Casey Ryan knew his desert.

Also, from long and not so happy experience, he knew Fords, or thought he did.

He made the mistake, however, of buying a nearly new one and asking it to accomplish the work of a twin six from the moment he got behind the wheel.
He was fortunate in buying a demonstrator's car with a hundred miles or so to its credit.

He arrived in Barstow before the proprietor of a supply store had gone to bed--for which he was grateful to the Ford.

He loaded up there with such necessities for desert prospecting as he had not waited to buy in Los Angeles, turned short off the main highway where traffic officers might be summoned by telephone to lie in wait for him, and took the steeper and less used trail north.