferences, including
EuroSTAR. He has a degree from the London School of Economics and is an
active member of BCS and especially its Special Interest Group in Software
Testing (SIGiST).

Angelina Samaroo began her career in the defence sector, where she worked
on the Tornado ADV. In 1995 she was awarded Chartered Engineer status by
the Royal Aeronautical Society. Early in her career she took an interest in
developing staff, managing the training of new engineers across the company,
to the standards laid down by the IEE (now the IET). She is an instructor for the
ISEB Foundation and Practitioner Courses in Software Testing. She has also
instructed delegates in other aspects of testing, such as unit testing, user
acceptance testing and managing testing projects, in the UK, Europe, North
America and Australia.

Geoff Thompson has been involved in testing for nearly 25 years, specialising
in test strategy, test management and process improvement. He is currently
consultancy director of the consulting organisation Experimentus Ltd. He has
been involved in developing software testing qualifications since 1997, working
first with ISEB and then with ISTQB (International Software Testing Qualifica-
tion Board), an organisation he founded in 2002. He is the chair of the UK Testing
Board, chair of the TMMi Foundation Management Executive, and is also the
vice-chairman of the BCS SIGiST Committee. He was awarded the UK Test
Excellence Award in 2008.

xi
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AUTHORS

Peter Williams previously worked in methods and systems improvement before

moving into systems development and subsequently software testing. He has
been a self-employed contract test manager or consultant in both financial
services and the public sector. He has evaluated test processes and subsequently
implemented improvements, at various organisations, including test
management and execution tools as appropriate. He has an MSc in computing
from the Open University and is chairman of the Examinations Panel for the
ISEB Foundation Certificate in Software Testing.

xii
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 1

INTRODUCTION

NATURE AND PURPOSE OF THE BOOK

The Information Systems Examination Board (ISEB) of BCS (www.bcs.org.uk/iseb)

instigated the Foundation Certificate in Software Testing in 1998; since then over
40,000 Foundation Certificates have been awarded. An intermediate level qualifi-
cation was introduced in 2007 as a step towards the more advanced Practitioner
qualification.

The International Software Testing Qualifications Board (ISTQB) (www.istqb.org)

was set up in 2001 to offer a similar certification scheme to as many countries
as wished to join this international testing community. The UK was a founding
member of ISTQB and, in 2005, adopted the ISTQB Foundation Certificate
Syllabus as the basis of examinations for the Foundation Certificate in the UK.
The Foundation Certificate is now an entry qualification for the ISTQB Advanced
Certificate. The Certified Tester Foundation Level Syllabus has been updated
and released in a 2010 version, and this book relates to the 2010 version of the
syllabus.

This book has been written specifically to help potential candidates for the
ISTQB–ISEB Certified Tester Foundation Level examination. The book is
therefore structured to support learning of the key ideas in the syllabus quickly
and efficiently for those who do not plan to attend a course, and to support
structured revision for anyone preparing for the exam.

In this introductory chapter we will explain the nature and purpose of the
Foundation Level and provide an insight into the way the syllabus is structured
and the way the book is structured to support learning in the various syllabus
areas. Finally we offer guidance on the best way to use this book, either as a
learning resource or as a revision resource.

PURPOSE OF FOUNDATION

The Certified Tester Foundation Level Certificate is the first level of a hierarchy
of ISTQB–ISEB certificates in software testing, and leads naturally into the next
level, known as the Intermediate Certificate in Software Testing, which in turn
leads on to the ISTQB Advanced Level, followed by the various ISTQB Expert
Level examinations.

1
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 2

SOFTWARE TESTING

The Foundation Level provides a very broad introduction to the whole discipline of
software testing. As a result coverage of topics is variable, with some only briefly
mentioned and others studied in some detail. The arrangement of the syllabus and
the required levels of understanding are explained in the next section.

The authors of the syllabus have aimed it at people with varying levels of experi-
ence in testing, including those with no experience at all. This makes the certificate
accessible to those who are or who aim to be specialist testers, but also to those who
require a more general understanding of testing, such as project managers and
software development managers. One specific aim of this qualification is to prepare
certificate holders for the next level of certification, but the Foundation Level has
sufficient breadth and depth of coverage to stand alone.

THE CERTIFIED TESTER FOUNDATION LEVEL SYLLABUS

Syllabus content and structure

The syllabus is broken down into six main sections, each of which has associated
with it a minimum contact time that must be included within any accredited
training course:

1) Fundamentals of testing (155 minutes)

2) Testing throughout the software life cycle (115 minutes)
3) Static techniques (60 minutes)
4) Test design techniques (285 minutes)
5) Test management (170 minutes)
6) Tool support for testing (80 minutes)

The relative timings are a reliable guide to the amount of time that should be
spent studying each section of the syllabus. These timings are further broken
down for each topic within a section.

Each section of the syllabus also includes a list of learning objectives that
provides candidates with a guide to what they should know when they have
completed their study of a section and a guide to what can be expected to be
asked in an examination. The learning objectives can be used to check that
learning or revision is adequate for each topic. In the book, which is structured
around the syllabus sections, we have presented the learning objectives for each
section at the beginning of the relevant chapter, and the summary at the end of
each chapter confirms how those learning objectives have been addressed.

Finally, each topic in the syllabus has associated with it a level of understanding,
represented by the legend K1, K2, K3 or K4:

Level of understanding K1 is associated with recall, so that a topic labelled

K1 contains information that a candidate should be able to remember but not
necessarily use or explain.

2
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 3

INTRODUCTION

Level of understanding K2 is associated with the ability to explain a topic or

to classify information or make comparisons.
Level of understanding K3 is associated with the ability to apply a topic in a
practical setting.
Level of understanding K4 is associated with the ability to analyse a situation
or a set of information to determine what action to take.

