THREE WISE MEN

by Romaine H. Lowdermilk

Author of "The Spirit of His Youth," "Too Much Caution," etc.

THREE large, evil men lolled in sultry shade of "Spade" Gowdy's Nugget Saloon, watching one small, righteous man at work in the sun. It was far too hot to work, but Obadiah Higgins toiled painstakingly with the resiny pine planking of the curb over the newly dug saloon well. The three onlookers had struck a bargain with Obadiah and were only awaiting the completion of the task to enjoy seeing Obadiah take his strange payment.

The wait was not irksome, for Obadiah was a deft workman; besides, he had been working on that well-curb since early morning, and it was now nearly noon. Obadiah drove the last nail as carefully and surely as he had the first. Skillfully he planed down imperceptible rough spots; carefully he hung the new pulley-wheel in the exact center of the frame. In fact, it was a well-curb fit to grace any well in the little Eastern hamlet that had been his home town, instead of being set over a saloon well, a mere unpainted pine necessity in a squalid little gulch town like El Oro.

Obadiah paused a moment to inspect his handiwork. Obadiah was scrawny. Yes, Obadiah Higgins was scrawny. He couldn't have tipped the scales over one hundred and twenty at his prime—if he ever had any prime—and now he was well past his prime—fifty at least, gray, with a smoothly shaven face pleasantly furrowed. Cheery little wrinkles played about the comers of his eyes and humorous, up-turned ones were etched where his lips met in their not too firm line in front of his toothless gums. His nose was thin, too, like the rest of him, and ended in a little hook. His eyes—his wistful gray eyes that had always trusted everybody and just couldn't get over their puppylike faith in the goodness of everything—looked out hungrily on a world they seemed never to understand.

Obadiah had been cheated. He—he was—well, possibly there was something lacking. Forty years he had endured the raillery of thoughtless citizens of the little home town -back East—forty years of satirical gibes that alone would have been enough to shift the balance of a stronger mind than his. Finally one of the younger generation openly called him a —— fool. Obadiah, with a childlike faith that he could go "out West" and make good, summoned all his courage and bid the town good-by.

Ten years Obadiah pitted his frail strength against the stem odds of the gold country. Finally he drifted to El Oro. He could have been a skilled worker in fine woods elsewhere, but in El Oro he was a carpenter. While it was pitifully apparent he had been a failure all along, he still harbored eternal hope that he could, before the end, go back home and show them that he had "made good."

EVIDENTLY Obadiah decided the job was satisfactorily done, for he put away his tools and proceeded to reap his reward. Taking from his toolkit a tomato can half filled with a black fluid composed of lampblack and a dash of the camp's meager supply of kerosene, Obadiah knelt stifly before the curb and stirred expectantly with the caked brash that was mostly handle. Then, with infinite care, he printed on the glaring hot planks a big, boyish looking G. Repeating the process, he turned out an O, then a D.

"G-o-d—good," stated "Spade" Gowdy to his two companions in the shade.

"Good nothin'," corrected Jim Moore scornfully; "can't you read, Spade? That word ain't 'good'—hit's 'Gawd!'"

"Ho, him, eh? You mean our ol' Uncle Billy in heaven we ain't never seen and won't till we croak an' he tells us to go to ——? Him?"

"Boys!" Obadiah twisted around, balancing with a hand to the curb, and addressed the three. "Oh, I wish you wouldn't talk that way. It's—it's wicked, boys. Besides, it's not giving the Creator a square deal. I just wish you'd wait a minute till I get this printed. It'll be something real nice, boys."

"Well, turn around an' git a move on, thin," suggested Danny Carver. "Go ahead wid yer printin', and mind ye now, git off a. new one. I'm fed up wid readin' the old ones on ivry rock an' plank in the counthry. Go on, print us a new one."

"Naw," objected Spade Gowdy. "Let him quit right there. He's got 'nough. That one word tells the tale. Leave her stand as it is."

