Chapter 21: On the Hot Sand

They marched two more days through said and cactus, but were not troubled again by the mysterious pursuers, and their supplies of water sank rather lower than the Professor liked.

“There is plenty for the four of us who are human beings,” he said, “but eight horses and mules require a great deal of water. We would not want to abandon the animals under any circumstances, and certainly we cannot dream of it, now that they alone can take our gold to civilization.”

“Camels could take us across the desert without water, I suppose,” said Herbert. “I’ve heard that they can go eight or ten days without a drink. Now if we only had some camels! Why have they never been introduced in the southwest, Professor?”

“It may be because our genuine desert area is too small, and that consequently they have not received the attention necessary in breeding,” replied the Professor. “We have no really great deserts on the scale of those of Africa, Asia and Australia. It may be, too, that our cold winter climate does not suit them. The camel has been transplanted to Australia, and has improved there. Already the Australian camel is superior to his Asiatic and African brethren. Before our great Civil War Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War, imported a herd of camels, and sent them into the southwest for the use of the army on the desert. But they were not a success, and they were turned loose to roam as they pleased.”

“What became of them?” asked Herbert with much interest.

“Members of the herd were seen now and then for a long time afterward, but I don’t suppose they had a fair chance. They offered too tempting a bait for hunters, and most of the camels were shot by them. A few descendants may be roaming yet about the foothills. There are stories now and then that one is seen, but I cannot vouch for their truth.”

“I think the stories are true,” said Herbert, always anxious to believe in the romantic and remarkable.

But the conversation ceased there. It was too hot, and they were too tired and dusty to waste energy in talk.

“Our deserts may not be as big as them that deface the maps o’ Afriky, Asia an’ Australier,” said Jedediah Simpson, “but they’re big enough to hold a heap o’ onpleasantness. See that vulture flyin’ aroun’ up thar. He thinks I’m to be his in the course o’ time, an’ he worries me.”

“He won’t get you, Jedediah,” said the Professor, comfortingly. “I can’t spare you; I’ll need you for a long time yet.”

“I hope so,” said Jed, and then he added with energy:

“Now, what under the sun is that?”

He pointed to a distant sand hill where two dark figure’s could be seen against the horizon.

“It may be one o’ them mirages,” he said, “or may be I’m just seein’ one o’ them grains o’ sand which are so thick in my eye, but anyway it’s mighty cur’ous an’ in-terestin’.”

The Professor’s glance followed Jed’s long pointing finger, and instantly his little figure became taut with excitement.

“Animals!” he exclaimed, “and large ones. They can’t be buffalo, because the buffalo is extinct save for the few in the mountains. The elk and deer do not roam on these sand plains, and they are too big for antelope. Having eliminated all these possibilities only one conclusion is left, and I must prove that to be true. Jed, my field glasses at once!”

Jed promptly brought the powerful glasses and the Professor took a long look through them. Then he leaped up and down in his joy.

“It is true! It is true!” he exclaimed. “They are camels, a pair of them, descendants, perhaps the sole surviving descendants of the herd that Jefferson Davis imported. What a lucky discovery, a fact that I must report to our geographical and faunal societies. I can see them distinctly, hoofs, body, head, tail and all, evidently a male and female. So, survivors do exist down here after all. What a stir this will create among the learned men when I get back to civilization. But I must have trustworthy witnesses. Here, Charles, take the glasses and look!”

Charles distinctly saw the camels. It was not possible to mistake such shapes as theirs, which those of no other beasts resemble. They stood there, motionless, side by side, apparently looking out over the desert sands. Charles wondered if they felt themselves the last of a lost race, or if, by some dim intuition, they knew that their brethren swarmed on other continents beyond their reach.

Herbert and Jed also took long looks, and the three witnesses were ready for the Professor, should any presumptuous learned body ever choose to dispute his word.

“I wish I had time to follow them up, and perhaps to lasso one,” said the Professor, “I might discover a number of vastly interesting details, such as the effect of a new climate and region upon the camel. Now, I wonder if an important variation from the original type could have occurred here. But we must go on. This troublesome gold claims our attention.”

“Yes, we must get our Spanish gold safe to civilization,” said Charles.

“Spanish gold it may have been once,” said Professor Longworth, “but a better name for it now is Apache gold. It is the Apaches that we have had to fight for it, and if the Apaches had not caused you two boys to flee into the canyon, and then up to the cliff village it probably never would have been found.”

“That’s right. Apache gold it is and Apache gold it shall be,” said the other three in unison.

And so they always spoke of it as Apache gold, despite what came after.

The Professor sighing deeply after another look at the camels gave the word to resume the advance, and they marched on through the deep sand. But everyone looked back and the camels still stood motionless on the sand hills, until they passed out of sight under the horizon.

It was late afternoon now, and it seemed to the two boys that it was hotter than ever. The sun, apparently, was only a mile or two away and it was bent upon burning them up. Puffs of wind arose and the whirling “dust devils” trod the plain, a swift procession. The sand, when it was blown in their faces, scorched like coals. The boys looked longingly at the water bags. The animals neighed and became uneasy.

The Professor, walking now, marched at the head and, as the afternoon waned and they came into rougher country, a look of relief appeared in the shrewd eyes behind the great glasses. Here were hills rather high, but like all the rest of that country bare and hideous.

“It will be three hours or more until darkness,” said Professor Longworth, “but we will stop here and renew our supplies of fresh water.”

“Renew our water!” exclaimed Charles. “Why, there cannot be any within at least twenty miles of us.”

