[CHAPTER XIV]
NEW MEXICO
I set out from Wagonmound with a light heart and a heavy stomach.
The road ran parallel with the rail for a mile, then crossed over by a level crossing and continued parallel on the other side. I did not get far. No doubt there had been unusual rain; great fields were now lakes with the grass bottom not always visible; little streams, normally no more than the size of a small spring, were now swollen rivers. These crossed the road in places. The road was fenced in. And thereby hangs a tale.
After precisely half an hour I found myself just three miles advanced, and in the midst of a hopeless chaos of sun-dried emaciated mud. I had "explored every avenue" of the road, but found none possible of negotiation. Bit by bit I dragged Lizzie back and returned to the level-crossing. Come what may I would try the track. Even if the sleepers shook my very bones to powder it would be better than eternally forging through the mud of New Mexico.
On each side of the road where it crossed the rails the track was guarded by a satanic device in the form of spikes and knife-edges skilfully arranged and extending to a distance of several yards. The function of these was evidently to prevent cattle and other animals straying on the line. Traversing these was no easy task. If one did not ride on top of the spikes, one's tyres wedged in between the knives. Once past, the rest seemed easy. But things are not what they seem, especially on railroad tracks. The sleepers were not ballasted and were anything but level. There was no room outside the track, for it was steeply banked, and the sleepers projected beyond the rails into space. At every few hundred yards the track ran over a brick bridge spanning a bog or a stream. The bridge was just the width of the rails apart. But when it came to riding—ugh! As every sleeper was passed, the wheels fell momentarily into the intervening space between it and the next, and a series of sudden, sharp shocks was hammered through Lizzie's poor frame as each sleeper in turn was struck by the front wheel. The faster I went the quicker and smaller were the shocks, and above a certain speed it was quite tolerable running.
I was just getting up a comfortable speed when I imagined I heard the whistle of a locomotive behind. This was discouraging and certainly unexpected. I stopped quickly and looked back. Sure enough there was a train coming, but it was easily half a mile away. To go forward in the hope of out-pacing it would be useless. There was not even room to get off the track, for once I got down the steep bank, I knew it would be next to impossible to get back again, or to get anywhere, for that matter.
Neither was there room to turn round and go back.
More than ever before did it appear to me that discretion was better than valour.