"Just put 'ain't hit hot' after that there word," broke in Moore. "That'll be a reg'lar he-platitude. Gord, ain't hit hot! I'm like Carver, I'm getting tired of 'Repent,' 'Seek ye the Lord,' and so forth, staring me in the face from every stone in Oro gulch. Give us a lively one, 'Parson.'"

"Nope," Spade Gowdy insisted stubbornly, "it's my well-curb and it's my say what goeth thereupon. I say——"

"You're wrong there, Spade," argued Moore. "You agreed to let Obadiah print any dad-gum thing on it he wanted to, long's he'd build it for you. Leave it to him, but for gosh sake let him pull off a new one."

With much stirring and many gyrations of his tongue against his cheek, Obadiah had placidly gone ahead, unmindful of the argument, and evolved the righteous sentence:

God is not Mocked.

" 'Gawd is not m-o-c-k-e-d.' Mock-ed. Moc-ke-d." Spade Gowdy struggled with the letters. "Neck-ed—hah, neckkid! Ol' parson out there says Uncle Billy Gawd ain't neckkid. How's he know? Heh, 'Parson,' how'd you know He 'ain't neckkid? Tell us that!"

Obadiah arose.

"Boys, I don't want to force the Word on you too much, but hark ye!" Obadiah's meek tones suddenly became clarion clear as he quoted: "'Unto him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven.' Luke twelve, ten."

Stepping humbly to another side of the curb, he knelt, stirred and printed.

"Wow," mocked Spade, "ol' 'Postle Paul sure turned on the gas that time. Won't be forgiven, eh? What's the idee to beller so about that?"

"Say, Spade," Carver began earnestly, "faith I do wish ye'd a leetle more eddicacation; then ye wouldn't be foriver danglin' the sword of Damocles over us this way. If ye don't belave there's a Creator, keep shut about it like I do."

"Well, we-l-l!" gasped Spade in feigned astonishment. "Why, hello, St. Peter. When'd you quit tendin' bar in the Nugget Saloon and begin distributin' tracts. Say, you red-headed Irishman, if you want to begin preachin', get a paint-pot an' go to it—but come first inside an' paint a sign 'Bartender Wanted' and let me pay you off."

Carver only swore.

Presently, craning, the three shifted their positions in the shade to see what Obadiah had produced.

Whatsoever a man soweth,

Moore read the words quizzically.

"'Whatsoever a man seweth?" repeated Spade wonderingly.

They waited in silence until Obadiah had finished the third side before they ventured out into the dazzling Arizona sun to view the result.

That shall he also reap.

Spade stared at Moore in blank unbelief. He started to speak but caught his word half uttered and doubled in raucous laughter.

"Neckkid," he gasped, "seweth—shall also rip. Haw, parson, you gotteth off a new one on me. Come inside an' have a drink on the house."

Obadiah waved his brush in lieu of reply. On the fourth side he was laboriously printing his final shot.

Strong Drink is Raging. Whosoever is deceived thereby is Not Wise.

Obadiah, feeling well paid for his morning's labor, hummed as he neatly repacked his kit.

"'Strong drink is r-a-g-i-n-g.'" Spade was endeavoring to find out what Obadiah had said about strong drink on his wellcurb. Eventually he decided the word was "rag-ging." He announced: "Strong drink is ragging. What the——"

"You bet it is," Moore affirmed. "That hooch you and Carver peddle in your honkeytonk sure puts raggin' into a feller's feet and the rags on his back. Makes him raggy, ragged and rank. I've been loafing around this joint a week when I'd ought to been out to my diggins gatherin' in a pooch-full of dust instead of spendin' hit. Come on in, I'll take a last drink with you. I'm dry, myself."

"W-E-E-LL look-e-e there!"

Carver was gazing intently at something that had appeared out of the blistering hills at the upper end of the gulch. A half-human object that progressed in weird humpings and stumblings among the hot, rounded boulders of the creek bed.

"Well, I'd say," mumbled Spade, leering half-heartedly at the bobbing figure. "Looks like a whinny-diddle."

