The Quest of the Four Part 44

After the task was finished, three went back for the horses to carry their food supply, and Phil was left to guard it. He was tired now, and he sat down on the ground with his rifle across his knee. The moon came out more brightly, and he saw well across the prairie. The slender, shadowy forms there increased in numbers, and they whined with eagerness, but the boy did not have the slightest fear. Nevertheless, he was glad they were not the great timber wolves of the North. That would have been another matter. At last he took a piece of the buffalo that his comrades and he would not use and flung it as far as he could upon the prairie.

There was a rush of feet, a confused snarling and fighting, and then a long death howl. In the rush some wolf had been bitten, and, at the sight of the blood, the others had leaped upon him and devoured him.

Phil, who understood the sounds, shuddered. He had not meant to cause cannibalism, and he was glad when his comrades returned with the horses.

They spent two days jerking the buffalo meat, as best they could in the time and under the conditions, and they soon found the precaution one of great wisdom, as they did not see any more game, and, on the second day afterward, entered a region of sand. The buffalo gra.s.s disappeared entirely, and there was nothing to sustain life. This was genuine desert, and it rolled before them in swells like the gra.s.sy prairie.

The four, after going a mile or so over the hot sand, stopped and regarded the gloomy waste with some apprehension. It seemed to stretch to infinity. They did not see a single stalk or blade of vegetation, and the sand looked so fine, or of such small grain, to Phil that he dismounted, picked up a handful of it, and threw it into the air. The sand seemingly did not fall back, but disappeared like white smoke. He tried it a second and a third time, with the same result in each case.

"It's not sand," he said, "it's just dust."

"Dust or sand," said Bill Breakstone, "we must rush our way through it, and I'm thinking that we've got to make every drop of water we have in the bags last as long as possible."

They rode on for several hours, and the very softness of the sand made the going the worst that they had ever encountered. The feet of the horses sank deep in it, and they began to pant with weariness, but there was no relief. The vertical sun blazed down with a fiery splendor that Phil hitherto would have believed impossible. The whole earth shimmered in the red glare, and the rays seemed to penetrate. All of them had broad brimmed hats, and they protected their eyes as much as possible.

The weariness of the horses became so great that after awhile the riders dismounted and walked by the side of them. Two hours of this, and they stopped in order that Breakstone might take the direction with a little compa.s.s that he carried in a bra.s.s box about two inches in diameter. He had made the others buy the same kind, but they had not yet used them.

"This is the best kind of compa.s.s to put in your baggage on such a trip as this," he said, "and it says that we re going straight on in the way we want to go. Come boys, the more sand we pa.s.s the less we have in front of us."

They staggered bravely on, but the glare seemed to grow. The whole sky was like a hot, bra.s.sy cover that held them prisoners below. It scarcely seemed possible to Phil that trees, green gra.s.s, and running water had ever existed anywhere. A light wind arose, but, unlike other winds that cool, this wind merely sent the heat against their faces in streams and currents that were hotter than ever. It also whirled the fine sand over them in blinding showers. Acting on the advice of Breakstone, they drew up their horses in a little circle, and stood in the center shielding their eyes with their hands. Peering over his horse's back, Phil saw hills of sand four or five feet high picked up and carried away, while hills equally high were formed elsewhere.

Ridges disappeared, and new ridges were formed. The wind blew for about two hours, and then the four, covered with sand, resumed their march noting with joy that the sun was now sinking and the heat decreasing.

The very first shadows brought relief, but the greatest solace was to the eye. Despite the protection of hand and hat-brims, they were so burnt by the sand and glare that it was a pain to see. Yet the four were so weary of mind and body that they said nothing, as they trudged on until the edge of the sun cut into the western plain on the horizon.

Phil had never before seen such a sun. He had not believed it could be so big, so glaring, and so hot. He was so glad now that the earth was revolving away from it that he raised his clenched hand and shook his fist in its very eye.

"Good-by to you," he exclaimed. "And I was never before so glad to see you go!"

Phil spoke in such deadly earnest that Bill Breakstone, despite his aching muscles and burning throat, broke into laughter.

"You talk as you feel, Phil," he said, "but it's no good to threaten the sun. It's just gone for a little while, and it will be back again to-morrow as bright and hot as ever."

"But while it iss gone we will be glad," said Arenberg.

Down dropped the shadows, deeper and deeper, and a delicious coolness stole over the earth. It was like a dew on their hot eyeb.a.l.l.s, and the pain there went swiftly away. A light wind blew, and they took the fresh air in long, deep breaths. They had been old three or four hours ago, now they were young again. The horses, feeling the same influence, raised their lowered heads and walked more briskly.

The shadows merged into the night, and now it was actually cold. But they went on an hour or more in order to find a suitable place for a camp. They chose at last a hollow just beyond a ridge of sand that seemed more solid than usual. On the slope grew a huge cactus with giant arms, the first that they had seen in a long time.

"Here we rest," said Bill Breakstone. "What more could a man ask?

Plenty of sand for all to sleep on. No crowding. Regular king's palace. Water in the water-bags, and firewood ready for us."

"Firewood," said John Bedford. "I fail to see it."

