A PICTURE
A hundred miles west from the shack, stretching away from it in an
almost unbroken expanse, was a desert within the desert. _Amole_
and sagebrush and cactus vied with each other to relieve the dead, flat,
monotonous brown. Without movement anywhere, save for the heat-waves
ascending, this expanse presented an unutterably drear and lonesome
aspect. It terminated, or partly terminated--swerving off into the south
beyond--in a long sand-dune running northeast and southwest. This mighty
roll lay brooding, as did the world-old expanse fringing it, in the
silence of late morning. Overhead a turquoise sky, low, spotless,
likewise brooding, dipped down gracefully to the horizon around--a
horizon like an immense girdle, a girdle which, as one journeyed along,
seemed to accompany him, rapidly if he moved rapidly, slowly if he moved
slowly--an immense circle of which he was the center. The sun was
glaring, and revealed here and there out of the drifts a bleached
skeleton, mutely proclaiming the sun as overlord, while over all, around
and about and within this throbbing furnace, there seemed to lurk a
voice, a voice of but a softly lisped word--solitude.
Suddenly, like a mere dot against the skyline, there appeared over the
giant dune to the north a single horseman. A moment he seemed to pause
on the crest, then began the long descent, slowly, with almost
imperceptible movement. He was not more than under way when another dot
appeared against the skyline, a second horseman, close behind the first,
who, like the first, after seeming to pause a moment on the crest,
dipped into the long slope with almost imperceptible movement. A third
dot appeared, two dots close beside each other, and these, like the
others, dipping into the descent with almost imperceptible movement, for
all the world like flies reluctantly entering a giant saucer. And then
appeared another, the fifth, and then no more. The last also seemed to
pause a brief moment on the crest, and also dipped with almost
imperceptible movement into the long descent.
They struck the floor of the furnace. Details began to emerge. One was a
fat man, another was a gaunt man, a third was a little man--all smooth
of face. Then there was a man with a scrubby beard. And there was
another smooth-faced man, riding a little apart from the others, a
little more alert, perhaps, his garments not their garments, his horse a
little rounder of outline, a little more graceful of movement. They
might have been in conversation, these riders out of the solitude. But
all were heavily armed. And all rode slowly, leisurely, taking their own
good time, as if this in itself was duty, with orders uncertain, or with
no orders at all. They rode on across the desert within the desert,
presenting three-quarter profile, then, with an hour passing, full
profile, then, with another hour passing, quarter profile, and now, with
yet another hour passing, five agreeable backs--broad, most of them, all
topped with sombreros, and all motionless save for the movement of their
mounts. On and on they rode into the south, underneath a blistering sun
at full zenith. They became mere dots again upon the pulsating horizon,
mere specks, and disappeared in the shimmering haze.
Solitude, the voice of solitude, the death-stillness, throbbing silence,
reigned once more. Not an animal, not an insect, not a tree, struck the
eye. The arid and level floor was again clean of movement. The sun
glared, revealing here and there out of the drifts a bleached skeleton,
in this speechless thing mutely proclaiming its own sway. Beneath the
sun the horizon, an immense girdle, swept round in unbroken line,
pulsating. The turquoise sky hung low, spotless and shimmering,
brooding, dipping smoothly down to the horizon and to the long sand-dune
running to northeast and southwest. Skirting this dune, reaching to it
out of the east, then swerving off to the south beyond, lay the almost
unbroken expanse, the desert within the desert, its dead, flat,
monotonous brown relieved here and there with alternating sagebrush and
cactus and _amole_, stretching back a distance of a hundred miles
to the shack.