صفحة 171 من 439

"Say, you Teddy hawss, I'm plumb fed up with sagebrush and

scenery. I kinder yearn for co'n bread and ham. I sure would give

six bits for a drink of real wet water. Yore sentiments are

similar, I reckon, Teddy."

The Texan patted the neck of his cow pony, which reached round

playfully and pretended to nip his leg. They understood each

other, and were now making the best of a very unpleasant

situation. Since morning they had been lost on the desert. The

heat of midday had found them plowing over sandy wastes. The

declining sun had left them among the foothills, wandering from

one to another, in the vain hope that each summit might show the

silvery gleam of a windmill, or even that outpost of

civilization, the barb-wire fence. And now the stars looked down

indifferently, myriads of them, upon the travelers still plodding

wearily through a land magically transformed by moonlight to a

silvery loveliness that blotted out all the garish details of

day.