“I don’t believe thar’s any within a million,” said Jed.

“As I said, we’ll stop here and renew our supplies of fresh water,” said the Professor quietly. “It is not a hundred yards away and there is plenty of it. Will all of you help me to take the packs off the animals as quickly as possible? They’ve had a long, hot march, and they need rest.”

The Professor spoke with decision, and they did not think of questioning his statement any further. The packs, including the bags of gold, were removed and several of the animals neighed with relief. At the Professor’s order a shovel and two spades were taken from the packs.

“Now follow me,” he said.

He led them between two of the bare hills into a little valley or dip, which was as dry and bare as the hills.

“Now dig, Jed,” he said, pointing to the center of the dip.

Jed, without a word, dug—his faith in the Professor was sublime—and the two boys helped with all their power. They threw up sand and dirt very fast, forming a conical pit, so the walls would not fall in on them, and when they had gone about ten feet Charles suddenly felt his feet grow wet.

“Why, there is water here!” he exclaimed.

“Certainly,” replied Professor Longworth. “What else did you suppose we were digging for?”

They threw out dirt and sand for four or five minutes more, and then the water, fairly cool, ran in quite freely. The diggers ceased their labors and climbed out, Jed murmuring on the way:

“He is shorely the greatest man in the world. Thar can’t be a doubt o’ it. He looks down at the san’, an’ the livin’ water comes up at his call.”

“It is perfectly simple,” said Professor Longworth. “Science accounts for everything. Man does not create something out of nothing. He merely discovers something that has existed always, and now and then by uniting several of these somethings he creates a new effect or at least one that he had not observed before. All our inventions are really discoveries. This matter of the water, however useful it may be to us, was a mere trifle in observation. All desert countries contain much water, though it may lie underground. Having that initial knowledge the question is how to reach it. That also is simple. I had observed that we were proceeding into a low part of the plain, despite the presence of hills. This dip seemed to me to be the lowest spot in all the country about, and naturally it would be a focus for underground water. As soon as we dug down far enough it began to soak and seep in in abundance. It is mere child’s play, provided you have the tools with which to dig. Many a man has died of thirst, when he could have easily reached water in an hour.”

“We certainly do live and learn,” said Charles.

“Learn,” said the Professor with emphasis. “Why the wisest of men are but in the infancy of knowledge. Ah, if I could only get a glimpse of the things that men will know ten thousand years from now!”

They filled their camp kettles, and gave the horses and mules an abundance. Then they replenished their own supply, and stayed by the “soak” until morning. But they resumed the march at earliest dawn, greatly refreshed and strengthened. Three at least had renewed confidence, knowing now that if one could not find water on the desert he might find it beneath it.

Their journey that day led into country not quite so bad. The giant cactus was abundant, and now and then they passed one or two little marshy pools, with a spear or two of grass growing about the margins. But the water was invariably alkaline, too bitter for the taste, and Jedediah Simpson expressed great disgust.

“‘Pears to me,” he said, “that the right place for salt water is right in the middle o’ the ocean. Thar’s enough out thar to last the whole world always, without sprinklin’ a lot o’ it ‘round on the land, whar it ain’t needed an’ whar fresh water is needed.”

Late in the afternoon they camped for the night by a sand hill, and Herbert strolled forward a little to explore. He passed around the sand hill, leaving his comrades and the animals out of sight and then, in the first faint shades of the twilight, he saw a beautiful lake surrounded by green grass and green trees, the clearest and most silvery water and the greenest grass and trees that he had ever seen, the most welcome of all sights to eyes seared with days of hot sand.

Herbert knew very well that it was a mirage, but it pleased him to look at this mystic creation as long as it would endure. Only about three minutes were allowed him, and then it floated away. There were the sand and cactus again, and, in addition, a marsh that sent forth a misty exhalation.

Herbert wondered if this marsh might not be an exception to the others, and contain fresh water instead of salt. Inspired by such a hope he walked rapidly toward it, but it proved to be further away than he had expected. It was almost a quarter of a mile across the sand before he reached the edge of the marsh and then, when he stepped forward, his feet sank suddenly. He started to turn back but his feet went down deeper.

It was not until he had made two or three efforts to leave this dismal place that looked like a marsh that Herbert realized what had happened to him. He was imbedded in a quicksand, and the more he struggled the deeper he sank. Even then fear did not strike him until he had gone far beyond his knees. But when fear did come it turned his heart as cold as ice. The twilight was spreading over the lonely world. A blood red streak in the west marked where the sun was setting. The east was already in darkness and the desolate night wind was beginning to moan. His comrades were hidden from him by the hill and the terrible sand was pulling at his legs like some subterranean monster that wished to devour him whole.

Herbert had good lungs, but at first he had been so nearly paralyzed by the suddenness and imminence of his danger that he forgot the use of his tongue. When the memory of it returned to him he shouted as few boys have ever shouted. He tried the white man’s shout and then the long whining Indian cry, uncertain which would carry the further. No response came to either.

He was now down almost to the hips, and he felt as if he were held in a vise. The last strip of blood red sun was gone, and darkness was sweeping fast from east to west. He must die there in the night and alone by the most horrible of deaths. An icy perspiration broke out all over him. Then raising his voice, in one last despairing effort, he uttered a tremendous, piercing cry.

In the twilight he dimly saw a figure appear on the sand hill, and hope fluttered, but it was gone in an instant, and then hope was still. Some one of his comrades had heard vaguely, but, believing it a mere echo, had turned back.