The desert held him for her own as she does all old-timers. He was under the "terrible fascination," wrote Edna Brush Perkins about her encounter with Francis Marion "Shady" Myrick, the famous Death Valley gemstone prospector. Perkins'The White Heart of Mojave (1922) is a noted desert classic about two wealthy women traveling across the Mojave Desert to Death Valley. Admitting that in the rush of things she did not even learn his Christian name, Mrs. Perkins nevertheless acknowledges Shady Myrick with four pages in her book. Obviously, she was deeply impressed by the man. "Everyone knew Shady," she told her readers. Shady was not, however, the stereotypical miner we often encounter in Western tales, the cranky, miserly misanthrope who had turned his back on civilization, but a kindly, trustworthy sort. Mrs. Perkins recalled Shady's gifts of gold and jasper just before she and her companion departed for their journey to Death Valley.