When he regained the place where he had left his pony he had been absent from it nearly, if not quite, an hour. Now it seemed as though he must have made some mistake in retracing his steps, for the animal was nowhere to be seen. There were his tracks, though, and there was the slender shaft of rotten sandstone to which he had been fastened, freshly broken off, and lying there upon the ground.
"Oh, what a fool I am! What a poor blind fool!" groaned the boy, as the full extent of this fresh disaster was made plain to him. "If I had only let the brute have his head in the first place, he would have carried me to the nearest water. I have often heard Mort say that a horse has a better knowledge of such things than a man; and of course he knows, for Mort knows everything. He knew that I was no more fit to take care of myself than a child, and he knew I would get lost. Oh, why didn't he send me back home, or tie me up, or do something to save me from my own foolish self? The dear old fellow won't be bothered with me any more, though, for we shall never meet again in this world. Poor Mort, how he must be suffering! But I can't die here. I can't! It is too horrible! If I could only reach those blue mountains. I wonder if there is the slightest chance of it? I wonder how long a fellow can live and travel without food or water?
"Water! Oh, for a long cool drink of it! How gladly would I give the wealth of the world to lie beside one of those springs that we passed a day or two ago, and drink and drink and drink! Or the well at grandfather's. Or the trout brook up in the Alleghanies. Or— But I mustn't think of such things or I shall go crazy, and that will be the end of everything. I will make a try, though, for those blue mountains, for I am sure there are springs and lovely streams in their dark cool valley. If I can only reach them! Oh, what joy! And if I don't— Well, I will have done my best. Which way are they? Yes, I know—they are over there, and if I walk all night and all day to-morrow I will surely come to them by to-morrow night. Only twenty-four hours more, and I believe I can hold out that long."
So the poor lad started, and walked with uncertain steps through the yielding sands in a direction that he believed would lead him to the wished-for mountains. He could no longer see them, but he knew their slender pinnacles were steadfastly uplifted like taper fingers beckoning to him and promising pleasant things.
Just before sunset he came to a broad opening between the clustering mesas, through which he caught another glimpse of them, now tinged with a rosy flush, and seeming more beautiful than before, but in a few minutes the light faded and they were gone. Then, trembling with weakness, the lad sat down and watched until a star rose where he had last seen them, when, with it as a guide, he resumed his weary way. He often stumbled, and sometimes he fell, but still he pushed on, until at length his glittering beacon was obscured by black clouds. Then he sank to the ground, without heart to rise again.
For a long time he lay asleep or in a stupor, from which he might never have awakened but for a shower of rain, that, falling on his upturned face, roused him to consciousness. Eagerly sucking the precious fluid from his saturated garments, and gaining fresh strength with every life-giving drop, he waited for the dawn, and with the first hazy glimpse of the far-away blue peaks he again staggered toward them.
The sun rose and scorched him with its pitiless heat, until he seemed to be treading coals of fire. Mirage after mirage danced before his bewildered vision, with pictures of all things shady and cool and refreshing, until his eye-sight failed him, and he groped his way amid a darkness shot by glowing sparks. The last thing of which he was conscious was a great white wall that seemed to rise to the sky before him, and stretch to infinity on either side. It seemed to shut him off completely from the blue peaks he had striven so bravely to gain, and apparently presented an effectual barrier to any further progress.
In that last moment his head was splitting, his brain was on fire, his mouth and throat were like molten brass, his whole body was racked with pain, and his feet were like leaden weights. Then all sense of suffering was lost in a delicious laughter, and he seemed to be floating through infinite space that was filled with the music of rippling waters.