"Something coming to git yuh, Spade," Moore jeered. "By Judas, the prophet's right. Strong drink is raging—I see it myself. I'm goin' to take a drink of water."

"It's a man, thot's what it is," Carver stated. Together they peered through the shimmering heat waves at the humping object. Obadiah set down his tool-kit and stared with the others.

"Yuh see hit too, Parson?" queried Moore.

"I—yes, my eyes—" Obadiah brushed the back of his hand across his face and shaded his eyes with both hands. "Yes— and I think it's a man. Possibly some prospector out of water. We'd better go up and do what we can to help him out."

"What! Up there in that sun?" grumbled Spade. "You're crazier 'n I am, an' I'm drunk an' you're not. Go nothin'. Send for Gawd. Let him do it. That's his trade, savin' fellers."

"Aw, come on, Spade." Moore slapped Gowdy's broad back with his open hand. "I know you're drunk, Spade, and it'll half kill you to walk out in that sun, but I just got a hankerin' to see. Come on; we're goin', too."

Already Obadiah and Carver were twenty yards up the gulch, stumbling over the loose, hot stones and splashing around the pools erf tepid black water. Moore seized Spade by the buckle of his protruding belt and dragged him, protesting, after.

"Mustn't let him drink much of this water," chattered Obadiah as he and the Irishman struggled forward, "if it's a thirsty prospector. Yes, see, he's down drinking a barrel of it. Come on, let's hurry!"

A moment more and Obadiah had the shaggy head of the heat-crazed prospector in his lap, shading the tormented man as best he could with his body and bathing the parched lips and brow. Spade and Moore, scarce a minute behind, fell upon the prospector's sack of ore, which Carver had already found and was emptying excitedly upon the sand.

"Gold!" yelled Spade.

"Gold!" howled Carver. "Mine—I got it—it's mine, I tell ye!"

"Shut up." Moore's heavy hand crashed full against Spade Gowdy's thick mouth and he shoved Carver aside. "Don't wake up the whole camp. Course it's gold. What else do you reckon a man 'd pack till he croaked alive like that feller's a-doin?" He indicated the prostrated man.

"Sure, an' I b'lave the parson'd pack his paint-pot," soothed Carver diplomatically.

The three peered surreptitiously back toward El Oro to see if, by any chance, some one had ventured out in the noon sun and seen them. All appeared quiet. The camp, squatting low amid the baking boulders and shimmering in the heat, appeared deserted. No living thing was im sight. Only the heat waves danced along, the crooked white street, distorting the buildings into fantastic shapes.

"Let's hide it," suggested Spade, jerking his head toward the ore, "an' him, too." He motioned to the prospector and winked significantly.

"Know him? Any of you know this man?" interrupted Obadiah anxiously, fanning the patient with his hat. "I'm afraid he's in bad shape."

"Not half as bad as he will be in a minute," growled Spade.

"Help me carry him to camp, boys," begged Obadiah.

"Where'd he git this rock he's packin', Spade?" Moore ignored Obadiah's plea. "Let's smuggle 'im off somewheres an' when he comes alive make him tell where he got hit at."

"You bet, make him tell!" grunted Spade from where, on his knees, he was gloating over the chunks of gold-flecked rock. "Gold—pure yaller gold! Talk about Gawd—well, here he is. This is what everybody worships and grovels down to."

"Lucky dog," murmured Carver, eying the prostrate prospector. "Lucky dog— say! Sa-a-a-a-y!"

Carver looked from one to the other of his companions, then crept softly to the still figure and, bending over it, searched the pockets deftly.

"'Thou shalt not steal,'" reminded Obadiah gently.

"Bah, ye little snipe!" barked Carver. "Ah, a-a-ah!" Eagerly his fingers drew forth the grimy location notice. Unfolding it, he glanced over the heading and skipped eagerly 'down to the location. "'In the Jackear Peak district,'" he read half aloud, "'about one hundred and twenty miles in a southwesterly direction from El Oro!'"