The level of understanding influences the level and type of questions that can
be expected to be asked about that topic in the examination. More detail about
the question style and about the examination is given in Chapter 7. Example
questions, written to the level and in the formats used in the examination, are
included within each chapter to provide generous examination practice.

Syllabus map
The syllabus can usefully be viewed as a mind map, as shown in Figure 0.1.
In this representation the main sections of the syllabus, corresponding to
chapters in the book, provide the first level of ordering. The next level provides
the breakdown into topics within each section. In most cases the syllabus breaks
topics down even further, but this level of breakdown is omitted from the diagram
for clarity. Figure 0.1 enables the entire syllabus to be viewed and is potentially
useful as a tracking mechanism to identify visually which parts of the syllabus
need most attention and which parts you feel are well understood. By recognising
the relative strengths and weaknesses by topic within sections it is easier to
understand the nature and extent of the weakness. For example, problems
with certain black-box techniques that are not also associated with white-box
techniques and experience-based techniques should give confidence in the overall
section on test case design techniques. It is also possible to identify how many
marks are ‘at risk’ from this weakness so that you can plan where to spend most
revision time and, perhaps, decide which weaknesses you feel able to leave until
after the examination.

RELATIONSHIP OF THE BOOK TO THE SYLLABUS

The book is structured into chapters that mirror the sections of the syllabus so
that you can work your way through the whole syllabus or select topics that are
of particular interest or concern. The structure enables you to go straight to
the place you need, with confidence either that what you need to know will
be covered there and nowhere else, or that relevant cross references will be
provided.

Each chapter of the book incorporates the learning objectives from the syllabus
and identifies the required level of understanding for each topic. Each chapter
also includes examples of typical examination questions to enable you to assess
your current knowledge of a topic before you read the chapter, and further
questions at the end of each chapter to provide practice in answering typical
examination questions. Topics requiring K3 level of understanding are presented
with worked examples as a model for the level of application expected from real

3
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Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 4

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Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 5

INTRODUCTION

examination questions. Answers are provided for all questions, and the rationale
for the correct answer is discussed for all practice questions.

A final chapter explains the Foundation Level examination strategy and provides
guidance on how to prepare for the examination and how to manage the
examination experience to maximise your own performance.

HOW TO GET THE BEST OUT OF THIS BOOK

This book is designed for use by different groups of people. If you are using the
book as an alternative to attending an accredited course you will probably find
the first method of using the book described below to be of greatest value. If you
are using the book as a revision aid you may find the second approach more
appropriate. In either case you would be well advised to acquire a copy of the
syllabus (available from www.istqb.org) and a copy of the sample examination
paper (available from ISEB) as reference documents, though neither is essential
and the book stands alone as a learning and revision aid.

Using the book as a learning aid

For those of you using the book as an alternative to attending an accredited course
the first step is to familiarise yourself with the syllabus structure and content by
skim reading the opening sections of each chapter where the learning objectives
are identified for each topic. You may then find it helpful to turn to Chapter 7 and
become familiar with the structure of the examination and the types and levels of
questions that you can expect in the examination. From here you can then work
through each of the six main chapters in any sequence before returning to
Chapter 7 to remind yourself of the main elements of the examination.

For each chapter begin by attempting the self-assessment questions at the

beginning to get initial confirmation of your level of confidence in the topics
covered by that chapter. This may help you to prioritise how you spend your
time. Work first through the chapters where your knowledge is weakest,
attempting all the exercises and following through all the worked examples.
Read carefully through the chapters where your knowledge is less weak but
still not good enough to pass the exam. You can be more selective with exer-
cises and examples here, but make sure you attempt the practice questions at
the end of the chapters. For the areas where you feel strong you can use the
chapter for revision, but remember to attempt the practice questions to
confirm positively your initial assessment of your level of knowledge. Every
chapter contains a summary section that reiterates the learning objectives,
so reading the first and last sections of a chapter will help you to understand
how your current level of knowledge relates to the level required to pass the
examination. The best confirmation of this is to attempt questions at the
appropriate K level for each topic; these are provided in the book.

5
Software Testing 2nd Edition:Layout 1 10/1/10 4:55 PM Page 6

SOFTWARE TESTING

Using the book as a revision aid

If you are using this book for final revision, perhaps after completing an
accredited course, you might like to begin by using a selection of the example
questions at the end of each chapter as a ‘mock examination’. The information
in Chapter 7 will enable you to construct a properly balanced mock exam of
your own. Your mock exam will provide some experience of answering typical
questions under the same time pressures that you will experience in the real
examination, and this will provide you with a fairly reliable guide to your
current state of readiness to take the real examination. You can also discover
which areas most need revision from your performance in the mock exam, and
this will guide you as you plan your revision.

Revise first where you feel weakest. You can use the opening sections of each
chapter, containing the learning objectives and the self-assessment questions,
together with the summary at the end of each chapter to refine further your
awareness of your own weaknesses. From here you can target your studies very
accurately. Remember that every K3 topic will have at least one worked example
and some exercises to help you build your confidence before tackling questions at
the level set in the real examination.

You can get final confirmation of your readiness to take the real examination by
taking the sample examination paper provided by ISEB.

