Supper was ready. We seized the tin battery, filled the plates with

the meat, bread, and canned corn, and squatted on our heels. The food

was good, and we ate hugely in silence. When we could hold no more we

lit pipes. Then we had leisure to notice that the storm cloud was

mounting in a portentous silence to the zenith, quenching the brilliant

desert stars.

"Rolls" were scattered everywhere. A roll includes a cowboy's bed and

all of his personal belongings. When the outfit includes a bed-wagon,

the roll assumes bulky proportions.

As soon as we had come to a definite conclusion that it was going to

rain, we deserted the camp fire and went rustling for our blankets. At

the end of ten minutes every bed was safe within the doors of the

abandoned adobe ranch house, each owner recumbent on the floor claim he

had pre-empted, and every man hoping fervently that he had guessed

right as to the location of leaks.

Ordinarily we had depended on the light of camp fires, so now

artificial illumination lacked. Each man was indicated by the

alternately glowing and waning lozenge of his cigarette fire.

Occasionally someone struck a match, revealing for a moment high-lights

on bronzed countenances, and the silhouette of a shading hand. Voices

spoke disembodied. As the conversation developed, we gradually

recognised the membership of our own roomful. I had forgotten to state

that the ranch house included four chambers. Outside, the rain roared

with Arizona ferocity. Inside, men congratulated themselves, or swore

as leaks developed and localised.

Naturally we talked first of stampedes. Cows and bears are the two

great cattle-country topics. Then we had a mouth-organ solo or two,

which naturally led on to songs. My turn came. I struck up the first

verse of a sailor chantey as possessing at least the interest of

novelty:

Oh, once we were a-sailing, a-sailing were we,

Blow high, blow low, what care we;

And we were a-sailing to see what we could see,

Down on the coast of the High Barbaree.

I had just gone so far when I was brought up short by a tremendous oath

behind me. At the same instant a match flared. I turned to face a

stranger holding the little light above his head, and peering with

fiery intentness over the group sprawled about the floor.

He was evidently just in from the storm. His dripping hat lay at his

feet. A shock of straight, close-clipped vigorous hair stood up grey

above his seamed forehead. Bushy iron-grey eyebrows drawn close

together thatched a pair of burning, unquenchable eyes. A square, deep

jaw, lightly stubbled with grey, was clamped so tight that the cheek

muscles above it stood out in knots and welts.

Then the match burned his thick, square fingers, and he dropped it into

the darkness that ascended to swallow it.

"Who was singing that song?" he cried harshly. Nobody answered.

"Who was that singing?" he demanded again.

By this time I had recovered from my first astonishment.

"I was singing," said I.

Another match was instantly lit and thrust into my very face. I

underwent the fierce scrutiny of an instant, then the taper was thrown

away half consumed.

"Where did you learn it?" the stranger asked in an altered voice.

"I don't remember," I replied; "it is a common enough deep-sea chantey."

A heavy pause fell. Finally the stranger sighed.

"Quite like," he said; "I never heard but one man sing it."

"Who in hell are you?" someone demanded out of the darkness.

Before replying, the newcomer lit a third match, searching for a place

to sit down. As he bent forward, his strong, harsh face once more came

clearly into view.

"He's Colorado Rogers," the Cattleman answered for him; "I know him."

"Well," insisted the first voice, "what in hell does Colorado Rogers

mean by bustin' in on our song fiesta that way?"

"Tell them, Rogers," advised the Cattleman, "tell them--just as you

told it down on the Gila ten years ago next month."

"What?" inquired Rogers. "Who are you?"

"You don't know me," replied the Cattleman, "but I was with Buck

Johnson's outfit then. Give us the yarn."

"Well," agreed Rogers, "pass over the 'makings' and I will."

He rolled and lit a cigarette, while I revelled in the memory of his

rich, great voice. It was of the sort made to declaim against the sea

or the rush of rivers or, as here, the fall of waters and the

thunder--full, from the chest, with the caressing throat vibration that

gives colour to the most ordinary statements. After ten words we sank

back oblivious of the storm, forgetful of the leaky roof and the dirty

floor, lost in the story told us by the Old Timer.

CHAPTER TEN

THE TEXAS RANGERS

I came from Texas, like the bulk of you punchers, but a good while

before the most of you were born. That was forty-odd years ago--and

I've been on the Colorado River ever since. That's why they call me

Colorado Rogers. About a dozen of us came out together. We had all

been Texas Rangers, but when the war broke out we were out of a job.

We none of us cared much for the Johnny Rebs, and still less for the

Yanks, so we struck overland for the West, with the idea of hitting the

California diggings.

Well, we got switched off one way and another. When we got down to

about where Douglas is now, we found that the Mexican Government was

offering a bounty for Apache scalps. That looked pretty good to us,

for Injin chasing was our job, so we started in to collect. Did pretty

well, too, for about three months, and then the Injins began to get too

scarce, or too plenty in streaks. Looked like our job was over with,

but some of the boys discovered that Mexicans, having straight black

hair, you couldn't tell one of their scalps from an Apache's. After

that the bounty business picked up for a while. It was too much for

me, though, and I quit the outfit and pushed on alone until I struck

the Colorado about where Yuma is now.

At that time the California immigrants by the southern route used to

cross just there, and these Yuma Injins had a monopoly on the ferry

business. They were a peaceful, fine-looking lot, without a thing on

but a gee-string. The women had belts with rawhide strings hanging to

the knees. They put them on one over the other until they didn't feel

too decollotey. It wasn't until the soldiers came that the officers'

wives got them to wear handkerchiefs over their breasts. The system

was all right, though. They wallowed around in the hot, clean sand,

like chickens, and kept healthy. Since they took to wearing clothes

they've been petering out, and dying of dirt and assorted diseases.

They ran this ferry monopoly by means of boats made of tules, charged a

scand'lous low price, and everything was happy and lovely. I ran on a

little bar and panned out some dust, so I camped a while, washing gold,

getting friendly with the Yumas, and talking horse and other things

with the immigrants.

About a month of this, and the Texas boys drifted in. Seems they sort

of overdid the scalp matter, and got found out. When they saw me, they

stopped and went into camp. They'd travelled a heap of desert, and

were getting sick of it. For a while they tried gold washing, but I

had the only pocket--and that was about skinned. One evening a fellow

named Walleye announced that he had been doing some figuring, and

wanted to make a speech. We told him to fire ahead.

"Now look here," said he, "what's the use of going to California? Why

not stay here?"

"What in hell would we do here?" someone asked. "Collect Gila monsters

for their good looks?"

"Don't get gay," said Walleye. "What's the matter with going into

business? Here's a heap of people going through, and more coming every

day. This ferry business could be made to pay big. Them Injins

charges two bits a head. That's a crime for the only way across. And

how much do you suppose whisky'd be worth to drink after that desert?

And a man's so sick of himself by the time he gets this far that he'd

play chuck-a-luck, let alone faro or monte."

That kind of talk hit them where they lived, and Yuma was founded right

then and there. They hadn't any whisky yet, but cards were plenty, and

the ferry monopoly was too easy. Walleye served notice on the Injins

that a dollar a head went; and we all set to building a tule raft like

the others. Then the wild bunch got uneasy, so they walked upstream

one morning and stole the Injins' boats. The Injins came after them

innocent as babies, thinking the raft had gone adrift. When they got

into camp our men opened up and killed four of them as a kind of hint.

After that the ferry company didn't have any trouble. The Yumas moved

up river a ways, where they've lived ever since. They got the corpses

and buried them. That is, they dug a trench for each one and laid

poles across it, with a funeral pyre on the poles. Then they put the

body on top, and the women of the family cut their hair off and threw

it on. After that they set fire to the outfit, and, when the poles bad

burned through, the whole business fell into the trench of its own

accord. It was the neatest, automatic, self-cocking, double-action

sort of a funeral I ever saw. There wasn't any ceremony--only crying.

The ferry business flourished at prices which were sometimes hard to

collect. But it was a case of pay or go back, and it was a tur'ble long

ways back. We got us timbers and made a scow; built a baile and saloon

and houses out of adobe; and called her Yuma, after the Injins that had

really started her. We got our supplies through the Gulf of

California, where sailing boats worked up the river. People began to

come in for one reason or another, and first thing we knew we had a

store and all sorts of trimmings. In fact we was a real live town.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE SAILOR WITH ONE HAND

At this moment the heavy beat of the storm on the roof ceased with

miraculous suddenness, leaving the outside world empty of sound save

for the DRIP, DRIP, DRIP of eaves. Nobody ventured to fill in the

pause that followed the stranger's last words, so in a moment he

continued his narrative.

We had every sort of people with us off and on, and, as I was lookout

at a popular game, I saw them all. One evening I was on my way home

about two o'clock of a moonlit night, when on the edge of the shadow I

stumbled over a body lying part across the footway. At the same

instant I heard the rip of steel through cloth and felt a sharp stab in

my left leg. For a minute I thought some drunk had used his knife on

me, and I mighty near derringered him as he lay. But somehow I didn't,

and looking closer, I saw the man was unconscious. Then I scouted to

see what had cut me, and found that the fellow had lost a hand. In

place of it he wore a sharp steel hook. This I had tangled up with and

gotten well pricked.