Breakstone pointed scornfully to the huge cactus.

"There it is, a whole forest of it," he said. "We break down that cactus, which is old and dry, and it burns like powder. But it will burn long enough to boil our coffee, which we need."

But they took a good drink of water first, and gave another to every one of the horses. Then they chopped down the giant cactus and cut it into lengths. As Breakstone had said, it burned with a light flame and was rapidly consumed, leaving nothing but thin ashes. But they were able to boil their coffee, which refreshed them even more than the food, and then they lay on their blankets, taking a deep, long rest. The contrast between night and day was extraordinary. The sun seemed to have taken all heat with it, and the wind blew. They could put on coats again, draw blankets over their bodies, and get ready for delicious sleep.

They knew that the sun with all its terrors would come back the next day, but they resolved to enjoy the night and its coolness to the full.

The wind rose, and dust and sand were blown across the plain, but it pa.s.sed over the heads of the four who lay in the narrow dip between the swells, and they soon fell into a sleep that built up brain and muscle anew for the next day's struggle.

CHAPTER XX

THE SILVER CUP

They awoke at the coming dawn, which began swiftly to drive away the coolness of the night, and, using what was left of the giant cactus, they boiled coffee and heated their food again. This was a brief task, but by the time it was finished the whole world was enveloped once more in a reddish glare. All that day they advanced, alternately riding and walking through an absolutely desolate land. The single cactus that they had burned loomed in Phil's memory like a forest. The water was doled out with yet more sparingness, and, a few minutes after they drank it, throat, tongue, and lips began to feel as parched as ever.

Phil did not see a living thing besides themselves. No rattlesnake, no lizard, no scorpion dwelled in this burning sand. Two or three of the horses began to show signs of weakness.

"If we only had a tent to shelter us from this awful glare," said Breakstone, "we could camp for the day, and then travel at night, but it will be worse standing still than going on. And get on we must. The horses have had no food, and they cannot stand it much longer."

They slept on the sand that night until a little past twelve o'clock, and then, to save time, resumed the march once more. The air was cool and pleasant at that time, but the desert looked infinitely weird and menacing under the starlight. The next day they entered upon a region of harder sand and in one or two places found a patch of scanty herbage, upon which the horses fed eagerly, but there was not a sign of water to ward off the new and formidable danger that was threatening them, as the canteens and water-bags were now almost empty.

"To-morrow they will be empty," said Bill Breakstone.

His dismal prophecy came true. At noon of the following day the last drop was gone, and John and Phil looked at each other in dismay. But Bill Breakstone was a man of infinite resource.

"I mean to find water before night," he said. "Not any of your Mississippis or Missouris, nor even a beautiful creek or brook, not anything flowing or pretty to the eye, but water all the same. You just wait and see."

He spoke with great emphasis and confidence, but the others were too much depressed to believe. Nevertheless, Bill Breakstone was watching the ground critically. He noticed that the depressions between the swells had deepened, and that the whole surface seemed to have a general downward slope. Toward the twilight they came to a deeper depression than any that they had seen before. Two or three slender trees, almost leafless grew in it. The trees themselves seemed to cry aloud: "I thirst! I thirst!" But Bill Breakstone was all cheeriness.

"Here is our water!" he cried briskly. "Get ready all!"

He himself took out a stout shovel from the baggage on his horse, and began to dig, with great vigor, in the lowest part of the bowl.

"I see," said Phil, "you're going to dig a well."

"I am, and you're going to help me do it, too."

"But will we find anything at the bottom of it?"

"We will. Many a man has died of thirst in the desert, with plenty of water not twenty feet away. Some men are born without brains, Phil.

Others have brains, but never use them, but I am egotistical enough to think that I have some brains, at least, and some will and capacity to use them. Now I've thrown up a pretty good pile of sand there, and I'm growing tired. You take that shovel and see what you can do, but make it a wide hole. You don't want a ton of sand caving in on you."

Phil took the shovel and worked with energy. John and Arenberg with tin cups also leaped down into the hole and helped as much as they could.

As the sand was soft they descended fast, and Phil suddenly uttered a shout. He drew up a shovelful of wet sand, and, after that, sand yet wetter.

"That will do," said Breakstone a minute or two later. "Stand aside now and watch the water come into our well."

They had reached an underground seepage or soakage, draining from the higher ground above, and slowly a pool of water gathered at the bottom.

The four uttered a shout of joy, entirely pardonable at such a time.

The water was muddy, and it was warm, but it was pure water without any alkali, and, as such it meant life, life to men and beasts in the desert.

"The horses first," said Breakstone, "or they'll be tumbling in here on our heads, and they are ent.i.tled to it, anyhow."

They filled their kettles and pans with water, climbing out again and again. The horses drank greedily and uttered deep sighs of satisfaction. It took a long time to give them enough by this method, but when they were satisfied the men took their tin cups and drank.

"Slowly now," said Breakstone. "Don't you be too eager there, John, you escaped convict! Phil, you accidental buffalo killer, just hold that cup of yours steady, or you'll be dashing its contents into your mouth before the rest of us. Now then, you sun-scorched scamps, drink!"