6
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so on.”
The Indian reached out a hand, lifted a stick of wood and laid it
across the fire. His eyes turned toward the river.
“Many times, when the air was warm and the stars sat in their
places to watch the night, my sergeant came here with me, and I
gathered wood to make a fire. Many hours he would sit here in his
chair beside the river. Sometimes he would talk. His words were of
the past when he was the strongest of all men. Sometimes his words
were of El Dorado. It is a city by the river, and a ferryboat is in the
midst thereof. It has made many rich with the gold they dig from the
mountains. I think that is the city you must go through.”
“There isn’t any city now,” Rawley told him. “It’s been abandoned
for years. I don’t think there’s a town there, any more.”
“There is the place by the river,” Johnny Buffalo observed calmly.
“There is the great and high mountain. There is ‘the path that no man
knoweth.’”
“Yes, you bet. And we’re going to find it, Johnny Buffalo. I’ve got a
chance to go out that way this month, to examine a mine. I didn’t
think I’d take the job. I wanted to go to Mexico. But now, of course, it
will be Nevada, and I’ll want you to go with me. Do you know that
country?”
A strange expression lightened the Indian’s face for an instant.
“When I killed my first meat,” he said, “I could walk from the kill to
the city by the river. My father’s tent was no more distant than it is
from here to the great city yonder. Not so far, I think. The way was
rough with many hills.”
 Impulsively Rawley leaned and stretched out his arm toward the
Indian.
“Let’s shake on it. We will go together, and you will be my partner.
Whatever we find is the gift of my grandfather, and half of it is yours
when we find it. I feel he’d want it that way. Is it a go, Johnny
Buffalo?”
Something very much like a smile stirred the old man’s lips. He
took Rawley’s hand and gave it a solemn shake, once up, once
down, as is the way of the Indian.
“It is go. You are like my sergeant when he held me in his arms
and gave me water from his canteen. You are my son. Where you go
I will go with you.”
 CHAPTER FIVE
A CITY FORSAKEN
The storekeeper at Nelson stood on his little slant-roofed porch
and mopped his beaded forehead with a blue calico handkerchief.
The desert wrinkles around his eyes drew together and deepened as
he squinted across the acarpous gulch where a few rough-board
shacks stood forlorn with uncurtained windows, to the heat-ridden
hillside beyond.
“It’s going to be awful hot down there by the river,” he observed
deprecatingly. “You’ll find the water pretty muddy—but maybe you
know that. Strangers don’t always; it’s best to make sure, so if you
haven’t a bucket or something to settle the water in, I’d advise you to
take one along. I’ve an extra one I could lend you, if you need it.”
“We have a bucket, thanks.” Rawley stepped into the dust-
covered car loaded with camp outfit. “El Dorado is right at the mouth
of the canyon, isn’t it?”
The storekeeper gave him an odd look. “This is El Dorado,” he
answered drily. “This whole canyon is the El Dorado. There used to
be a town at the mouth of the canyon, but that’s gone years ago.
Better take the left-hand road when you get down here a quarter of a
mile or so. That will take you past the Techatticup Mine. Below there,
turn to the right where two shacks stand close together in the fork of
the road. The other trail’s washed, and I don’t know as you could get
down that way. Car in good shape for the pull back? She’s pretty
steep, coming this way.”
“She’s pulled everything we’ve struck, so far,” Rawley replied
cheerfully. “Other cars make it, don’t they?”
“Some do—and some holler for help. It’s a long, hard drag up the
wash. And if you tackle it in the hot part of the day you’ll need plenty
of water. And,” the storekeeper added with a whimsical half-smile,
“the hot part of the day is any time between sunrise and dark. It does
get awful hot down in there! I don’t mean to knock my own district,”
he added, “but I don’t like to see any one start down the canyon
without knowing about what to expect. Then, if they want to go, that’s
their business.”
“That’s the way to look at it,” Rawley agreed. “I expect you’ve
been here a good while, haven’t you?”
The storekeeper wiped a fresh collection of beads from his
forehead. He looked up and down the canyon rather wistfully.
“About as many years as you are old,” he said quietly. “I came in
here twenty-five years ago.”
Rawley laughed. “I was about a year old when you landed. Seems
a long while back, to me.” He stepped on the starter, waved his hand
to the storekeeper and went grinding away down the steep trail
through the loose sand. Johnny Buffalo, sitting beside him, lifted a
hand and laid it on his arm.
“Stop! He calls,” he said.
Rawley stopped the car, his head tilted outward, looking back. The
storekeeper was coming down the trail toward them.
“I forgot to tell you there’s a bad Indian loose in the hills
somewhere along the river,” he panted when he came up. “He’s
waylaid a couple of prospectors that we know of. A blood feud
against the whites, the Indians tell me. You may not run across him
at all, but it will be just as well to keep an eye out.”
“What’s his name?” Johnny Buffalo turned his head and stared
hard at the other.
“His name’s Queo. He’s middle-aged—somewhere in the late
forties, I should say. Medium-sized and kind of stocky built. He’ll kill
to get grub or tobacco. Seeing there’s two of you he might not try
anything, but I’d be careful, if I were in your place. There’s a price on
his head, so if he tries any tricks—” He waved his hand and grinned
expressively as he turned back to the store.
“He is older than that man thinks,” said Johnny Buffalo after a
silence. “Queo has almost as many years as I have. When we were
children we fought. He is bad. For him to kill is pleasure, but he is a
coward.”
“If there is a price on his head he has probably left the country,”
Rawley remarked indifferently. “Old-timers are fine people, most of
them. But they do like to tell it wild to tenderfeet. I suppose that’s
human nature.”
Johnny Buffalo did not argue the point. He seemed content to
gaze at the hills in the effort to locate old landmarks. And as for
Rawley himself, his mind was wholly absorbed by his mission into
the country, which he had dreamed of for more than a month. There
had been some delay in getting started. First, he could not well
