The Treasure of Hidden Valley

ON the following afternoon Roderick saddled his pony Badger and rode over to the Conchshell ranch. The Holdens received the news of Buell Hampton’s mysterious departure with dee...

WHEN Grant Jones and Roderick arrived at the Major’s home that evening they found other visitors already installed before the cheerful blaze of the open hearth. These were Tom S...

IT was a dear, crisp October morning. There was a shrill whistle of a locomotive, and then a westbound passenger train dashed into the depot of an Iowa town. A young man descend...

RODERICK spent a few days in Rawlins, improving his acquaintance with Jim Rankin and making a general survey of the situation. The ex-sheriff proved to be a veritable repository...

WITHIN a few days of Roderick’s advent into the camp he was duly added to the cowboy list on the ranch of the wealthy cattleman, Mr. Shields, whose property was located a few mi...

DURING the night a few flakes of snow had fallen—just the flurry of a storm that had come and tired and paused to rest awhile. The morning broke grey and sombre and intensely st...

THE night of the big fiesta at the Shields ranch had arrived, and the invited guests had gathered from far and near. And what a bevy of pretty girls and gay young fellows they w...

RODERICK WARFIELD’S election to a seat on the board of directors of the Encampment Mine and Smelter Company had for him a series of most unexpected consequences. He had had no k...

THERE was great excitement among the bunch of cowboys on the Shields’ ranch when the local newspapers came out with startling headlines and full announcements in regard to the a...

Hampton walked down to the smelter office. He was met at the door of the directors’ room by the general manager, Mr. W. B. Grady. Despite a bold front Grady looked careworn and...

BY SUBTLE alchemy of thought Roderick’s feelings toward Scotty Meisch had become entirely changed. On the ranch he had treated the rough, uncultivated and at times insolent yout...

ALLEN MILLER, the rich banker, was alone—alone in the president’s room at his bank, and feeling alone in the fullest sense of the word now that Roderick Warfield had gone, the y...

AS THE two young men walked down the brilliantly lighted main street of Encampment, Grant Jones explained that the water had been dammed several miles up the south fork of the E...

Roderick and Grant still made the editor’s shack their home—the old place endeared to them by many fond associations. A few days after Whitley Adams’ visit they were seated at t...

FOR a time Roderick had hung back from accepting the invitation to call at the Conchshell ranch, as the Holden place was called. In pursuing the acquaintanceship with Gail he kn...

IT WAS but a few seconds until Roderick was again on his feet Hurriedly taking his bearings, he started off through the little park in the direction of the Palace Hotel. In the...

THE following evening Roderick called at the Major’s home, and found a visitor there, a stranger yet very well known to him by reputation. This was no other than the Reverend St...

IT WAS just such talk as Big Phil Lee’s that kept the Bragdon forces lined up and defiant to the point of an open rupture and a total disregard for the minority, while the Democ...

The raw, cold wind was blowing a terrific gale, the streets were deserted save for a few half drunken stragglers who had been making a night of it, going the rounds of saloons a...

THAT night the big snow storm did indeed come, and when Roderick woke up next morning it was to find mountain and valley covered with a vast bedspread of immaculate white and th...

DOROTHY mourned for Grant Jones—for days she wept and would not be consoled. Roderick had not seen her since the disaster; when he had called at the ranch Barbara had brought a...

YES, there was a letter from Stella Rain. Roderick took it eagerly from the hands of the clerk at the general delivery window. A good number of people were already crowding into...

AFTER a brief consultation on the hospital veranda, Buell Hampton, Roderick and Grant decided on an immediate consultation with Jim Rankin. They found the ex-sheriff busy among...

THE morning after the directors’ meeting, when Roderick awakened and looked out of the window, he found the air filled with flakes of falling snow. He wasted no time over his to...

THE general shock of horror caused by the San Francisco disaster was intensified at Encampment when the news ran round that three local people had been in the stricken city at t...

STELLA RAIN belonged to one of the first families of Galesburg. Their beautiful home, an old style Southern mansion, painted white with green shutters, was just across from the...

IN A day or two the excitement over the great evening party at the Shields ranch had passed and the humdrum duties of everyday life had been resumed. Whitley Adams had completed...

DAYLIGHT had not yet broken when the three four-horse wagons were loaded and ready for the road. Not a moment had been lost after Roderick’s arrival at the Major’s. That night h...

A COUPLE of hours later Roderick arrived at Buell Hampton’s home. The Major was alone; there were no signs of Jim Rankin or Tom Sun; no traces of the recent midnight toil. The r...

RODERICK was prompt to the minute in keeping his appointment. He found the Major seated before a bright log-fire, and his first glance around the old familiar room showed the pr...

TEN days before the departure from San Francisco telegrams had been sent in all directions giving forth the glad tidings that General Holden and Gail, Roderick and Buell Hampton...

SO IT is you who have found my Hidden Valley,” said Buell Hampton as he drew near. His voice had a regretful ring, but as he grasped Roderick’s hand he added cordially: “I thank...

IT WAS the morning following the big entertainment at the Shields ranch when Roderick and two other cowboy companions began the work of breaking some outlaw horses to the saddle...

“Oh, yes,” replied Grant, when Roderick called his attention to it, “this convention trouble has been brewing for some time. Personally, as you know, I am a Republican, even tho...

EARLY the following morning several hundred searchers were at the scene of the snow slide in Cow Creek Canyon. Every precaution was taken not to have anyone walk along near the...

AFTER a tedious and delayed trip of three days and nights Roderick’s train steamed onto the mole at Oakland. During the last night he had refused to have the berth in his drawin...

WITHIN less than a year of his leaving Keokuk to play football with the world, as Uncle Allen Miller had phrased it, Roderick Warfield had established himself in a sound financi...

ON the very day following Roderick Warfield’s departure from Keokuk there appeared in one of the morning newspapers an item of intelligence that greatly surprised and shocked th...

WHEN Buell Hampton left the assayer’s office he felt a chilliness in the air that caused him to cast his eyes upwards. There had been bright sunshine early that morning, but now...

AS the train rumbled along carrying Roderick back to Burlington, he was lost in reverie and exultation. He was making plans for a mighty future, into which now a romance of love...