"How long have you been here, then?" I asked.
"Nigh on a couple o' weeks, brother. We've bin waitin' fer the rain to clear off."
Truly a bright prospect.
I slept well that night, in spite of the fact that my day's mileage was only thirty, and awoke to find the sky clear and promising.
I spent the morning in tuning Lizzie and making minor adjustments and preparation. I commissioned my tinsmith friend to make me a new accumulator box, my own having become entirely disintegrated with the vibration. For 1,000 miles it had been held together with straps fastened tightly round it to the frame.
The distance to Santa Fé was only twenty-five miles, so I judged I should be able to reach it that day.
Those twenty-five miles took four hours. I will not attempt to describe those four hours. They were filled to the brim with mud, rain, wash-outs, and bridgeless rivers. In many places there were great "washes" of sand brought down from the hill-sides that nearly completely obliterated the trail as it struggled across the mountains.
It was a very weary motor-cyclist indeed who rattled into Santa Fé at 5.30 that afternoon. And that motor-cyclist had quite made up his mind to have a few days' rest before anything else happened his way.
With a deep sigh of relief I leant Lizzie up against the pavement opposite the "Montezuma Hotel." With heavy, aching limbs and sodden, mud-stained clothes, I walked towards the door.