Within twenty yards Marcus paused, made a rest of his left forearm and fired.
"You GOT him," cried McTeague. "No, he's up again. Shoot him again. He's going to bolt."
Marcus ran on, firing as he ran. The mule, one foreleg trailing, scrambled along, squealing and snorting. Marcus fired his last shot. The mule pitched forward upon his head, then, rolling sideways, fell upon the canteen, bursting it open and spilling its entire contents into the sand.
Marcus and McTeague ran up, and Marcus snatched the battered canteen from under the reeking, bloody hide. There was no water left. Marcus flung the canteen from him and stood up, facing McTeague. There was a pause.
"We're dead men," said Marcus.
McTeague looked from him out over the desert. Chaotic desolation stretched from them on either hand, flaming and glaring with the afternoon heat. There was the brazen sky and the leagues upon leagues of alkali, leper white. There was nothing more. They were in the heart of Death Valley.
"Not a drop of water," muttered McTeague; "not a drop of water."
"We can drink the mule's blood," said Marcus. "It's been done before. But — but—" he looked down at the quivering, gory body—"but I ain't thirsty enough for that yet."
"Where's the nearest water?"
"Well, it's about a hundred miles or more back of us in the Panamint hills," returned Marcus, doggedly. "We'd be crazy long before we reached it. I tell you, we're done for, by damn, we're DONE for. We ain't ever going to get outa here."