curtail the length of his visit with his mother, in spite of the fact that
they seemed to have little in common. Then he thought it wise to
make the trip to Kingman and report upon a property there which
was about to be sold for a good-sized fortune. The job netted him
several hundred dollars, which he was likely to need. Wherefore he
had of necessity had plenty of time to dream over his own fortune
which might be lying in the hills—“In the cleft of the jagged rocks”—
waiting for him to find it.
Just at first he had been somewhat skeptical. Fifty years is a long
time for gold to remain hidden in the hills of a mining country so rich
as Nevada, without some prospector discovering it. But Johnny
Buffalo believed. Whether his belief was based solely upon his faith
in his sergeant, Rawley could not determine. But Johnny Buffalo had
a very plausible argument in favor of the gold remaining where
Grandfather King had left it in the underground stream.
The fact that Rawley was exhorted to “take victuals for the
journey” meant a distance of a good many miles, perhaps, which
they must travel from El Dorado. Then, they were to go to the top of
a very high mountain and pass over on the other side. Johnny
Buffalo argued that the start was to be made from El Dorado merely
because the mountain would be most visible from that point. It would
be rough country, he contended. The code mentioned cliffs and great
heaps of stones and clefts in jagged rocks, with a deep pit, “Hid from
the eyes of all living,” for the final goal. He thought it more than likely
that Grandfather King’s gold mine was still undiscovered. And toward
the last, Rawley had been much more inclined to believe him. He
had read diligently all the mining information he could get concerning
this particular district, as far back as the records went. Nowhere was
any mention made of such a rich placer discovery on—or in—a
mountain.
 He was thinking all this as he drove the devious twistings and
turnings of the canyon road. Another mine or two they passed; then,
nosing carefully down a hill steeper than the others, they turned
sharply to the left and were in the final discomfort of the “wash.” A
veritable sweat box it was on this particular hot afternoon in July. The
baked, barren hills rose close on either side. Like a deep, gravelly
river bed long since gone dry, the wash sloped steeply down toward
the Colorado. Rawley could readily understand now the solicitude of
the storekeeper. The return was quite likely to be a time of
tribulation.
He had expected to come upon a camp of some sort. But the
canyon opened bleakly to the river, the hot sand of its floor sloping
steeply to meet the lapping waves of the turgid stream. At the
water’s edge, on the first high ground of the bank, were ruins of an
old stamp mill, which might have been built ten years ago or a
hundred, so far as looks went.
He left the car and climbed upon the cement floor of the old mill.
What at first had seemed to be a greater extension of the plant he
now discovered was a walled roadway winding up to the crest of the
hill. He swung about and gazed to the northward, as the Bible code
had commanded that he should travel. A mile or so up the river were
the walls of a deep canyon,—Black Canyon, according to his map.
Farther away, set back from the river a mile, perhaps two miles, a
sharp-pointed hill shouldered up above its fellows. This seemed to
be the highest mountain, so far as he could see, in that direction. If
that were the “great and high mountain” described in the code, their
journey would not be so long as Johnny Buffalo anticipated.
The nearer view was desolation simmering in the heat. A hundred
yards away, on the opposite bank of the wash, the forlorn ruins of a
cabin or two gave melancholy evidence that here men had once
worked and laughed and loved—perchance. He looked at the
furnace yawning beside him, and at the muddy water swirling in
drunken haste just below. It might have been just here that his
grandfather had landed from the steamboat Gila and had watched
the lovely young half-breed girl in the crowd come to welcome the
boat and passengers.
 He started when Johnny Buffalo spoke at his elbow. How the
Indian had reached that spot unheard and unseen Rawley did not
know. Johnny Buffalo was pointing to the north.
“I think that high mountain is where we must go,” he said. “It is
one day’s travel. We can go to-day when the sun is behind the
mountains, and we can walk until the stars are here. Very early in the
morning we can walk again, and before it is too hot we can reach the
trees where it will be cool.”
“We have a lot of grub and things in the car,” Rawley objected. “It
seems to me that it wouldn’t be a bad plan to carry the stuff up here
and cache it somewhere in this old mill. Then if your friend Queo
should show up, there won’t be so much for him to steal. And if we
want to make a camp on the mountain, we can come down here and
carry the stuff up as we need it. There’s a hundred dollars’ worth of
outfit in that car, Johnny,” he added frugally. “I’m all for keeping it for
ourselves.”
Johnny Buffalo looked at the mountain, and he looked down at the
car,—and then grunted a reluctant acquiescence. Rawley laughed at
him.
“That’s all right—the mountain won’t run away over night,” he
bantered, slapping his hand down on Johnny Buffalo’s shoulder with
an affectionate familiarity bred in the past month. “I’ve been juggling
that car over the desert trails since sunrise, and I wouldn’t object to
taking it easy for a few hours.”
Johnny Buffalo said no more but began helping to unload the car.
It was he who chose the trail by which they carried the loads to the
upper level, cement-floored, where no tracks would show. He chose
a hiding place beneath the wreckage of some machinery that had
fallen against the bank in such a way that an open space was left
beneath, large enough to hold their outfit.
A huge rattlesnake protested stridently against being disturbed.
Rawley drew his automatic, meaning to shoot it; but Johnny Buffalo
stopped him with a warning gesture, and himself killed the snake
with a rock. While it was still writhing with a smashed head, he
picked it up by the tail, took a long step or two and heaved it into the
river, grinning his satisfaction over a deed well done.
 Rawley, standing back watching him, had a swift vision of the old
Indian paddling solemnly about the yard near the west wing. There
he was an incongruous figure amongst the syringas and the roses.
