The American Northwest is quiet. Sometimes out in the desert, it's quiet enough to hear

yourself breathing. It's quiet enough to hear yourself think. And that was just the way

the young cowboy Claude Dallas liked it. The long days out on the range could be punishing.

It was always work to do on a sprawling ranch, even if it was in solitude on the farthest

reaches of the spread. But this was the life for Claude, the life of a Buccaru. And even

though he liked the solitude of riding the range and sleeping under the stars, it was still

nice to enjoy the silence of the area from the comfort of his bed every now and then. And

that was where he was now, lying on his bed in a bunkhouse on a ranch in Elco County,

Nevada. The gigantic county occupies the entire northeast corner of Nevada, where the

state borders Utah on the east and Idaho on the north. It's straight north of Las Vegas

by about 300 miles, but couldn't be more different from the glitz and glamour of the strip.

Here in 1973, Las Vegas was arguably at the peak of its early years. The dunes and the

sands were popular hotels. So were the Sahara, the desert in, the Flamingo, and Caesars

Palace. Elvis Presley, Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra, and Wayne Newton were some of the headliners.

But for a drifting cowboy up in Elco County, the 24 hour mayhem of lights and noise of Las

Vegas would have been as foreign as something out of a science fiction novel. Claude lay

on his bed in the bunkhouse enjoying the silence of a desert ranch that couldn't be

conceived of by a person who strolled down Las Vegas Boulevard. He'd been in northern

Nevada for a couple years now, and lots of drifting ranch hands had come and gone during

his time. And that's who he assumed opened the door to the bunkhouse now, a couple new

cowboys who joined the outfit. But when Claude looked at the three new arrivals, it was

clear they weren't cowboys. One of the three asked Claude to confirm his name. He stood

...