Forty-nine
Cold awakened me. My muscles were cramped and stiff. Sodden with sleep and exhaustion, I rolled over and sat up.
The sky was very clear, the stars unbelievably bright. Listening, I heard no sound in the night. Staggering to my feet, I leaned for a moment on my rifle. The sand was very white, and there were dark patches of grease-wood. Slowly, for I was still stiff from yesterday’s running, I began to walk toward Pilot Knob. Careful to leave no tracks, stepping on rocks whenever possible, I pushed on. There were springs up ahead if they knew where to find them, but I did not intend to be their guide.
From my conversations with the Cahuillas I knew that Pilot Knob was something over ten miles, yet exact distances were always hard to get from Indians. Yet with luck I could make Pilot Knob by sunup, and those who pursued me would not start before then. As the sun lifted to the horizon, I was drinking from a small spring near the base of the Knob.
Escape from those who would kill me was first, yet I must conserve my strength. There was no guessing what ordeals might await me, yet I was gambling I knew the desert better than they. One thing worried me: what of those who had turned back? Had they quit? Gone for fresh horses and water? Or to plan some other device, some other way in which to entrap me?
Indian Spring would be my next stop, and it would not be easily found, but now I would begin the destruction of those who followed me. I suspected they had found Bed Rock Spring, but I had traveled by night and left few signs; the slight winds that stirred the sand would remove those. They had followed me into the desert to kill me; they had tried to trap me, and were themselves trapped. Few in California knew the deserts except for the Indians. The Califomios kept to their lands along the seaward side of the mountains, and the interior was as strange to them as the surface of the moon. I had only myself of whom to think; if the others returned they would have six horses and as many men. Looking back along my trail, I thought I saw them, but it was likely to be my imagination. “Go back while you can.” I spoke aloud. My muscles had loosened with movement and heat. I walked easily now, although my moccasins were wearing through. By nightfall they would be gone. It was very hot. Off to the south where the dry lakes were I saw dust devils dancing. Heat waves shimmered, obscuring the distance and the mountains. By midday I was at Indian Spring. There were many boulders in the wash where it lay, and high brush hid the spring itself, offering no indication of the presence of water. Indians had placed stones to wall the spring, and the water was about three feet deep. No stream, not so much as a trickle, escaped it. No doubt it was just a seeping to the surface of water running down the wash from Eagle Crags.
Kneeling by the water, I drank. Scooping up handfuls of water, I bathed my neck, face, and chest. Then I drank again. Resting in the shade of the brush, I continued to soak up water. Several times I crawled from my shelter, and keeping under cover, studied my back trail.
At last I saw them. Even at this distance I could see they were walking and leading their horses. I counted the horses.
Five … Five?
One was gone, then. One horse had gone down. “I am sorry for the horses.” I spoke aloud, as a lonely man often does, hungry for the sound of some voice, even if it is his own.
Reluctantly I yielded my shade to the lizards and went away from the spring, stepping from rock to rock. I doubted they would find it. Without my friends the Indians I would never have imagined water in this place. The sky was molten brass, the desert a vague, dusty copper where heat waves shimmered. Looking down at my own ragged moccasins, I could scarcely see my own feet, but I went out into the desert, going east now with the knowledge that before me was a long and bitter trek to the next water of which I knew, at what was called Garlic Springs.
My rifle was heavy in my hands, and it was a temptation to discard it, a temptation I resisted. Pausing briefly in the shade of some rocks, I looked off to the east in the direction I must go, squinting my eyes against the glare. Nothing but bald, open desert. In the distance, far away, some low, ragged mountains if such they could be called. I sat down, staring again at that awful waste that lay before me. Could I make it? Could anybody make it? Anybody at all?
There might be water closer than Garlic Springs, but I knew of none, and my enemies were coming behind me. I looked back again but could see nothing; then I did. I saw a man leading a horse, enormously tall, an impression of height created by heat waves.
It would be hours before I would have another drink, if I ever did. Yet, before I was halfway across, night would come with its coolness and its dark, so I must think of that. I must endure. I must wait for it. Yet, if I waited, I might fight them off. I might get all of them.
“Don’t be a fool.” I told myself irritably. “One or two, but not all.” Standing up, I took a step, and taking it, I gave myself to the desert, to the heat, to the thirst. I walked boldly into the desert and took step after step, my eyes upon those distant mountains, shimmering in heat waves like some weird land beyond imagination. Slowly, steadily, I walked. I chose little goals for myself. That grease-wood with the weird shape. If I could get that far … A white rock as large as my two fists. I made it to the rock, and chose another, and then another. I kept my eyes from the awful distance and chose just the near goals. It was midafternoon before I stumbled, minutes later when I fell. The heat on the face of the desert was unbearable. Struggling up, I started on again. Once I turned to look back. They were there, they had seen me, and they were coming.
Squinting again, I saw but three. Only three? I was winning, then. I was winning? Grimly I laughed within. The desert was winning. Whatever killing was done, the desert would do.
How long since I had eaten? I could not remember, but the thought of food nauseated me. I fell again, but I got up. Glancing back, I could see they were closer now. They had gotten into their saddles. They were riding to catch me, but the horses were walking. I did not think they could run. Walking on into the beat, I staggered, almost fell, but caught myself on the rifle, using it as a staff. Turning then, I lifted the rifle, holding to the wood, for the barrel was too hot to touch, took careful aim, and fired. A man lurched in the saddle. I had scarcely hoped to hit him, but then he fell. Stumbling, staggering, I kept moving. Once more I fell, and from somewhere a thought came to me. “I am Johannes Verne. I am not afraid.” I got up to my knees, lurched to my feet, and walked on, nor did I fall again.
“I am Johannes Verne, and I am not afraid.”
Over and over I said it, and over and over like some weird litany it chanted itself in my brain, and then from somewhere came coolness, and the day was gone. The low, ragged mountains were not that far away. In the coolness of the early evening when the stars were just appearing, I came to the springs. There were two of them, only a few yards apart, lying at the edge of some low hills near the Tiefort Mountains. Dropping to my knees, I bathed my face and neck. I swallowed a little water, then a little more. I put my head down into the water, then withdrew it, dripping. I turned around and sat down to face the desert from which my enemies would come. I got out a piece of dried beef and worried a piece from the end with my teeth. Slowly, methodically, I chewed.
My foot moved, and I gasped with sudden agony. I looked again. My moccasins were gone. My feet were raw and bloody, the broken skin cracked and the cracks filled with sand.
Scooping water with my left hand, as my right held the pistol, I bathed my feet.