I dragged him out into the light. He was a slim-built young fellow,

with straight black hair, long and lank and oily, a lean face, and big

hooked nose. He had on only a thin shirt, a pair of rough wool pants,

and the rawhide home-made zapatos the Mexicans wore then instead of

boots. Across his forehead ran a long gash, cutting his left eyebrow

square in two.

There was no doubt of his being alive, for he was breathing hard, like

a man does when he gets hit over the head. It didn't sound good. When

a man breathes that way he's mostly all gone.

Well, it was really none of my business, as you might say. Men got

batted over the head often enough in those days. But for some reason I

picked him up and carried him to my 'dobe shack, and laid him out, and

washed his cut with sour wine. That brought him to. Sour wine is fine

to put a wound in shape to heal, but it's no soothing syrup. He sat up

as though he'd been touched with a hot poker, stared around wild-eyed,

and cut loose with that song you were singing. Only it wasn't that

verse. It was another one further along, that went like this:

Their coffin was their ship, and their grave it was the sea,

Blow high, blow low, what care we;

And the quarter that we gave them was to sink them in the sea,

Down on the coast of the High Barbaree.

It fair made my hair rise to hear him, with the big, still, solemn

desert outside, and the quiet moonlight, and the shadows, and him

sitting up straight and gaunt, his eyes blazing each side his big eagle

nose, and his snaky hair hanging over the raw cut across his head.

However, I made out to get him bandaged up and in shape; and pretty

soon he sort of went to sleep.

Well, he was clean out of his head for nigh two weeks. Most of the

time he lay flat on his back staring at the pole roof, his eyes burning

and looking like they saw each one something a different distance off,

the way crazy eyes do. That was when he was best. Then again he'd

sing that Barbaree song until I'd go out and look at the old Colorado

flowing by just to be sure I hadn't died and gone below. Or else he'd

just talk. That was the worst performance of all. It was like

listening to one end of a telephone, though we didn't know what

telephones were in those days. He began when he was a kid, and he gave

his side of conversations, pausing for replies. I could mighty near

furnish the replies sometimes. It was queer lingo--about ships and

ships' officers and gales and calms and fights and pearls and whales

and islands and birds and skies. But it was all little stuff. I used

to listen by the hour, but I never made out anything really important

as to who the man was, or where he'd come from, or what he'd done.

At the end of the second week I came in at noon as per usual to fix him

up with grub. I didn't pay any attention to him, for he was quiet. As

I was bending over the fire he spoke. Usually I didn't bother with his

talk, for it didn't mean anything, but something in his voice made me

turn. He was lying on his side, those black eyes of his blazing at me,

but now both of them saw the same distance.

"Where are my clothes?" he asked, very intense.

"You ain't in any shape to want clothes," said I. "Lie still."

I hadn't any more than got the words out of my mouth before he was atop

me. His method was a winner. He had me by the throat with his hand,

and I felt the point of the hook pricking the back of my neck. One

little squeeze--Talk about your deadly weapons!

But he'd been too sick and too long abed. He turned dizzy and keeled

over, and I dumped him back on the bunk. Then I put my six-shooter on.

In a minute or so he came to.

"Now you're a nice, sweet proposition," said I, as soon as I was sure

he could understand me. "Here I pick you up on the street and save

your worthless carcass, and the first chance you get you try to crawl

my hump. Explain."

"Where's my clothes?" he demanded again, very fierce.

"For heaven's sake," I yelled at him, "what's the matter with you and

your old clothes? There ain't enough of them to dust a fiddle with

anyway. What do you think I'd want with them? They're safe enough."'

"Let me have them," he begged.

"Now, look here," said I, "you can't get up to-day. You ain't fit."

"I know," he pleaded, "but let me see them."

Just to satisfy him I passed over his old duds.

"I've been robbed," he cried.

"Well," said I, "what did you expect would happen to you lying around

Yuma after midnight with a hole in your head?"

"Where's my coat?" he asked.

"You had no coat when I picked you up," I replied.

He looked at me mighty suspicious, but didn't say anything more--he

wouldn't even answer when I spoke to him. After he'd eaten a fair meal

he fell asleep. When I came back that evening the bunk was empty and

he was gone.

I didn't see him again for two days. Then I caught sight of him quite

a ways off. He nodded at me very sour, and dodged around the corner of

the store.

"Guess he suspicions I stole that old coat of his," thinks I; and

afterwards I found that my surmise had been correct.

However, he didn't stay long in that frame of mind. It was along

towards evening, and I was walking on the banks looking down over the

muddy old Colorado, as I always liked to do. The sun had just set, and

the mountains had turned hard and stiff, as they do after the glow, and

the sky above them was a thousand million miles deep of pale green-gold

light. A pair of Greasers were ahead of me, but I could see only their

outlines, and they didn't seem to interfere any with the scenery.

Suddenly a black figure seemed to rise up out of the ground; the

Mexican man went down as though he'd been jerked with a string, and the

woman screeched.

I ran up, pulling my gun. The Mex was flat on his face, his arms

stretched out. On the middle of his back knelt my one-armed friend.

And that sharp hook was caught neatly under the point of the Mexican's

jaw. You bet he lay still.

I really think I was just in time to save the man's life. According to

my belief another minute would have buried the hook in the Mexican's

neck. Anyway, I thrust the muzzle of my Colt's into the sailor's face.

"What's this?" I asked.

The sailor looked up at me without changing his position. He was not

the least bit afraid.

"This man has my coat," he explained.

"Where'd you get the coat?" I asked the Mex.

"I ween heem at monte off Antonio Curvez," said he.

"Maybe," growled the sailor.

He still held the hook under the man's jaw, but with the other hand he

ran rapidly under and over the Mexican's left shoulder. In the half

light I could see his face change. The gleam died from his eye; the

snarl left his lips. Without further delay he arose to his feet.

"Get up and give it here!" he demanded.

The Mexican was only too glad to get off so easy. I don't know whether

he'd really won the coat at monte or not. In any case, he flew poco

pronto, leaving me and my friend together.

The man with the hook felt the left shoulder of the coat again, looked

up, met my eye, muttered something intended to be pleasant, and walked

away.

This was in December.

During the next two months he was a good deal about town, mostly doing

odd jobs. I saw him off and on. He always spoke to me as pleasantly

as he knew how, and once made some sort of a bluff about paying me back

for my trouble in bringing him around. However, I didn't pay much

attention to that, being at the time almighty busy holding down my card

games.

The last day of February I was sitting in my shack smoking a pipe after

supper, when my one-armed friend opened the door a foot, slipped in,

and shut it immediately. By the time he looked towards me I knew where

my six-shooter was.

"That's all right," said I, "but you better stay right there."

I intended to take no more chances with that hook.

He stood there looking straight at me without winking or offering to

move.

"What do you want?" I asked.

"I want to make up to you for your trouble," said he. "I've got a good

thing, and I want to let you in on it."

"What kind of a good thing?" I asked.

"Treasure," said he.

"H'm," said I.

I examined him closely. He looked all right enough, neither drunk nor

loco.

"Sit down," said I--"over there; the other side the table." He did so.

"Now, fire away," said I.

He told me his name was Solomon Anderson, but that he was generally

known as Handy Solomon, on account of his hook; that he had always

followed the sea; that lately he had coasted the west shores of Mexico;

that at Guaymas he had fallen in with Spanish friends, in company with

whom he had visited the mines in the Sierra Madre; that on this

expedition the party had been attacked by Yaquis and wiped out, he

alone surviving; that his blanket-mate before expiring had told him of

gold buried in a cove of Lower California by the man's grandfather;

that the man had given him a chart showing the location of the

treasure; that he had sewn this chart in the shoulder of his coat,

whence his suspicion of me and his being so loco about getting it back.

"And it's a big thing," said Handy Solomon to me, "for they's not only

gold, but altar jewels and diamonds. It will make us rich, and a dozen

like us, and you can kiss the Book on that."

"That may all be true," said I, "but why do you tell me? Why don't you

get your treasure without the need of dividing it?"

"Why, mate," he answered, "it's just plain gratitude. Didn't you save

my life, and nuss me, and take care of me when I was nigh killed?"

"Look here, Anderson, or Handy Solomon, or whatever you please to call

yourself," I rejoined to this, "if you're going to do business with

me--and I do not understand yet just what it is you want of me--you'll

have to talk straight. It's all very well to say gratitude, but that

don't go with me. You've been around here three months, and barring a

half-dozen civil words and twice as many of the other kind, I've failed

to see any indications of your gratitude before. It's a quality with a

hell of a hang-fire to it."

He looked at me sideways, spat, and looked at me sideways again. Then

he burst into a laugh.

"The devil's a preacher, if you ain't lost your pinfeathers,"' said he.

"Well, it's this then: I got to have a boat to get there; and she must

be stocked. And I got to have help with the treasure, if it's like

this fellow said it was. And the Yaquis and cannibals from Tiburon is

through the country. It's money I got to have, and it's money I

haven't got, and can't get unless I let somebody in as pardner."

