“Huh! in this case you’re meanin’ a hearse, ’cause mebbe we’ll have to shoot him up afore he calls quits,” and Perk grinned horribly at his own wit.
So they left the ship stranded there, sprawled out like a gigantic dragon-fly or a monstrous toad. If Fortune proved kind they might yet live to make good use of it again when the time came to fly back to God’s country on the other side of the border where defeated candidates are in the habit of accepting the dictum of the voters, and retiring from the field of battle await the next call to arms, with ballots instead of bullets as their method of settling elections.
Side by side they set forth, like a pair of adventurers starting out in search of Fortune’s smiles, and careless alike as to whether they met with success or not, so long as the excitement they craved came their way.
Perk managed to conceal the chagrin with which he buckled down to his unwelcome task, walking always gave him a pain, mental rather than physical but on the whole he was a good scout, and could follow the beckoning finger of duty, even though he loathed the conditions attached to the performance of his role.
The sand was far from compact, and allowed them to sink in somewhat, so this made the going more difficult in contrast to that on the seashore which being beaten down by incoming waves is often as hard as concrete and a pleasure to walk over; whereas this of the desert was dry and sifted at the least puff of wind.
Perk having had some previous experience with deserts, felt no love for the uninviting waste places of the earth only such useless vegetation as sage, greasewood, cactus and yucca would grow between the sand dunes amidst the blistering fangs of the infernal heat and always vowed he disliked such arid regions with a violence too deep for mere words.
Yet he kept his own counsel and plodded away alongside his pal as if he had no personal feelings in the matter whatsoever. Far off in front of them they could see the line of peaks studded against the sky once or twice Perk felt certain he had caught a fluttering light aloft such as might spring from a passing plane but in every instance he finally decided it must be some shooting star, ducking behind the mountain range, leaving a trailing wake behind that but reflected its passing glory.
One hour, two, and then a third dragged along before Jack thought fit to call a halt. Never did poor weary footsore Perk, almost used up, listen to more welcome and delightful words than when Jack as he drew to a halt went on to say:
“Time to rest, partner, you know—I’d like to find a bunch of shady trees that would afford us a decent shelter from the blazing sun, should we be so unfortunate as to get adrift after leaving all landmarks behind.”
“Oh! bless you for sayin’ that, buddy,” Perk was saying hoarsely, for his throat seemed as dry as tinder, the fine sand even affecting his vocal cords so that he would not have recognized his own voice. “By your leave I guess I’ll lie down and get the kinks outen my legs. Wow! that must abeen fi’ miles if she was one—my shoes are full o’ sand, an’ altogether I don’t feel half the man I was on startin’ out.”