Here, although he had discarded the showy fringed buckskin for the
orthodox brown khaki clothes of the desert, he somehow fitted into
his surroundings and became a part of the wilderness itself. Johnny
Buffalo was assuredly coming into his own.
 CHAPTER SIX
TRAILS MEET
By sunrise they were ready for the trail, light packs and filled
canteens slung upon their shoulders. The car was backed against
the bluff that would shade it from the scorching sunlight from early
afternoon to sundown. Beside it were the embers of a mesquite-
wood fire where they had boiled coffee and fried bacon in the cool of
dawn. As a safeguard against the loss of his car, Rawley had
disconnected the breaker points from the distributor and carried
them, carefully wrapped, in his pocket. There would be no moving of
the car under its own power until the points were replaced. And
Johnny Buffalo had advised leaving a few things in the car, to ward
off suspicion that their outfit had been cached. Furthermore, he had
cunningly obliterated their tracks through the deep, fine sand to the
ruins of the stamp mill. Even the keen, predatory eyes of an outlaw
Indian could scarcely distinguish any trace of their many trips that
way.
They crossed the wash, turned into the remnant of an old road
leading up the bank to the level above, and followed a trail up the
river. Once Johnny Buffalo stopped and pointed down the bank.
“The ferryboat went there,” he explained. “Much land has been
eaten by the river since last I saw this place. Many houses stood
here. They are gone. All is gone. My people are gone, like the town.
Of Queo only have I heard, and him the white men hunt as they hunt
the wolf.”
Rawley nodded, having no words for what he felt. There was
something inexpressibly melancholy in this desolation where his
grandfather had found riotous life. Of the fortunes gathered here, the
fortunes lost—of the hopes fulfilled and the hopes crushed slowly in
long, monotonous days of toil and disappointment—what man could
tell? Only the river, rushing heedlessly past as it had hurried, all
those years ago, to meet the lumbering little river boats struggling
against its current with their burden of human emotions, only the
river might have told how the town was born,—and how it had died.
Or the grim hills standing there as they had stood since the land was
in the making, looking down with saturnine calm upon the puny
endeavors of men whose lives would soon enough cease upon earth
and be forgotten. Rawley’s boot toe struck against something in the
loose gravel,—a child’s shoe with the toe worn to a gaping mouth,
the heel worn down to the last on the outer edge: dry as a bleached
bone, warped by many a storm, blackened, doleful. Even a young
man setting out in quest of his fortune, with a picturesque secret
code in his pocket, may be forgiven for sending a thought after the
child who had scuffed that coarse little shoe down here in El Dorado.
But presently Johnny Buffalo, leading the way briskly, his sharp
old eyes taking in everything within their range as if he were eagerly
verifying his memories of the place, turned from the trail along the
river and entered the hills. His moccasined feet clung tenaciously to
the steep places where Rawley’s high-laced mining boots slipped.
The sun rays struck them fiercely and the “little stinging gnats” which
Grandfather King had mentioned in his diary were there to pester
them, poising vibrantly just before the eyes as if they waited only the
opportunity to dart between the lids.
The thought that perhaps his grandfather had come that way, fifty
years ago, filled the toil of climbing up the long gully with a peculiar
interest. Fifty years ago these hills must have looked much the
same. Fifty years ago, the prospect holes they passed occasionally
may have been fresh-turned earth and rocks. Men searching for rich
silver and gold might have been seen plodding along the hillsides;
but the hills themselves could not have changed much. His
grandfather had looked upon all this, and had divided his thoughts,
perhaps, between the gold and his latest infatuation, the half-breed
girl, Anita. And suddenly Rawley put a vague speculation into words:
“Hey, Johnny! Here’s a good place to make a smoke, in the
shade.” He waited until the Indian had retraced the dozen steps
between them. “Johnny, there was a beautiful half-breed girl here,
when Grandfather made his last trip up the river. She was half
Spanish. My grandfather mentioned her once or twice in his diary.
Do you remember her?”
 “There were many beautiful girls in my tribe,” Johnny Buffalo
retorted drily. “What name did he call her?”
“Anita. It’s a pretty name, and it proves the Spanish, I should say.”
The old man stared at the opposite slope. His mouth grew thin-
lipped and stern.
“My uncle, the chief, was betrayed in his old age. His youngest
squaw loved a Spanish man with noble look. I have the tale from my
older brothers, who told me. The child she bore was the child of the
Spanish gentleman. My uncle’s youngest squaw—died.” Johnny
Buffalo paused significantly. “The child was given to my mother to
keep. Her name was Anita. She was very beautiful. I remember.
Many visits Anita made with friends near this place. I think she is the
same. It was not good for my sergeant to look upon her with love. I
have heard my brothers whisper that Anita looked with soft eyes
upon the white soldiers.”
Rawley’s young sympathies suffered a definite revulsion. If his
grandfather’s dulce corazon were a coquette, her fruitless waiting for
his return was not so beautifully tragic after all. There were other
white soldiers stationed along the river, Rawley remembered, with a
curl of the lip. His romantic imagination had not balked at the savage
blood in her veins, since she was a beauty of fifty years ago. But he
was a sturdy-souled youth with very old-fashioned notions
concerning virtue. He finished his smoke and went on, feeling
cheated by the cold facts he had almost forced from Johnny Buffalo.
They reached the head of that gulch, climbed a steep, high ridge
where they must use hands as well as feet in the climbing, and dug
heels into the earth in a descent even steeper. Rawley told himself
once that he would just as soon start out to follow a crow through
this country as to follow Johnny Buffalo. One word had evidently
been omitted from the Indian’s English education by Grandfather
King,—the word “detour.” Rawley thought of the straight-forward