"Why me?" I asked.

"Why not?" he retorted. "I ain't see anybody I like better."

We talked the matter over at length. I had to force him to each point,

for suspicion was strong in him. I stood out for a larger party. He

strongly opposed this as depreciating the shares, but I had no

intention of going alone into what was then considered a wild and

dangerous country. Finally we compromised. A third of the treasure

was to go to him, a third to me, and the rest was to be divided among

the men whom I should select. This scheme did not appeal to him.

"How do I know you plays fair?" he complained. "They'll be four of you

to one of me; and I don't like it, and you can kiss the Book on that."

"If you don't like it, leave it," said I, "and get out, and be damned

to you."

Finally he agreed; but he refused me a look at the chart, saying that

he had left it in a safe place. I believe in reality he wanted to be

surer of me, and for that I can hardly blame him.

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE MURDER ON THE BEACH

At this moment the cook stuck his head in at the open door.

"Say, you fellows," he complained, "I got to be up at three o'clock.

Ain't you never going to turn in?"

"Shut up, Doctor!" "Somebody kill him!" "Here, sit down and listen to

this yarn!" yelled a savage chorus.

There ensued a slight scuffle, a few objections. Then silence, and the

stranger took up his story.

I had a chum named Billy Simpson, and I rung him in for friendship.

Then there was a solemn, tall Texas young fellow, strong as a bull,

straight and tough, brought up fighting Injins. He never said much,

but I knew he'd be right there when the gong struck. For fourth man I

picked out a German named Schwartz. He and Simpson had just come back

from the mines together. I took him because he was a friend of

Billy's, and besides was young and strong, and was the only man in town

excepting the sailor, Anderson, who knew anything about running a boat.

I forgot to say that the Texas fellow was named Denton.

Handy Solomon had his boat all picked out. It belonged to some Basques

who had sailed her around from California. I must say when I saw her I

felt inclined to renig, for she wasn't more'n about twenty-five feet

long, was open except for a little sort of cubbyhole up in the front of

her, had one mast, and was pointed at both ends. However, Schwartz

said she was all right. He claimed he knew the kind; that she was the

sort used by French fishermen, and could stand all sorts of trouble.

She didn't look it.

We worked her up to Yuma, partly with oars and partly by sails. Then

we loaded her with grub for a month. Each of us had his own weapons,

of course. In addition we put in picks and shovels, and a small cask

of water. Handy Solomon said that would be enough, as there was water

marked down on his chart. We told the gang that we were going trading.

At the end of the week we started, and were out four days. There

wasn't much room, what with the supplies and the baggage, for the five

of us. We had to curl up 'most anywheres to sleep. And it certainly

seemed to me that we were in lots of danger. The waves were much

bigger than she was, and splashed on us considerable, but Schwartz and

Anderson didn't seem to mind. They laughed at us. Anderson sang that

song of his, and Schwartz told us of the placers he had worked. He and

Simpson had made a pretty good clean-up, just enough to make them want

to get rich. The first day out Simpson showed us a belt with about an

hundred ounces of dust. This he got tired of wearing, so he kept it in

a compass-box, which was empty.

At the end of the four days we turned in at a deep bay and came to

anchor. The country was the usual proposition--very light-brown,

brittle-looking mountains, about two thousand feet high; lots of sage

and cactus, a pebbly beach, and not a sign of anything fresh and green.

But Denton and I were mighty glad to see any sort of land. Besides,

our keg of water was pretty low, and it was getting about time to

discover the spring the chart spoke of. So we piled our camp stuff in

the small boat and rowed ashore.

Anderson led the way confidently enough up a dry arroyo, whose sides

were clay and conglomerate. But, though we followed it to the end, we

could find no indications that it was anything more than a wash for

rain floods.

"That's main queer," muttered Anderson, and returned to the beach.

There he spread out the chart--the first look at it we'd had--and set

to studying it.

It was a careful piece of work done in India ink, pretty old, to judge

by the look of it, and with all sorts of pictures of mountains and

dolphins and ships and anchors around the edge. There was our bay, all

right. Two crosses were marked on the land part--one labelled "oro"

and the other "agua."

"Now there's the high cliff," says Anderson, following it out, "and

there's the round hill with the boulder--and if them bearings don't

point due for that ravine, the devil's a preacher."

We tried it again, with the same result. A second inspection of the

map brought us no light on the question. We talked it over, and looked

at it from all points, but we couldn't dodge the truth: the chart was

wrong.

Then we explored several of the nearest gullies, but without finding

anything but loose stones baked hot in the sun.

By now it was getting towards sundown, so we built us a fire of

mesquite on the beach, made us supper, and boiled a pot of beans.

We talked it over. The water was about gone.

"That's what we've got to find first," said Simpson, "no question of

it. It's God knows how far to the next water, and we don't know how

long it will take us to get there in that little boat. If we run our

water entirely out before we start, we're going to be in trouble.

We'll have a good look to-morrow, and if we don't find her, we'll run

down to Mollyhay[4] and get a few extra casks."

"Perhaps that map is wrong about the treasure, too," suggested Denton.

"I thought of that," said Handy Solomon, "but then, thinks I to myself,

this old rip probably don't make no long stay here--just dodges in and

out like, between tides, to bury his loot. He would need no water at

the time; but he might when he came back, so he marked the water on his

map. But he wasn't noways particular AND exact, being in a hurry. But

you can kiss the Book to it that he didn't make no such mistakes about

the swag."

"I believe you're right," said I.

When we came to turn in, Anderson suggested that he should sleep aboard

the boat. But Billy Simpson, in mind perhaps of the hundred ounces in

the compass-box, insisted that he'd just as soon as not. After a

little objection Handy Solomon gave in, but I thought he seemed sour

about it. We built a good fire, and in about ten seconds were asleep.

Now, usually I sleep like a log, and did this time until about

midnight. Then all at once I came broad awake and sitting up in my

blankets. Nothing had happened--I wasn't even dreaming--but there I

was as alert and clear as though it were broad noon.

By the light of the fire I saw Handy Solomon sitting, and at his side

our five rifles gathered.

I must have made some noise, for he turned quietly toward me, saw I was

awake, and nodded. The moonlight was sparkling on the hard stony

landscape, and a thin dampness came out from the sea.

After a minute Anderson threw on another stick of wood, yawned, and

stood up.

"It's wet," said he; "I've been fixing the guns."

He showed me how he was inserting a little patch of felt between the

hammer and the nipple, a scheme of his own for keeping damp from the

powder. Then he rolled up in his blanket. At the time it all seemed

quite natural--I suppose my mind wasn't fully awake, for all my head

felt so clear. Afterwards I realised what a ridiculous bluff he was

making: for of course the cap already on the nipple was plenty to keep

out the damp. I fully believe he intended to kill us as we lay. Only

my sudden awakening spoiled his plan.

I had absolutely no idea of this at the time, however. Not the

slightest suspicion entered my head. In view of that fact, I have

since believed in guardian angels. For my next move, which at the time

seemed to me absolutely aimless, was to change my blankets from one

side of the fire to the other. And that brought me alongside the five

rifles.

Owing to this fact, I am now convinced, we awoke safe at daylight,

cooked breakfast, and laid the plan for the day. Anderson directed us.

I was to climb over the ridge before us and search in the ravine on the

other side. Schwartz was to explore up the beach to the left, and

Denton to the right. Anderson said he would wait for Billy Simpson,

who had overslept in the darkness of the cubbyhole, and who was now

paddling ashore. The two of them would push inland to the west until a

high hill would give them a chance to look around for greenery.

We started at once, before the sun would be hot. The hill I had to

climb was steep and covered with chollas, so I didn't get along very

fast. When I was about half way to the top I heard a shot from the

beach. I looked back. Anderson was in the small boat, rowing rapidly

out to the vessel. Denton was running up the beach from one direction

and Schwartz from the other. I slid and slipped down the bluff,

getting pretty well stuck up with the cholla spines.

At the beach we found Billy Simpson lying on his ace, shot through the

back. We turned him over, but he was apparently dead. Anderson had

hoisted the sail, had cut loose from the anchor, and was sailing away.

Denton stood up straight and tall, looking. Then he pulled his belt in

a hole, grabbed my arm, and started to run up the long curve of the

beach. Behind us came Schwartz. We ran near a mile, and then fell

among some tules in an inlet at the farther point.

"What is it?" I gasped.

"Our only chance--to get him--" said Denton. "He's got to go around

this point--big wind--perhaps his mast will bust--then he'll come

ashore--" He opened and shut his big brown hands.

So there we two fools lay, like panthers in the tules, taking our only

one-in-a-million chance to lay hands on Anderson. Any sailor could

have told us that the mast wouldn't break, but we had winded Schwartz a

quarter of a mile back. And so we waited, our eyes fixed on the boat's

sail, grudging her every inch, just burning to fix things to suit us a

little better. And naturally she made the point in what I now know was

only a fresh breeze, squared away, and dropped down before the wind

toward Guaymas.