That was all. Anxiously they gathered together and searched the document for further guidance. There was none. The name of the locator was signed "Henry Blane" in a forceful scrawl, as if the writer, at last the possessor of a fortune, had managed to convey his pride into his writing. Clearly Henry Blane had found a bonanza and was on his way to file his location notice. Immediately the three men became acutely solicitous as to Henry's welfare.

"Here, Parson—" seizing Henry Blane's limp shoulders Moore lifted them clear of the hot sands—"help me pack him over to my cabin."

"Not much—to mine!" demanded Carver, glaring at Moore indignantly.

"Both wrong!" Spade started forward, an evil glint in his dark eyes. "We'll pack him to—to—" Spade hesitated as his eyes caught the gleaming rock scattered on the sand. "No, go ahead, any —— place."

Craftily, as the others lifted the limp form, Spade thrust the rich rock back into the sack and essayed to slip away among the brush and boulders.

Moore, seeing him, halted and unfeelingly let the fore end of Henry drop heavily as he drew his huge six-shooter.

"Come on back with that sack, Spade," he ordered, "or we'll lynch you here an' now! Don't make me bring everybody out from El Oro by my shoo tin'."

Spade was loath and slow to obey.

"Come on back, you fat booze-hound," Moore gritted, drawing back the heavy hammer with a pronounced click. "Come on in!"

"Yes, come on in," added Carver; "lay thot sack on Hennery's belly an' grab holt his belt opposite the parson there."

"And we can take him to my cabin," offered Obadiah; "it's the nearest, anyhow. I can take good care of him there, boys. Come on, Mr. Gowdy, please, and help take this man to my house."

Sullenly Spade obeyed, placing the sack of ore on Henry's lank middle and assisting as Carver had suggested. Thus they stole to Obadiah's neat little cabin on the outskirts of El Oro and set about bringing their patient back to consciousness.

Henry Blane responded nobly to their ridiculous ministrations. While his eyes were yet dimmed with hallucination, his first thought was for his sack of ore.

"Where's my sack?" he demanded thickly. Then, his sight clearing momentarily, he glimpsed the faces of Spade, Carver and Moore bending over him. He quickly amended it to: "Which one o' you got my sack? Which one, I say." Desperately he raised himself on one elbow and clawed for his gun. Finding the weapon gone, he sank back resignedly. "Take it. I know where there's a ledge of it as long as a crazy man's dream. I was a fool to bring any of it along. Awful rough traveling—hot—straight up an' down—more'n a hundred an' twenty mile—cactus' an' brush—rock an' loose gravel—sand, sand, sand—sand an' sun——"

TWENTY minutes later Henry Blane awoke, again to inquire after his sack. Then, once more seeing the three hard visages hovering solicitously about his cot, he grunted resignedly—

"Fat chanct a sick feller's got with this layout."

"Why, here's your sack, Hank, right here," bellowed Spade jovially in his best saloon-welcome manner, being exceedingly anxious to retain the esteem of Henry Blane.

"Shure," seconded Carver, equally as merrily. "We was only bringin' it along for ye to have whin ye woken up, Hennery."

He added his hand to help Spade lay the sack in Henry's lap. Jim Moore, too, put forth a hand to assist in the presentation.

"Well I be blowed," gasped Henry, all precedent shaken to the foundation. Then, seeing Obadiah hovering on the outskirts of the trio, Henry suddenly understood. "Ho, there's a parson." He settled back in relief. "Got a parson in camp, hev you? I see now—he made you bring it along. Didn't you, parson? How'd you do it, anyhow? They'd got off with it ef you hadn't been watchin', that I know. Me, too, like as not. Eh, parson?"

"W-w-why, no. I—I'm not a reg'lar parson, I—I just try to be. An' they—" Obadiah strove to believe he was telling the truth—"they aimed to bring it along, all right. They'd fixed you up 'thout me."

"I'll bet they would," grunted Henry Blane positively.