march of locusts he had once read about and wondered if Johnny
Buffalo had taken lessons from them in his youth.
However, he consoled himself with the thought that a straight line
to the mountain would undoubtedly shorten the distance. If the
Indian could climb sneer walls of rock like a lizard, Rawley would
attempt to follow. And they would ultimately arrive at their
destination, though the glimpse he had obtained of the mountain
from the ridge they had just crossed failed to confirm Johnny
Buffalo’s assertion that it was one day’s travel. They had been
walking three hours by Rawley’s watch, and the mountain looked
even farther away than from El Dorado. But Johnny Buffalo was so
evidently enjoying every minute of the hike through his native hills
that Rawley could not bear to spoil his pleasure by even hinting that
he was blazing a mighty rough trail.
They were working up another tortuous ravine where not even
Johnny Buffalo could always keep a straight line by the sun. In
places the walls overhung the gulch in shelving, weather-worn cliffs
of soft limestone. Bowlders washed down from the heights made
slow going, because they were half the time climbing over or around
some huge obstruction; and because of the rattlesnakes they must
look well where a hand or a foot was laid. Johnny Buffalo was still in
the lead; and Rawley, for all his youth and splendid stamina was not
finding the Indian too slow a pacemaker. Indeed, he was perfectly
satisfied when the dozen feet between them did not lengthen to
fifteen or twenty.
The mounting sun made the heat in that gully a terrific thing to
endure. But the Indian did not lift the canteen to his mouth; nor did
Rawley. Both had learned the foolishness of drinking too freely at the
beginning of a journey. So, when Johnny Buffalo stopped suddenly
in the act of passing around a jutting ledge, Rawley halted in his
tracks and waited to see what was the reason.
The Indian glanced back at him and crooked a forefinger. Rawley
set one foot carefully between two rocks, planted the other as
circumspectly, and so, without a sound, stole up to Johnny Buffalo’s
side. Johnny waited until their shoulders touched then leaned
forward and pointed.
Up on the ridge a couple of hundred yards before them, a man
moved crouching behind a bush, came into the open, bent lower and
peered downward. His actions were stealthy; his whole manner
inexpressibly furtive. His back was toward them, and the ridge itself
hid the thing he was stalking.
“He’s after a deer, maybe. Or a mountain sheep,” Rawley
whispered, when the man laid a rifle across a rock and settled lower
on his haunches.
“Still, it is well that we see what he sees,” Johnny Buffalo
whispered back. “We will stalk him as he stalks his kill.”
The Indian squirmed his shoulder out of the strap sling that held
his rifle in its case behind him. With seeming deliberation, yet with
speed he uncased the weapon, worked the lever gently to make sure
the gun was chamber loaded, and motioned Rawley to follow him.
In the hills the old man had somehow slipped into the leadership,
and now Rawley obeyed him without a word. They stole up the side
of the gulch where the man on the ridge could not discover them
without turning completely around; which would destroy his position
beside the rock and risk the loss of a shot at his game. He seemed
wholly absorbed in watching something on the farther side of the
ridge, and it did not seem likely that he would hear them.
A little farther up, a ledge cutting across the head of the gulch hid
him completely from the two. An impulse seized Rawley to cross the
gulch there and to climb the ridge farther on, nearer the spot which
the man had seemed to be watching. He caught the attention of
Johnny Buffalo, whispered to him his desire, and received a nod of
understanding and consent. Johnny would keep straight on, and so
come up behind the fellow.
Unaccountably, Rawley wanted to hurry. He wanted to see the
man’s quarry before a shot was fired. So, when a wrinkle in the ridge
made easy climbing and afforded concealment, he went up a tiny
gully, digging in his toes and trying to keep in the soft ground so that
sliding rocks could not betray him.
Unexpectedly the deep wrinkle brought him up to a notch in the
ridge, beyond which another gully led steeply downward.
Immediately beneath him a narrow trail wound sinuously, climbing
just beyond around the point of another hill. He could not see the
man up on the ridge, but he could not doubt that the rifle was aimed
at some point along this trail. He was standing on a rock,
reconnoitering and expecting every moment to hear a shot, when the
unmistakable sound of voices came up to him from somewhere
below. He listened, his glance going from the ridge to the bit of trail
that showed farther away on the point of the opposite hill. The
thought flashed through his mind that the man with the rifle could
easily have seen persons coming around that point; that he must be
lying in wait. Whoever it was coming, they must pass along the trail
directly beneath the watcher on the ridge. It would be an easy rifle
shot; a matter of no more than a hundred yards downhill.
He stepped down off the rock and started running down the steep
gully to the trail. He was, he judged, fully a hundred yards up the trail
from where the man was watching above. He did not know who was
coming; it did not matter. It was an ambush, and he meant to spoil it.
So he came hurtling down the steep declivity, the lower third of which
was steeper than he suspected. Had he made an appointment with
the travelers to meet them at that spot, he could not possibly have
kept it more punctually. For he slid down a ten-foot bank of loose
earth and arrived sitting upright in the trail immediately under the
nose of a bald-faced burro with a distended pack half covering it
from sight.
There was no time for ceremony. Rawley flung up his arms and
shooed the astonished animal back against another burro, so
precipitately that he crowded it completely off the trail and down the
steep bank. Rawley heard the sullen thud of the landing as he
scrambled to his knees, glancing apprehensively over his shoulder
as he did so. There had been no shot fired, but he could not be
certain that the small flurry in the trail had been unobserved.
“Get back, around the turn!” he commanded guardedly and drove
before him the two women who had been walking behind the burros.
The first, a fat old squaw with gray bangs hanging straight down to