We walked back slowly to our camp, swallowing the copper taste of too

hard a run. Schwartz we picked up from a boulder, just recovering. We

were all of us crazy mad. Schwartz half wept, and blamed and cussed.

Denton glowered away in silence. I ground my feet into the sand in a

help less sort of anger, not only at the man himself, but also at the

whole way things had turned out. I don't believe the least notion of

our predicament had come to any of us. All we knew yet was that we had

been done up, and we were hostile about it.

But at camp we found something to occupy us for the moment. Poor Billy

was not dead, as we had supposed, but very weak and sick, and a hole

square through him. When we returned he was conscious, but that was

about all. His eyes were shut, and he was moaning. I tore open his

shirt to stanch the blood. He felt my hand and opened his eyes. They

were glazed, and I don't think he saw me.

"Water, water!" he cried.

At that we others saw all at once where we stood. I remember I rose to

my feet and found myself staring straight into Tom Denton's eyes. We

looked at each other that way for I guess it was a full minute. Then

Tom shook his head.

"Water, water!" begged poor Billy.

Tom leaned over him.

"My God, Billy, there ain't any water!" said he.

[4] Mulege--I retain the Old Timer's pronunciation.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

BURIED TREASURE

The Old Timer's voice broke a little. We had leisure to notice that

even the drip from the eaves had ceased. A faint, diffused light

vouchsafed us dim outlines of sprawling figures and tumbled bedding.

Far in the distance outside a wolf yelped.

We could do nothing for him except shelter him from the sun, and wet

his forehead with sea-water; nor could we think clearly for ourselves

as long as the spark of life lingered in him. His chest rose and fell

regularly, but with long pauses between. When the sun was overhead he

suddenly opened his eyes.

"Fellows," said he, "it's beautiful over there; the grass is so green,

and the water so cool; I am tired of marching, and I reckon I'll cross

over and camp."

Then he died. We scooped out a shallow hole above tide-mark, and laid

him in it, and piled over him stones from the wash.

Then we went back to the beach, very solemn, to talk it over.

"Now, boys," said I, "there seems to me just one thing to do, and that

is to pike out for water as fast as we can."

"Where?" asked Denton.

"Well," I argued, "I don't believe there's any water about this bay.

Maybe there was when that chart was made. It was a long time ago. And

any way, the old pirate was a sailor, and no plainsman, and maybe he

mistook rainwater for a spring. We've looked around this end of the

bay. The chances are we'd use up two or three days exploring around

the other, and then wouldn't be as well off as we are right now."

"Which way?" asked Denton again, mighty brief.

"Well," said I, "there's one thing I've always noticed in case of folks

held up by the desert: they generally go wandering about here and there

looking for water until they die not far from where they got lost. And

usually they've covered a heap of actual distance."

"That's so," agreed Denton.

"Now, I've always figured that it would be a good deal better to start

right out for some particular place, even if it's ten thousand miles

away. A man is just as likely to strike water going in a straight line

as he is going in a circle; and then, besides, he's getting somewhere."

"Correct," said Denton,

"So," I finished, "I reckon we'd better follow the coast south and try

to get to Mollyhay."

"How far is that?" asked Schwartz.

"I don't rightly know. But somewheres between three and five hundred

miles, at a guess."

At that he fell to glowering and grooming with himself, brooding over

what a hard time it was going to be. That is the way with a German.

First off he's plumb scared at the prospect of suffering anything, and

would rather die right off than take long chances. After he gets into

the swing of it, he behaves as well as any man.

We took stock of what we had to depend on. The total assets proved to

be just three pairs of legs. A pot of coffee had been on the fire, but

that villain had kicked it over when he left. The kettle of beans was

there, but somehow we got the notion they might have been poisoned, so

we left them. I don't know now why we were so foolish--if poison was

his game, he'd have tried it before--but at that time it seemed

reasonable enough. Perhaps the horror of the morning's work, and the

sight of the brittle-brown mountains, and the ghastly yellow glare of

the sun, and the blue waves racing by outside, and the big strong wind

that blew through us so hard that it seemed to blow empty our souls,

had turned our judgment. Anyway, we left a full meal there in the

beanpot.

So without any further delay we set off up the ridge I had started to

cross that morning. Schwartz lagged, sulky as a muley cow, but we

managed to keep him with us. At the top of the ridge we took our

bearings for the next deep bay. Already we had made up our minds to

stick to the sea-coast, both on account of the lower country over which

to travel and the off chance of falling in with a fishing vessel.

Schwartz muttered something about its being too far even to the next

bay, and wanted to sit down on a rock. Denton didn't say anything, but

he jerked Schwartz up by the collar so fiercely that the German gave it

over and came along.

We dropped down into the gully, stumbled over the boulder wash, and

began to toil in the ankle-deep sand of a little sage-brush flat this

side of the next ascent. Schwartz followed steadily enough now, but

had fallen forty or fifty feet behind. This was a nuisance, as we bad

to keep turning to see if he still kept up.

Suddenly he seemed to disappear.

Denton and I hurried back to find him on his hands and knees behind a

sagebrush, clawing away at the sand like mad.

"Can't be water on this flat," said Denton; "he must have gone crazy."

"What's the matter, Schwartz?" I asked.

For answer he moved a little to one side, showing beneath his knee one

corner of a wooden box sticking above the sand.

At this we dropped beside him, and in five minutes had uncovered the

whole of the chest. It was not very large, and was locked. A rock

from the wash fixed that, however. We threw back the lid.

It was full to the brim of gold coins, thrown in loose, nigh two

bushels of them.

"The treasure!" I cried.

There it was, sure enough, or some of it. We looked the rest through,

but found nothing but the gold coins. The altar ornaments and jewels

were lacking.

"Probably buried in another box or so," said Denton.

Schwartz wanted to dig around a little.

"No good," said I. "We've got our work cut out for us as it is."

Denton backed me up. We were both old hands at the business, had each

in our time suffered the "cotton-mouth" thirst, and the memory of it

outweighed any desire for treasure.

But Schwartz was money-mad. Left to himself he would have staid on

that sand flat to perish, as certainly as had poor Billy. We had

fairly to force him away, and then succeeded only because we let him

fill all his pockets to bulging with the coins. As we moved up the

next rise, he kept looking back and uttering little moans against the

crime of leaving it.

Luckily for us it was winter. We shouldn't have lasted six hours at

this time of year. As it was, the sun was hot against the shale and

the little stones of those cussed hills. We plodded along until late

afternoon, toiling up one hill and down another, only to repeat

immediately. Towards sundown we made the second bay, where we plunged

into the sea, clothes and all, and were greatly refreshed. I suppose a

man absorbs a good deal that way. Anyhow, it always seemed to help.

We were now pretty hungry, and, as we walked along the shore, we began

to look for turtles or shellfish, or anything else that might come

handy. There was nothing. Schwartz wanted to stop for a night's rest,

but Denton and I knew better than that.

"Look here, Schwartz," said Denton, "you don't realise you're entered

against time in this race--and that you're a damn fool to carry all

that weight in your clothes."

So we dragged along all night.

It was weird enough, I can tell you. The moon shone cold and white

over that dead, dry country. Hot whiffs rose from the baked stones and

hillsides. Shadows lay under the stones like animals crouching. When

we came to the edge of a silvery hill we dropped off into pitchy

blackness. There we stumbled over boulders for a minute or so, and

began to climb the steep shale on the other side. This was fearful

work. The top seemed always miles away. By morning we didn't seem to

have made much of anywhere. The same old hollow-looking mountains with

the sharp edges stuck up in about the same old places.

We had got over being very hungry, and, though we were pretty dry, we

didn't really suffer yet from thirst. About this time Denton ran

across some fishhook cactus, which we cut up and chewed. They have a

sticky wet sort of inside, which doesn't quench your thirst any, but

helps to keep you from drying up and blowing away.

All that day we plugged along as per usual. It was main hard work, and

we got to that state where things are disagreeable, but mechanical.

Strange to say, Schwartz kept in the lead. It seemed to me at the time

that he was using more energy than the occasion called for--just as man

runs faster before he comes to the giving-out point. However, the

hours went by, and he didn't seem to get any more tired than the rest

of us.

We kept a sharp lookout for anything to eat, but there was nothing but

lizards and horned toads. Later we'd have been glad of them, but by

that time we'd got out of their district. Night came. Just at sundown

we took another wallow in the surf, and chewed some more fishhook

cactus. When the moon came up we went on.

I'm not going to tell you how dead beat we got. We were pretty tough

and strong, for all of us had been used to hard living, but after the

third day without anything to eat and no water to drink, it came to be

pretty hard going. It got to the point where we had to have some

REASON for getting out besides just keeping alive. A man would

sometimes rather die than keep alive, anyway, if it came only to that.

But I know I made up my mind I was going to get out so I could smash up

that Anderson, and I reckon Denton had the same idea. Schwartz didn't

say anything, but he pumped on ahead of us, his back bent over, and his

clothes sagging and bulging with the gold he carried.

