[CHAPTER XI.—AN UNPLEASANT EXPERIENCE.]
At first poor Billie was almost wild with the fear that swept over him, when he realized his true condition, and that he was lost in that sand storm in the heart of an Arizona desert.
He started to shout, but made a sorry mess of it. The fine sand almost choked him as soon as he opened his mouth; and the fierce wind that was sending it scurrying all around in little whirlwinds carried his feeble cry away, so that he knew it could not be heard twenty feet distant.
He sat there on the back of Jupiter, and waited, still hugging the hope to his heart that his chums would immediately miss him, and come hastily back on their course to find him. And if that happened, Billie knew that his chances would be considerably improved did he stay where he was, rather than start roaming this way and that.
But the minutes lengthened into nearly half an hour, and there was not the slightest sign of any one being near him. The storm still kept up, and Donald had said that the probability was it would continue until sundown, when the wind might lull, so as to allow the choked atmosphere a chance to rid itself of the floating gritty sand.
By degrees Billie began to get his nerve back. He was far from being a coward; only he lacked experience; and was moreover hardly fitted either physically or through education for butting up against these rude experiences.
“I’ve just got to do something, and I can’t stay here, that’s plain,” he told himself; “which means I’ve got to go on. But I want to be mighty careful about how I travel. I’ve heard tell how people are apt to go round and round in a circle till they’re played out, and exhausted. None of that for me; and why should there be when I’m carrying that precious little compass.”
Thereupon Billie fumbled around in the various pockets of his khaki hunting coat, meaning to find the said compass, and get his bearings. He had quite a fright at first, for he failed to find it where he expected; and was running through all his other pockets wildly, when he happened to remember placing it in his hat at the time he last looked at the instrument, which was when one of his chums mentioned the fact that they would have to depend
on the magnetic needle should they be overwhelmed in just such a storm.
It was a great relief to the fat boy to discover the little brass bound compass safely lodged in his hat when he hastily looked. Owing to the air being filled with the flying sand it was only after considerable difficulty that he could see just which way the indicator pointed. So he started off, urging the unwilling Jupiter to put his best foot forward, though the animal gave evidences of being more inclined to stand still, with his tail toward the storm.