her eyebrows, scuttled for cover, the lead burro crowding past her
and neatly overturning her in the trail. But a slim girl in khaki
breeches and high-laced boots stood her ground, eyeing him with a
slight frown from under a light gray Stetson hat.
“Get back, I say! A man on the ridge is watching this trail with a
rifle across a rock. It may be Queo—get back!” He did not stop with
words. He took the girl by the arm and bustled her forcibly around
the sharp kink in the trail that would, he hoped, effectually hide them
from the ridge.
“Are you quite insane?” The girl twitched her arm out of his grasp.
“Or is this a joke you are perpetrating on the natives? I must say I fail
to see the humor of it.”
 “Climb that gully to the top and sneak along the ridge a couple of
hundred yards, and you will see the point of the joke,” Rawley
retorted with an access of dignity, perhaps to cover the extreme
informality of his arrival.
“And why should any one—even Queo—want to shoot us?” True
to her sex, the girl was refusing to abdicate her first position in the
matter.
“How should I know? He may not be watching for you, particularly.
From the ridge he probably saw your pack train around the turn
above here, and he may have thought you were prospectors. I don’t
know; I’m only guessing. What I do know is what I saw: a man with a
rifle laid across a rock, up there, watching this trail. It may not be you
he’s after; but I wouldn’t deliberately walk into range just to find out.”
“What would you do, then? Stay here forever?”
“Until my partner and I eliminate the risk, you’d better stay here.”
Rawley’s tone was masterful. “I only came down to warn whoever
was coming—walking into an ambush.”
The girl eyed him speculatively, with an exasperating little smile.
“It all sounds very thrilling; very tenderfooty indeed. And in the
meantime, there’s poor old Deacon down there on his back in the
ditch. Do you always—er—arrive like that?”
Rawley turned his back on her indignantly and discovered the old
squaw sitting solidly where the lead burro had placed her. She was
very fat, and she filled that portion of the trail which she occupied.
The red bandana was pushed back on her head, and her gray
curtain of bangs was parted rakishly on one side. She was staring at
Rawley fixedly, a look of terror in her eyes.
He went to her, meaning to help her up. Now that he recalled that
first panicky moment, he remembered that the burro had deposited
her with some force in her present position. She might be hurt.
But the old squaw put up her hands before her, palms out to ward
him off. She cried out, a shrill expostulation in her own tongue which
caused the girl to swing round quickly and hurry toward her.
“No, no! He isn’t a ghost! Whatever made you think of such a
thing? He doesn’t mean to harm you—no, he is not a spirit. He
merely fell down hill, and he wants to help you up. Are you hurt—
Grandmother?” Her clear, gray-brown eyes went quickly, defiantly to
Rawley’s face.
That young man could not repress a startled look, which traveled
from the slim girl, indubitably white, to the squaw whimpering in the
trail. She must be trying her own hand at a joke, he thought, just to
break even with his fancied presumption in halting their leisurely
progress down the trail.
From up on the ridge a rifle cracked. The three turned heads
toward the thin, sinister report. They waited motionless for a
moment. Then the girl spoke.
“That wasn’t fired in our direction,” she said, and immediately
there came the sound of another shot. “And that’s not the same
gun,” she added. “That sounds like an old-fashioned gun shooting
black powder. Didn’t you hear the pow-w of it?”
“That would be Johnny Buffalo—my Indian partner,” said Rawley.
“You folks stay here. I’m going back up there and see what’s doing.”
“Is that necessary?” The girl looked at him quickly. “I think you
ought to help turn Deacon right side up before you go.” She leaned
sidewise and peered down over the bank. “He’s in an awful mess.
His pack is wedged between two bowlders, and his legs are sticking
straight up in the air.”
Rawley sent a hasty glance down the bank. “He’s all right—he’s
flopping his ears,” he observed reassuringly. “I’ll be back just as soon
as I see how Johnny Buffalo is making out. That fellow may have got
him. You stay back here out of sight. Promise me.” He looked at her
earnestly, as if by the force of his will he would compel obedience.
Her eyes evaded the meeting. “Pickles will have to be rounded
up,” she said. “He’s probably halfway to Nelson by this time. And
there’s Grandmother to think of.”
“Well, you think of those things until I get back,” he said, with a
swift smile. “I can’t leave my partner to shoot it out alone.”
 CHAPTER SEVEN
NEVADA
He ran to the point of rocks, gathered himself together and
cleared the trail and the open space beyond in one leap. How he got
up the steep bank he never remembered afterward. He only knew
that he heard the sharp crack of the first rifle again as he was
sprinting up the little gully that had concealed his descent. He gained
the top, stopped to get his bearings more accurately and made his
way toward the spot where he had seen the man with the rifle.
It occurred to him that he had best approach the spot from the
shelter of the ledge where he had separated from Johnny Buffalo. At
that point he could pick up the Indian’s tracks and follow them, so
saving time in the long run.
Johnny Buffalo’s moccasins left little trace in the gravelly soil. But
here and there they left a mark, and Rawley got the direction and
hurried on. Fifty yards farther up the ridge he glimpsed something
yellowish-brown against a small juniper. A few feet farther, he saw
that it was Johnny Buffalo, lying on his face, one arm thrown outward
with the hand still grasping the stock of his rifle.
He snatched up the rifle, crouched beside the Indian and
searched the neighborhood with his eyes, trying to get a sight of the
killer. In a moment he spied him, away down the deep ravine up
which he and Johnny Buffalo had toiled not half an hour before. The
man was running. Rawley raised the rifle to his shoulder, took careful
aim and fired, but he had small hope of hitting his target at that
distance.
At the sound of the shot so close above him, Johnny Buffalo
stirred uneasily, as if disturbed in his sleep. The man in the distance
ducked out of sight amongst the bowlders; and that was the last
Rawley saw of him at that time.