We used to travel all night, because it was cool, and rest an hour or

two at noon. That is all the rest we did get. I don't know how fast

we went; I'd got beyond that. We must have crawled along mighty slow,

though, after our first strength gave out. The way I used to do was to

collect myself with an effort, look around for my bearings, pick out a

landmark a little distance off, and forget everything but it. Then I'd

plod along, knowing nothing but the sand and shale and slope under my

feet, until I'd reached that landmark. Then I'd clear my mind and pick

out another.

But I couldn't shut out the figure of Schwartz that way. He used to

walk along just ahead of my shoulder. His face was all twisted up, but

I remember thinking at the time it looked more as if he was worried in

his mind than like bodily suffering. The weight of the gold in his

clothes bent his shoulders over.

As we went on the country gradually got to be more mountainous, and, as

we were steadily growing weaker, it did seem things were piling up on

us. The eighth day we ran out of the fishhook cactus, and, being on a

high promontory, were out of touch with the sea. For the first time my

tongue began to swell a little. The cactus had kept me from that

before. Denton must have been in the same fix, for he looked at me and

raised one eyebrow kind of humorous.

Schwartz was having a good deal of difficulty to navigate. I will say

for him that he had done well, but now I could see that his strength

was going on him in spite of himself. He knew it, all right, for when

we rested that day he took all the gold coins and spread them in a row,

and counted them, and put them back in his pocket, and then all of a

sudden snatched out two handfuls and threw them as far as he could.

"Too heavy," he muttered, but that was all he could bring himself to

throw away.

All that night we wandered high in the air. I guess we tried to keep a

general direction, but I don't know. Anyway, along late, but before

moonrise--she was now on the wane--I came to, and found myself looking

over the edge of a twenty-foot drop. Right below me I made out a faint

glimmer of white earth in the starlight. Somehow it reminded me of a

little trail I used to know under a big rock back in Texas.

"Here's a trail," I thought, more than half loco; "I'll follow it!"

At least that's what half of me thought. The other half was sensible,

and knew better, but it seemed to be kind of standing to one side, a

little scornful, watching the performance. So I slid and slipped down

to the strip of white earth, and, sure enough, it was a trail. At that

the loco half of me gave the sensible part the laugh. I followed the

path twenty feet and came to a dark hollow under the rock, and in it a

round pool of water about a foot across. They say a man kills himself

drinking too much, after starving for water. That may be, but it

didn't kill me, and I sucked up all I could hold. Perhaps the fishhook

cactus had helped. Well, sir, it was surprising how that drink brought

me around. A minute before I'd been on the edge of going plumb loco,

and here I was as clear-headed as a lawyer.

I hunted up Denton and Schwartz. They drank, themselves full, too.

Then we rested. It was mighty hard to leave that spring--

Oh, we had to do it. We'd have starved sure, there. The trail was a

game trail, but that did us no good, for we had no weapons.

How we did wish for the coffeepot, so we could take some away. We

filled our hats, and carried them about three hours, before the water

began to soak through. Then we had to drink it in order to save it.

The country fairly stood up on end. We had to climb separate little

hills so as to avoid rolling rocks down on each other. It took it out

of us. About this time we began to see mountain sheep. They would

come right up to the edges of the small cliffs to look at us. We threw

stones at them, hoping to hit one in the forehead, but of course

without any results.

The good effects of the water lasted us about a day. Then we began to

see things again. Off and on I could see water plain as could be in

every hollow, and game of all kinds standing around and looking at me.

I knew these were all fakes. By making an effort I could swing things

around to where they belonged. I used to do that every once in a

while, just to be sure we weren't doubling back, and to look out for

real water. But most of the time it didn't seem to be worth while. I

just let all these visions riot around and have a good time inside me

or outside me, whichever it was. I knew I could get rid of them any

minute. Most of the time, if I was in any doubt, it was easier to

throw a stone to see if the animals were real or not. The real ones

ran away.

We began to see bands of wild horses in the uplands. One day both

Denton and I plainly saw one with saddle marks on him. If only one of

us had seen him, it wouldn't have counted much, but we both made him

out. This encouraged us wonderfully, though I don't see why it should

have. We had topped the high country, too, and had started down the

other side of the mountains that ran out on the promontory. Denton and

I were still navigating without any thought of giving up, but Schwartz

was getting in bad shape. I'd hate to pack twenty pounds over that

country even with rest, food, and water. He was toting it on nothing.

We told him so, and he came to see it, but he never could persuade

himself to get rid of the gold all at once. Instead he threw away the

pieces one by one. Each sacrifice seemed to nerve him up for another

heat. I can shut my eyes and see it now--the wide, glaring, yellow

country, the pasteboard mountains, we three dragging along, and the

fierce sunshine flashing from the doubloons as one by one they went

spinning through the air.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

THE CHEWED SUGAR CANE

"I'd like to have trailed you fellows," sighed a voice from the corner.

"Would you!" said Colorado Rogers grimly.

It was five days to the next water. But they were worse than the eight

days before. We were lucky, however, for at the spring we discovered

in a deep wash near the coast, was the dried-up skull of a horse. It

had been there a long time, but a few shreds of dried flesh still clung

to it. It was the only thing that could be described as food that had

passed our lips since breakfast thirteen days before. In that time we

had crossed the mountain chain, and had come again to the sea. The

Lord was good to us. He sent us the water, and the horse's skull, and

the smooth hard beach, without breaks or the necessity of climbing

hills. And we needed it, oh, I promise you, we needed it!

I doubt if any of us could have kept the direction except by such an

obvious and continuous landmark as the sea to our left. It hardly

seemed worth while to focus my mind, but I did it occasionally just by

way of testing myself. Schwartz still threw away his gold coins, and

once, in one of my rare intervals of looking about me, I saw Denton

picking them up. This surprised me mildly, but I was too tired to be

very curious. Only now, when I saw Schwartz's arm sweep out in what

had become a mechanical movement, I always took pains to look, and

always I saw Denton search for the coin. Sometimes he found it, and

sometimes he did not.

The figures of my companions and the yellow-brown tide sand under my

feet, and a consciousness of the blue and white sea to my left, are all

I remember, except when we had to pull ourselves together for the

purpose of cutting fishhook cactus. I kept going, and I knew I had a

good reason for doing so, but it seemed too much of an effort to recall

what that reason was.

Schwartz threw away a gold piece as another man would take a stimulant.

Gradually, without really thinking about it, I came to see this, and

then went on to sabe why Denton picked up the coins; and a great

admiration for Denton's cleverness seeped through me like water through

the sand. He was saving the coins to keep Schwartz going. When the

last coin went, Schwartz would give out. It all sounds queer now, but

it seemed all right then--and it WAS all right, too.

So we walked on the beach, losing entire track of time. And after a

long interval I came to myself to see Schwartz lying on the sand, and

Denton standing over him. Of course we'd all been falling down a lot,

but always before we'd got up again.

"He's give out," croaked Denton.

His voice sounded as if it was miles away, which surprised me, but,

when I answered, mine sounded miles away, too, which surprised me still

more.

Denton pulled out a handful of gold coins.

"This will buy him some more walk," said he gravely, "but not much."

I nodded. It seemed all right, this new, strange purchasing power of

gold--it WAS all right, by God, and as real as buying bricks--

"I'll go on," said Denton, "and send back help. You come after."

"To Mollyhay!" said I.

This far I reckon we'd hung onto ourselves because it was serious. Now

I began to laugh. So did Denton. We laughed and laughed.

"A damn long way

To Mollyhay."

said I. Then we laughed some more, until the tears ran down our cheeks,

and we had to hold our poor weak sides. Pretty soon we fetched up with

a gasp.

"A damn long way

To Mollyhay,"

whispered Denton, and then off we went into more shrieks. And when we

would sober down a little, one or the other of us would say it again:

"A damn long way

To Mollyhay,"

and then we'd laugh some more. It must have been a sweet sight!

At last I realised that we ought to pull ourselves together, so I

snubbed up short, and Denton did the same, and we set to laying plans.

But every minute or so one of us would catch on some word, and then

we'd trail off into rhymes and laughter and repetition.

"Keep him going as long as you can," said Denton.

"Yes."

"And be sure to stick to the beach."

That far it was all right and clear-headed. But the word "beach" let

us out.

"I'm a peach

Upon the beach,"

sings I, and there we were both off again until one or the other

managed to grope his way back to common sense again. And sometimes we

crow-hopped solemnly around and around the prostrate Schwartz like a

pair of Injins.

But somehow we got our plan laid at last, slipped the coins into

Schwartz's pocket, and said good-bye.

"Old socks, good-bye,

You bet I'll try,"

yelled Denton, and laughing fit to kill, danced off up the beach, and

out into a sort of grey mist that shut off everything beyond a certain

distance from me now.

So I kicked Schwartz, he felt in his pocket, threw a gold piece away,

and "bought a little more walk."

My entire vision was fifty feet or so across. Beyond that was grey

mist. Inside my circle I could see the sand quite plainly and Denton's

footprints. If I moved a little to the left, the wash of the waters

would lap under the edge of that grey curtain.

