“Hold on,” warned the desert rat. “This aint no picnic party, Perfesser. We got to git busy ’fore Sidewinder gits busy, but there’s no sense to rushin’ things. We can’t take no autybile over there. We got to hike. Ground’s durned rocky and rough. Yessir! We’re headin’ east on a rough and rocky road, and no mistake. That’s one reason nobody aint never follered none o’ that gang to the roost. Nobody much hint been along this yere range for ten or twelve year—she’s got the repytation of havin’ petered out. You and me can prob’ly git there sometime tonight, ease up the cañon, git the lay of the land toward sunup, and git into action. Wipe out the hull durned batch!”
Ramsay frowned. “That’s a trifle bloodthirsty, isn’t it? I want those two murderers; if I can get ’em alive to stand trial, all right. If not—”
“They’re all in the same kittle,” snapped Sagebrush. “Wipe ’em out! Yessir! I’m riled. But no sense goin’ too fast. We got to see who’s there and how many, and what things look like. That there cañon is shaped like the figger X, and where the lines cross is a right narrer gap. The back end is a box cañon, all right, with durned steep walls and lots of timber. Only green spot this side o’ them hills. Last time I was there was ten year back, when Chuck Martin busted his whiffletree, and we rode over yere to find a new stick. We had some liquor along them days, and Chuck he took a drap too much and went to sleep in an ol’ shack, and when he woke up it was dark, and they was a hull passel o’ ’phoby skunks holdin’ a carnival, and Chuck busted up the dance ’fore he knowed what it was. Gosh, I can smell him yet when I think of it. Yessir, ‘Look ’fore you sleep’ is a dad-blamed good rule to foller in these ol’ shacks—and anywheres else too, I reckon. Well, I’ll git the packs made up while you clean camp.”
The two men set to work. After the flivver was laid out of sight in the clump of piñon trees and thorny mesquite, the loads were assembled, and within twenty minutes the partners were on their way. What with grub and blankets, rifle and water-bag, Ramsay had all the weight to carry that he wanted, and he faced the prospect of a full day in rocky desert ground with a grimace.
His expectations were entirely fulfllled. Sagebrush led the way, skirting the high and precipitous mesa for a time and then striking directly off toward the hills to the northeast. The abundance of rocks showed Ramsay that no flivver could hope to cover this ground; the snow had all vanished long since, and no trace of moisture remained to mark its passing.
Fortunately for Ramsay, the old desert rat was used to the slow burro pace, and shuffled along at a steady plodding gait which was not difficult to sustain, and which ate up the distance slowly but surely. To anyone not used to it, there was something terrible in the thought of thus shuffling across the desert day in and day out for years, eternally seeking the yellow dust; and yet men did it, hundreds of them, and were not happy unless doing it.
Pat Ramsay faced the project which lay ahead of them, unblinking the facts, and not shirking what was to be done. He now knew what before he had only conjectured. Impossible as it seemed, he knew it to be true. Here at this back door of civilization existed a number of men whose business in life was robbery and if necessary murder—an abnormal situation, to be handled with other than normal methods. Ramsay was no innocent in the waste places. He knew that in these vast stretches of desert country there existed strange things, that in this apparently empty basin of forgotten seas there were still unsolved problems and undiscovered wonders. If he was to go seeking the men who had murdered his brother, he must put away all thought of haling them before the bar of justice; the only justice which obtained in the desert was that of the strong hand and the inexorable requisitions of nature. If men offended the laws of nature, a terrible punishment was exacted from them. If they offended the laws of man, as they did every day, the ordinary machinery of man’s justice could not always reach them—and they knew it.
“By gosh,” said Sagebrush, when they halted at noon in the shade of a towering pinnacle of rock, “ye done a good stroke when ye got to work this mornin’ and cut off Sidewinder from them fellers yonder! Yessir! I’d think twicet or maybe three times ’fore I tackled that there gent. Most likely that cholo and Mesquite rode in to git supplies, and cuttin’ them off was a right smart piece o’ work. Wisht we had a hoss apiece! Sing out next you see a nice fat chuckwalla. I’d like to git me a good chunk o’ lizard-tail for supper, Per-fesser.”
Before they had left the overhanging rock, indeed, Sagebrush located a fine big lizard and staged a battle royal. The lizard, ensconced in a rock cranny, inflated himself and could not be dislodged for all the tugging of Sagebrush, who in the end was content with taking the tail. This the chuckwalla gladly surrendered, and Sagebrush stowed it away in his pocket after Ramsay refused to share the delicacy.
The afternoon drew on. They did not hurry; yet the ground was covered steadily, and no moving object broke the dun expanse of glaring rock and sand. Gradually they approached a patch of green high on the hills, which served as landmark, but the entrance to Hourglass Cañon itself did not open up before them. When the sun was drawing down to the western horizon, Sagebrush halted.