“I must apologize for not taking you more seriously when you
warned me,” said the girl, just behind him. “Is this—?”
 “My partner, Johnny Buffalo. He isn’t dead—he moved, just now—
but I’m afraid he’s badly hurt.” Rawley lifted anxious blue eyes to her
face.
“We can carry him down to the trail. Then, if Deacon is all right
when we get him up, we can put your partner on him and pack him
home. It’s only a mile or so.”
“It might be better to take him to Nelson,” Rawley amended the
suggestion. “I could get a car there and take him on to Las Vegas,
probably. Or some mine will have a doctor.”
“It’s farther—and the heat, with the long ride, would probably finish
him,” the girl pointed out bluntly. “On the other hand, a mile on the
burro will get him home, where it’s cool and we can see how badly
he’s hurt. And then, if he needs hospital care, Uncle Peter can take
him down to Needles in the launch, this evening when it’s cool. I
really don’t mean to be disagreeable and argumentative, but it
seems to me that will be much the more comfortable plan for him.
And I can’t help feeling responsible, in a way. I suppose he was
trying to protect us, when he was shot.”
Rawley looked up from an amateurish examination of the old man.
The bullet wound was in the shoulder, and he was hoping that it was
high enough so that the lung was not injured. His flask of brandy,
placed at Johnny’s lips, brought a gulp and a gasp. The black eyes
opened, looked from Rawley to the girl and closed again.
“There! I believe he’s going to be all right,” the girl declared
optimistically. “I’ll take his feet, and you carry his shoulders. When
we get him down to the trail, I’ll have Grandmother look after him
until we get the burros straightened out. Queo—or whoever it was—
did you see him?”
Rawley waved a hand toward the rocky ravine. “You heard me
shoot,” he reminded her. “Missed him—with that heirloom Johnny
carries. He was running like a jackrabbit when I saw him last. Well, I
think you’re right—but I hate to trouble you folks. Though I’d trouble
the president himself, for Johnny Buffalo’s sake.”
“It’s a strange name,” she remarked irrelevantly, stooping and
making ready to lift his knees. “He must be a Northern Indian.”
 “Born in this district,” Rawley told her. “Grandfather found him in
the desert when he was a kid. I suppose he gave him the name—
regardless.”
Until they reached the trail there was no further talk, their breath
being needed for something more important. They laid the injured
man down in the shade of a greasewood, and the girl immediately
left to bring the old squaw. She was no sooner gone than Johnny
Buffalo opened his eyes.
“It was Queo,” he said, huskily whispering. “I thought he was
shooting at you. I tried to kill him. But the damn gun is old—old. It
struck me hard. I did not shoot straight. I did not kill him. Queo
looked, he saw me and he shot as he ran away. The gun has killed
many—but I am old—”
“You’re all right,” Rawley interrupted. “Quit blaming yourself. You
saved two women by shooting when you did. Queo was afraid to
stay and shoot again when he knew there was a gun at his back. He
has gone down the ravine where we came up.”
“Who was the white girl?” Even Johnny Buffalo betrayed a very
masculine interest, Rawley observed, grinning inwardly. But he only
said:
“I don’t know. She was on the trail, with an old squaw and two
burros. It was they that Queo was laying for, evidently. Don’t try to
talk any more, till I get you where we can look after you properly.
Where’s your pack? I didn’t see it, up there.”
“It is hidden in the juniper. I did not want to fight with a load on my
back.”
“All right. Don’t talk any more. We’ll fix you up, all fine as silk.”
The girl was returning, and after her waddled the squaw, reluctant,
looking ready to retreat at the first suspicious move. Rawley stood
aside while the girl gave her brief directions in Indian,—so that
Johnny Buffalo could understand, Rawley shrewdly suspected, and
thanked her with his eyes. The squaw sidled past Rawley and sat
down on the bank, still staring at him fixedly. His abrupt appearance
and the consequent stampede of the burros had evidently impressed
her unfavorably. The look she bestowed upon Johnny Buffalo was
more casual. He was an Indian and therefore understandable, it
seemed.
The narrow canyon lay sun-baked and peaceful to the hard blue
of the sky. With the lightness which came of removing the pack from
his shoulders, Rawley walked up the trail and around the turn to
where the burro called Deacon still lay patiently on his back in the
narrow watercourse below the trail. He slid down the bank and
inspected the lashings of the pack.
“We use what is called the squaw hitch,” the girl informed him
from the trail just above his head. “If you cut that forward rope I think
you can loosen the whole thing. The knot is on top of the pack, and
of course Deacon’s lying on it.” A moment later she added, “I’ll go
after Pickles, unless I can be of some use to you.”
Privately, Rawley thought that she was useful as a relief to the
eyes, if nothing else. But he told her that he could get along all right,
and let her go. The girl piqued his interest; she was undoubtedly
beautiful, with her slim, erect figure, her clear, hazel eyes with
straight eyebrows, heavy lashes, and her lips that were firm for all
their soft curves. But Johnny Buffalo’s life might be hanging on
Rawley’s haste. However beautiful, however much she might attract
his interest, no girl could tempt him from the chief issue.
By the time she returned with Pickles, Rawley had retrieved
Deacon and was gone down the trail with him. She came up in time
to help him lift Johnny Buffalo on the burro and tie him there with the
pack rope. She was efficient as a man, and almost as strong,
Rawley observed. And although she treated the squaw with careful
deference, she was plainly the head of their little expedition,—and
the shoulders and the brains.
Only once did the squaw speak on the way to the river. The girl
was walking alongside Deacon, steadying Johnny Buffalo on that
side while Rawley held the other. They were talking easily now, of
impersonal things; and when, on a short climb, the burro stepped
sharply to one side and Johnny Buffalo lurched toward the girl,
Rawley slipped his arm farther behind the Indian. His fingers clasped
for an instant the girl’s hand. The squaw, walking heavily behind,
saw the brief contact.
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