If I moved to the right, I came to cliffs. The nearer I drew to them,

the farther up I could see, but I could never see to the top. It used

to amuse me to move this area of consciousness about to see what I

could find. Actual physical suffering was beginning to dull, and my

head seemed to be getting clearer.

One day, without any apparent reason, I moved at right angles across

the beach. Directly before me lay a piece of sugar cane, and one end

of it had been chewed.

Do you know what that meant? Animals don't cut sugar cane and bring it

to the beach and chew one end. A new strength ran through me, and

actually the grey mist thinned and lifted for a moment, until I could

make out dimly the line of cliffs and the tumbling sea.

I was not a bit hungry, but I chewed on the sugar cane, and made

Schwartz do the same. When we went on I kept close to the cliff, even

though the walking was somewhat heavier.

I remember after that its getting dark and then light again, so the

night must have passed, but whether we rested or walked I do not know.

Probably we did not get very far, though certainly we staggered ahead

after sun-up, for I remember my shadow.

About midday, I suppose, I made out a dim trail leading up a break in

the cliffs. Plenty of such trails we had seen before. They were

generally made by peccaries in search of cast-up fish--I hope they had

better luck than we.

But in the middle of this, as though for a sign, lay another piece of

chewed sugar cane.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE CALABASH STEW

I had agreed with Denton to stick to the beach, but Schwartz could not

last much longer, and I had not the slightest idea how far it might

prove to be to Mollyhay. So I turned up the trail.

We climbed a mountain ten thousand feet high. I mean that; and I know,

for I've climbed them that high, and I know just how it feels, and how

many times you have to rest, and how long it takes, and how much it

knocks out of you. Those are the things that count in measuring

height, and so I tell you we climbed that far. Actually I suppose the

hill was a couple of hundred feet, if not less. But on account of the

grey mist I mentioned, I could not see the top, and the illusion was

complete.

We reached the summit late in the afternoon, for the sun was square in

our eyes. But instead of blinding me, it seemed to clear my sight, so

that I saw below me a little mud hut with smoke rising behind it, and a

small patch of cultivated ground.

I'll pass over how I felt about it: they haven't made the words--

Well, we stumbled down the trail and into the hut. At first I thought

it was empty, but after a minute I saw a very old man crouched in a

corner. As I looked at him he raised his bleared eyes to me, his head

swinging slowly from side to side as though with a kind of palsy. He

could not see me, that was evident, nor hear me, but some instinct not

yet decayed turned him toward a new presence in the room. In my wild

desire for water I found room to think that here was a man even worse

off than myself.

A vessel of water was in the corner. I drank it. It was more than I

could hold, but I drank even after I was filled, and the waste ran from

the corners of my mouth. I had forgotten Schwartz. The excess made me

a little sick, but I held down what I had swallowed, and I really

believe it soaked into my system as it does into the desert earth after

a drought.

In a moment or so I took the vessel and filled it and gave it to

Schwartz. Then it seemed to me that my responsibility had ended. A

sudden great dreamy lassitude came over me. I knew I needed food, but

I had no wish for it, and no ambition to search it out. The man in the

corner mumbled at me with his toothless gums. I remember wondering if

we were all to starve there peacefully together--Schwartz and his

remaining gold coins, the man far gone in years, and myself. I did not

greatly care.

After a while the light was blotted out. There followed a slight

pause. Then I knew that someone had flown to my side, and was kneeling

beside me and saying liquid, pitying things in Mexican. I swallowed

something hot and strong. In a moment I came back from wherever I was

drifting, to look up at a Mexican girl about twenty years old.

She was no great matter in looks, but she seemed like an angel to me

then. And she had sense. No questions, no nothing. Just business.

The only thing she asked of me was if I understood Spanish.

Then she told me that her brother would be back soon, that they were

very poor, that she was sorry she had no meat to offer me, that they

were VERY poor, that all they had was calabash--a sort of squash. All

this time she was bustling things together. Next thing I know I had a

big bowl of calabash stew between my knees.

Now, strangely enough, I had no great interest in that calabash stew.

I tasted it, sat and thought a while, and tasted it again. By and by I

had emptied the bowl. It was getting dark. I was very sleepy. A man

came in, but I was too drowsy to pay any attention to him. I heard the

sound of voices. Then I was picked up bodily and carried to an

out-building and laid on a pile of skins. I felt the weight of a

blanket thrown over me--

I awoke in the night. Mind you, I had practically had no rest at all

for a matter of more than two weeks, yet I woke in a few hours. And,

remember, even in eating the calabash stew I had felt no hunger in

spite of my long fast. But now I found myself ravenous. You boys do

not know what hunger is. It HURTS. And all the rest of that night I

lay awake chewing on the rawhide of a pack-saddle that hung near me.

Next morning the young Mexican and his sister came to us early,

bringing more calabash stew. I fell on it like a wild animal, and just

wallowed in it, so eager was I to eat. They stood and watched me--and

I suppose Schwartz, too, though I had now lost interest in anyone but

myself--glancing at each other in pity from time to time.

When I had finished the man told me that they had decided to kill a

beef so we could have meat. They were very poor, but God had brought

us to them--

I appreciated this afterward. At the time I merely caught at the word

"meat." It seemed to me I could have eaten the animal entire, hide,

hoofs, and tallow. As a matter of fact, it was mighty lucky they

didn't have any meat. If they had, we'd probably have killed ourselves

with it. I suppose the calabash was about the best thing for us under

the circumstances.

The Mexican went out to hunt up his horse. I called the girl back.

"How far is it to Mollyhay?" I asked her.

"A league," said she.

So we had been near our journey's end after all, and Denton was

probably all right.

The Mexican went away horseback. The girl fed us calabash. We waited.

About one o'clock a group of horsemen rode over the hill. When they

came near enough I recognised Denton at their head. That man was of

tempered steel--

They had followed back along the beach, caught our trail where we had

turned off, and so discovered us. Denton had fortunately found kind

and intelligent people.

We said good-bye to the Mexican girl. I made Schwartz give her one of

his gold pieces.

But Denton could not wait for us to say "hullo" even, he was so anxious

to get back to town, so we mounted the horses he had brought us, and

rode off, very wobbly.

We lived three weeks in Mollyhay. It took us that long to get fed up.

The lady I stayed with made a dish of kid meat and stuffed olives--

Why, an hour after filling myself up to the muzzle I'd be hungry again,

and scouting round to houses looking for more to eat!

We talked things over a good deal, after we had gained a little

strength. I wanted to take a little flyer at Guaymas to see if I could

run across this Handy Solomon person, but Denton pointed out that

Anderson would be expecting just that, and would take mighty good care

to be scarce. His idea was that we'd do better to get hold of a boat

and some water casks, and lug off the treasure we had stumbled over.

Denton told us that the idea of going back and scooping all that dinero

up with a shovel had kept him going, just as the idea of getting even

with Anderson had kept me going. Schwartz said that after he'd carried

that heavy gold over the first day, he made up his mind he'd get the

spending of it or bust. That's why he hated so to throw it away.

There were lots of fishing boats in the harbour, and we hired one, and

a man to run it for next to nothing a week. We laid a course north,

and in six days anchored in our bay.

I tell you it looked queer. There were the charred sticks of the fire,

and the coffeepot lying on its side. We took off our hats at poor

Billy's grave a minute, and then climbed over the cholla-covered hill

carrying our picks and shovels, and the canvas sacks to take the

treasure away in.

There was no trouble in reaching the sandy flat. But when we got there

we found it torn up from one end to the other. A few scattered timbers

and three empty chests with the covers pried off alone remained. Handy

Solomon had been there before us.

We went back to our boat sick at heart. Nobody said a word. We went

aboard and made our Greaser boatman head for Yuma. It took us a week

to get there. We were all of us glum, but Denton was the worst of the

lot. Even after we'd got back to town and fallen into our old ways of

life, he couldn't seem to get over it. He seemed plumb possessed of

gloom, and moped around like a chicken with the pip. This surprised

me, for I didn't think the loss of money would hit him so hard. It

didn't hit any of us very hard in those days.

One evening I took him aside and fed him a drink, and expostulated with

him.

"Oh, HELL, Rogers," he burst out, "I don't care about the loot. But,

suffering cats, think how that fellow sized us up for a lot of

pattern-made fools; and how right he was about, it. Why all he did was

to sail out of sight around the next corner. He knew we'd start across

country; and we did. All we had to do was to lay low, and save our

legs. He was BOUND to come back. And we might have nailed him when he

landed."

"That's about all there was to it," concluded Colorado Rogers, after a

pause, "--except that I've been looking for him ever since, and when I

heard you singing that song I naturally thought I'd landed."

"And you never saw him again?" asked Windy Bill.

"Well," chuckled Rogers, "I did about ten year later. It was in

Tucson. I was in the back of a store, when the door in front opened

and this man came in. He stopped at the little cigar-case by the door.

In about one jump I was on his neck. I jerked him over backwards

before he knew what had struck him, threw him on his face, got my hands

in his back-hair, and began to jump his features against the floor.

Then all at once I noted that this man had two arms; so of course he

was the wrong fellow. "Oh, excuse me," said I, and ran out the back

door."

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE HONK-HONK BREED

It was Sunday at the ranch. For a wonder the weather had been

favourable; the windmills were all working, the bogs had dried up, the

beef had lasted over, the remuda had not strayed--in short, there was

nothing to do. Sang had given us a baked bread-pudding with raisins in

it. We filled it--in a wash basin full of it--on top of a few

incidental pounds of chile con, baked beans, soda biscuits, "air

tights," and other delicacies. Then we adjourned with our pipes to the

shady side of the blacksmith's shop where we could watch the ravens on

top the adobe wall of the corral. Somebody told a story about ravens.

This led to road-runners. This suggested rattlesnakes. They started

Windy Bill.

"Speakin' of snakes," said Windy, "I mind when they catched the

great-granddaddy of all the bullsnakes up at Lead in the Black Hills.

I was only a kid then. This wasn't no such tur'ble long a snake, but

he was more'n a foot thick. Looked just like a sahuaro stalk. Man

name of Terwilliger Smith catched it. He named this yere bullsnake

Clarence, and got it so plumb gentle it followed him everywhere. One

day old P. T. Barnum come along and wanted to buy this Clarence

snake--offered Terwilliger a thousand cold--but Smith wouldn't part

with the snake nohow. So finally they fixed up a deal so Smith could

go along with the show. They shoved Clarence in a box in the baggage

car, but after a while Mr. Snake gets so lonesome he gnaws out and

starts to crawl back to find his master. Just as he is half-way

between the baggage car and the smoker, the couplin' give way--right on

that heavy grade between Custer and Rocky Point. Well, sir, Clarence

wound his head 'round one brake wheel and his tail around the other,

and held that train together to the bottom of the grade. But it

stretched him twenty-eight feet and they had to advertise him as a

boa-constrictor."

Windy Bill's story of the faithful bullsnake aroused to reminiscence

the grizzled stranger, who thereupon held forth as follows:

Wall, I've see things and I've heerd things, some of them ornery, and

some you'd love to believe, they was that gorgeous and improbable.

Nat'ral history was always my hobby and sportin' events my special

pleasure and this yarn of Windy's reminds me of the only chanst I ever

had to ring in business and pleasure and hobby all in one grand

merry-go-round of joy. It come about like this:

One day, a few year back, I was sittin' on the beach at Santa Barbara

watchin' the sky stay up, and wonderin' what to do with my year's

wages, when a little squinch-eye round-face with big bow spectacles

came and plumped down beside me.

"Did you ever stop to think," says he, shovin' back his hat, "that if

the horsepower delivered by them waves on this beach in one single hour

could be concentrated behind washin' machines, it would be enough to

wash all the shirts for a city of four hundred and fifty-one thousand

one hundred and thirty-six people?"

"Can't say I ever did," says I, squintin' at him sideways.

"Fact," says he, "and did it ever occur to you that if all the food a

man eats in the course of a natural life could be gathered together at

one time, it would fill a wagon-train twelve miles long?"

"You make me hungry," says I.

"And ain't it interestin' to reflect," he goes on, "that if all the

finger-nail parin's of the human race for one year was to be collected

and subjected to hydraulic pressure it would equal in size the pyramid

of Cheops?"

"Look yere," says I, sittin' up, "did YOU ever pause to excogitate that

if all the hot air you is dispensin' was to be collected together it

would fill a balloon big enough to waft you and me over that Bullyvard

of Palms to yonder gin mill on the corner?"

He didn't say nothin' to that--just yanked me to my feet, faced me

towards the gin mill above mentioned, and exerted considerable pressure

on my arm in urgin' of me forward.

"You ain't so much of a dreamer, after all," thinks I. "In important

matters you are plumb decisive."

We sat down at little tables, and my friend ordered a beer and a

chicken sandwich.

"Chickens," says he, gazin' at the sandwich, "is a dollar apiece in

this country, and plumb scarce. Did you ever pause to ponder over the

returns chickens would give on a small investment? Say you start with

ten hens. Each hatches out thirteen aigs, of which allow a loss of say

six for childish accidents. At the end of the year you has eighty

chickens. At the end of two years that flock has increased to six

hundred and twenty. At the end of the third year--"

He had the medicine tongue! Ten days later him and me was

occupyin' of an old ranch fifty mile from anywhere. When they run

stage-coaches this joint used to be a roadhouse. The outlook was on

about a thousand little brown foothills. A road two miles four rods

two foot eleven inches in sight run by in front of us. It come over

one foothill and disappeared over another. I know just how long it

was, for later in the game I measured it.

Out back was about a hundred little wire chicken corrals filled with

chickens. We had two kinds. That was the doin's of Tuscarora. My

pardner called himself Tuscarora Maxillary. I asked him once if that

was his real name.

"It's the realest little old name you ever heerd tell of," says he. "I

know, for I made it myself--liked the sound of her. Parents ain't got

no rights to name their children. Parents don't have to be called them

names."

Well, these chickens, as I said, was of two kinds. The first was these

low-set, heavyweight propositions with feathers on their laigs, and not

much laigs at that, called Cochin Chinys. The other was a tall

ridiculous outfit made up entire of bulgin' breast and gangle laigs.

They stood about two foot and a half tall, and when they went to peck

the ground their tail feathers stuck straight up to the sky. Tusky

called 'em Japanese Games.

"Which the chief advantage of them chickens is," says he, "that in

weight about ninety per cent of 'em is breast meat. Now my idee is,

that if we can cross 'em with these Cochin Chiny fowls we'll have a

low-hung, heavyweight chicken runnin' strong on breast meat. These Jap

Games is too small, but if we can bring 'em up in size and shorten

their laigs, we'll shore have a winner."

That looked good to me, so we started in on that idee. The theery was

bully, but she didn't work out. The first broods we hatched growed up

with big husky Cochin Chiny bodies and little short necks, perched up

on laigs three foot long. Them chickens couldn't reach ground nohow.

We had to build a table for 'em to eat off, and when they went out

rustlin' for themselves they had to confine themselves to sidehills or

flyin' insects. Their breasts was all right, though--"And think of

them drumsticks for the boardinghouse trade!" says Tusky.

So far things wasn't so bad. We had a good grubstake. Tusky and me

used to feed them chickens twict a day, and then used to set around

watchin' the playful critters chase grasshoppers up an' down the wire

corrals, while Tusky figgered out what'd happen if somebody was dumfool

enough to gather up somethin' and fix it in baskets or wagons or such.

That was where we showed our ignorance of chickens.

One day in the spring I hitched up, rustled a dozen of the youngsters

into coops, and druv over to the railroad to make our first sale. I

couldn't fold them chickens up into them coops at first, but then I

stuck the coops up on aidge and they worked all right, though I will

admit they was a comical sight. At the railroad one of them towerist

trains had just slowed down to a halt as I come up, and the towerist

was paradin' up and down allowin' they was particular enjoyin' of the

warm Californy sunshine. One old terrapin, with grey chin whiskers,

projected over, with his wife, and took a peek through the slats of my

coop. He straightened up like someone had touched him off with a

red-hot poker.

"Stranger," said he, in a scared kind of whisper, "what's them?"

"Them's chickens," says I.

He took another long look.

"Marthy," says he to the old woman, "this will be about all! We come

out from Ioway to see the Wonders of Californy, but I can't go nothin'

stronger than this. If these is chickens, I don't want to see no Big

Trees."

Well, I sold them chickens all right for a dollar and two bits, which

was better than I expected, and got an order for more. About ten days

later I got a letter from the commission house.

"We are returnin' a sample of your Arts and Crafts chickens with the

lovin' marks of the teeth still onto him," says they. "Don't send any

more till they stops pursuin' of the nimble grasshopper. Dentist bill

will foller."

With the letter came the remains of one of the chickens. Tusky and I,

very indignant, cooked her for supper. She was tough, all right. We

thought she might do better biled, so we put her in the pot over night.

Nary bit. Well, then we got interested. Tusky kep' the fire goin' and

I rustled greasewood. We cooked her three days and three nights. At

the end of that time she was sort of pale and frazzled, but still

givin' points to three-year-old jerky on cohesion and other

uncompromisin' forces of Nature. We buried her then, and went out back

to recuperate.

There we could gaze on the smilin' landscape, dotted by about four

hundred long-laigged chickens swoopin' here and there after

grasshoppers.

"We got to stop that," says I.

"We can't," murmured Tusky, inspired. "We can't. It's born in 'em;

it's a primal instinct, like the love of a mother for her young, and it

can't be eradicated! Them chickens is constructed by a divine

providence for the express purpose of chasin' grasshoppers, jest as the

beaver is made for buildin' dams, and the cow-puncher is made for

whisky and faro-games. We can't keep 'em from it. If we was to shut

'em in a dark cellar, they'd flop after imaginary grasshoppers in their

dreams, and die emaciated in the midst of plenty. Jimmy, we're up agin

the Cosmos, the oversoul--" Oh, he had the medicine tongue, Tusky had,

and risin' on the wings of eloquence that way, he had me faded in ten

minutes. In fifteen I was wedded solid to the notion that the bottom

had dropped out of the chicken business. I think now that if we'd shut

them hens up, we might have--still, I don't know; they was a good deal

in what Tusky said.

"Tuscarora Maxillary," says I, "did you ever stop to entertain that

beautiful thought that if all the dumfoolishness possessed now by the

human race could be gathered together, and lined up alongside of us,

the first feller to come along would say to it 'Why, hello, Solomon!'"

We quit the notion of chickens for profit right then and there, but we

couldn't quit the place. We hadn't much money, for one thing, and then

we, kind of liked loafin' around and raisin' a little garden truck,

and--oh, well, I might as well say so, we had a notion about placers in

the dry wash back of the house you know how it is. So we stayed on,

and kept a-raisin' these long-laigs for the fun of it. I used to like

to watch 'em projectin' around, and I fed 'em twict a day about as

usual.

So Tusky and I lived alone there together, happy as ducks in Arizona.

About onc't in a month somebody'd pike along the road. She wasn't much

of a road, generally more chuckholes than bumps, though sometimes it

was the other way around. Unless it happened to be a man horseback or

maybe a freighter without the fear of God in his soul, we didn't have

no words with them; they was too busy cussin' the highways and

generally too mad for social discourses.

One day early in the year, when the 'dobe mud made ruts to add to the

bumps, one of these automobeels went past. It was the first Tusky and

me had seen in them parts, so we run out to view her. Owin' to the

high spots on the road, she looked like one of these movin' picters, as

to blur and wobble; sounded like a cyclone mingled with cuss-words, and

smelt like hell on housecleanin' day.

"Which them folks don't seem to be enjoyin' of the scenery," says I to

Tusky. "Do you reckon that there blue trail is smoke from the machine

or remarks from the inhabitants thereof?"

Tusky raised his head and sniffed long and inquirin'.

"It's langwidge," says he. "Did you ever stop to think that all the

words in the dictionary stretched end to end would reach--"

But at that minute I catched sight of somethin' brass lyin' in the

road. It proved to be a curled-up sort of horn with a rubber bulb on

the end. I squoze the bulb and jumped twenty foot over the remark she

made.

"Jarred off the machine," says Tusky.

"Oh, did it?" says I, my nerves still wrong. "I thought maybe it had

growed up from the soil like a toadstool."

About this time we abolished the wire chicken corrals, because we

needed some of the wire. Them long-laigs thereupon scattered all over

the flat searchin' out their prey. When feed time come I had to

screech my lungs out gettin' of 'em in, and then sometimes they didn't

all hear. It was plumb discouragin', and I mighty nigh made up my mind

to quit 'em, but they had come to be sort of pets, and I hated to turn

'em down. It used to tickle Tusky almost to death to see me out there

hollerin' away like an old bull-frog. He used to come out reg'lar,

with his pipe lit, just to enjoy me. Finally I got mad and opened up

on him.

"Oh," he explains, "it just plumb amuses me to see the dumfool at his

childish work. Why don't you teach 'em to come to that brass horn, and

save your voice?"

"Tusky," says I, with feelin', "sometimes you do seem to get a glimmer

of real sense."

Well, first off them chickens used to throw back-sommersets over that

horn. You have no idee how slow chickens is to learn things. I could

tell you things about chickens--say, this yere bluff about roosters

bein' gallant is all wrong. I've watched 'em. When one finds a nice

feed he gobbles it so fast that the pieces foller down his throat like

yearlin's through a hole in the fence. It's only when he scratches up

a measly one-grain quick-lunch that he calls up the hens and stands

noble and self-sacrificin' to one side. That ain't the point, which

is, that after two months I had them long-laigs so they'd drop

everythin' and come kitin' at the HONK-HONK of that horn. It was a

purty sight to see 'em, sailin' in from all directions twenty foot at a

stride. I was proud of 'em, and named 'em the Honk-honk Breed. We

didn't have no others, for by now the coyotes and bob-cats had nailed

the straight-breds. There wasn't no wild cat or coyote could catch one

of my Honk-honks, no, sir!

We made a little on our placer--just enough to keep interested. Then

the supervisors decided to fix our road, and what's more, THEY DONE IT!

That's the only part in this yarn that's hard to believe, but, boys,

you'll have to take it on faith. They ploughed her, and crowned her,

and scraped her, and rolled her, and when they moved on we had the

fanciest highway in the State of Californy.

That noon--the day they called her a job--Tusky and I sat smokin' our

pipes as per usual, when way over the foothills we seen a cloud of dust

and faint to our ears was bore a whizzin' sound. The chickens was

gathered under the cottonwood for the heat of the day, but they didn't

pay no attention. Then faint, but clear, we heard another of them

brass horns:

"Honk! honk!" says it, and every one of them chickens woke up, and

stood at attention.

"Honk! honk!" it hollered clearer and nearer.

Then over the hill come an automobeel, blowin' vigorous at every jump.

"My God!" I yells to Tusky, kickin' over my chair, as I springs to my

feet. "Stop 'em! Stop 'em!"

But it was too late. Out the gate sprinted them poor devoted chickens,

and up the road they trailed in vain pursuit. The last we seen of 'em

was a mingling of dust and dim figgers goin' thirty mile an hour after

a disappearin' automobeel.

That was all we seen for the moment. About three o'clock the first

straggler came limpin' in, his wings hangin', his mouth open, his eyes

glazed with the heat. By sundown fourteen had returned. All the rest

had disappeared utter; we never seen 'em again. I reckon they just

naturally run themselves into a sunstroke and died on the road.

It takes a long time to learn a chicken a thing, but a heap longer to

unlearn him. After that two or three of these yere automobeels went by

every day, all a-blowin' of their horns, all kickin' up a hell of a

dust. And every time them fourteen Honk-honks of mine took along after

'em, just as I'd taught 'em to do, layin' to get to their corn when

they caught up. No more of 'em died, but that fourteen did get into

elegant trainin'. After a while they got plumb to enjoyin' it. When

you come right down to it, a chicken don't have many amusements and

relaxations in this life. Searchin' for worms, chasin' grasshoppers,

and wallerin' in the dust is about the limits of joys for chickens.

It was sure a fine sight to see 'em after they got well into the game.

About nine o'clock every mornin' they would saunter down to the rise of

the road where they would wait patient until a machine came along. Then

it would warm your heart to see the enthusiasm of them. With, exultant

cackles of joy they'd trail in, reachin' out like quarter-horses, their

wings half spread out, their eyes beamin' with delight. At the lower

turn they'd quit. Then, after talkin' it over excited-like for a few

minutes, they'd calm down and wait for another.

After a few months of this sort of trainin' they got purty good at it.

I had one two-year-old rooster that made fifty-four mile an hour behind

one of those sixty-horsepower Panhandles. When cars didn't come along

often enough, they'd all turn out and chase jack-rabbits. They wasn't

much fun at that. After a short, brief sprint the rabbit would crouch

down plumb terrified, while the Honk-honks pulled off triumphal dances

around his shrinkin' form.

Our ranch got to be purty well known them days among automobeelists.

The strength of their cars was horse-power, of course, but the speed of

them they got to ratin' by chicken-power. Some of them used to come

way up from Los Angeles just to try out a new car along our road with

the Honk-honks for pace-makers. We charged them a little somethin',

and then, too, we opened up the road-house and the bar, so we did purty

well. It wasn't necessary to work any longer at that bogus placer.

Evenin's we sat around outside and swapped yarns, and I bragged on my

chickens. The chickens would gather round close to listen.

They liked to hear their praises sung, all right. You bet they sabe!

The only reason a chicken, or any other critter, isn't intelligent is

because he hasn't no chance to expand.

Why, we used to run races with 'em. Some of us would hold two or more

chickens back of a chalk line, and the starter'd blow the horn from a

hundred yards to a mile away, dependin' on whether it was a sprint or

for distance. We had pools on the results, gave odds, made books, and

kept records. After the thing got knowed we made money hand over fist.

The stranger broke off abruptly and began to roll a cigarette.

"What did you quit it for, then?" ventured Charley, out of the hushed

silence.

"Pride," replied the stranger solemnly. "Haughtiness of spirit."

"How so?" urged Charley, after a pause.

"Them chickens," continued the stranger, after a moment, "stood around

listenin' to me a-braggin' of what superior fowls they was until they

got all puffed up. They wouldn't have nothin' whatever to do with the

ordinary chickens we brought in for eatin' purposes, but stood around

lookin' bored when there wasn't no sport doin'. They got to be just

like that Four Hundred you read about in the papers. It was one

continual round of grasshopper balls, race meets, and afternoon

hen-parties. They got idle and haughty, just like folks. Then come

race suicide. They got to feelin' so aristocratic the hens wouldn't

have no eggs."

Nobody dared say a word.

"Windy Bill's snake--" began the narrator genially.

"Stranger," broke in Windy Bill, with great emphasis, "as to that

snake, I want you to understand this: yereafter in my estimation that

snake is nothin' but an ornery angleworm!"