"I'm Gowdy," Spade began heartily. "I run the Nugget Saloon here in camp. When you git to feelin' like it come around and we'll show you a good time. The place'll be yours, an' the house foots the bill. This here's Dan Carver, one of my best bar-men. And this here's Jim Moore, one of the camp's biggest sluicers. He owns a mess of the best placer claims along the gulch. An' say, Hank, being's you've already staked off what you want of your new discovery, can't you let us in on what's left?" Spade paused expectantly.

Henry looked around dubiously.

"We-e-ll," he began slowly, "they ain't much use tellin'. They's only 'bout room for one more stakin'. Yeh, just 'bout room for one more. 'Tain't no cause for a stampede, as they's only room for one more."

"Only one?" wailed Spade in dismay. "Thought you said it was a long one."

"Well, it is a long one, considerin' the quality. Six feet of it 'd make rich men out o' a dozen paupers. Minute I see thet outcrop I begun puttin' up stakes an' monument rocks like a steamboat nigger hustlin' watermelons out o' a melon patch at night. Then, like a fool, I chips off this forty pound o' ore an' hikes for to record. I'm here now, ain't I? An' in a minnit I'll be over at the recorder's office, yeh."

"Just right," assented Moore, "that's the way to do business. But now, considerin' who picked you up, savin' yore life, so to speak, why not go ahead an' tell us where this ledge is, so we c'n get what's left. We'll stake her an' divide it amongst us."

Still Henry Blane was reticent.

"Aw, come on, Hennery," Carver wheedled. "We won't tell anybody. There'll be no stampede. We'll just slip out an' stake her off an' come back and record. Jist look who saved yer life."

"Jus' look!" mumbled Henry, his eyes roving over his saviors. "Yeah, jus' look! Still, I reckon I mought as well tell you fellers as anybody else. You can fight it out amongst yerselves. I got mine all safe, an' there's a million in sight left over, so you oughtn't have much trouble dividin' it. Now listen—I'm only goin' to say it jus' once:

"It lays in a little cañon on this slope of the Jackear Mountains, about the middle of the range, nearest the peaks. To git there go out to Sandy Spring, thirty mile west of El Oro, and then slew off southwest straight toward them Jackears. When you find the right canon, toiler up it till you come to a break—a plumb, blank wall that juts right up out o' the canon bed. This falls is white rock—you'll know it when you see it if you've had to trace a dozen other canons before you hit the right one. Well, when you find this white wall in the canon, you'll know you're in the right one, so go on over and follow up the canon about a quarter mile more, where you'll come to a spring with some grass around it.

"There'll likely be a couple o' burros there—mine. I left 'em there so's to make better speed gettin' here. It's a tumble rough country between here and there— straight up an' down, and a jack can't hardly make it, an' feed's scarce as honesty in politics. I wanted to come straight across and climb the bluffs where I pleased, so I left my burros behind. It'd take two days longer with jacks."

"Yes, I know it's rough country," conconceded Moore. "I been as far as Sandy Spring and I could see it's rougher 'n—— beyond. Go ahead an' tell us how to find your ledge after we get to the spring where you left yore jackasses. On up the cañon?"

"Yeah, on up the canon," resumed Henry. "On up about a hundred yards. You'll see it—ledge crosses the canon floor; sticks up 'bout a foot all along. My stakes are on the right side. Take all you see to the left. There's a million there."

"Come on, men!" Spade turned to go. "Let's start!"

Carver and Moore, without a word, fell in behind him. Only Obadiah tarried.

"Thank you, Mr. Blane!" Obadiah spoke fervently. "Thank you ever so much. I just feel that this is my chance. We thank you ever so much. Use the house while I'm gone."

OBADIAH had to run to catch up with his late companions. Hearing his footsteps, they turned. Spade appraised Obadiah scornfully.

"Why, hello, Jehovah!" he drawled insultingly. "Where'd you think you're goin'?"

"Why, w-w-hy I'm—I want to go along with you, boys," stammered Obadiah, an anxious look clouding his face.

Spade cursed viciously. So did Moore and Carver.

"No! No! Ye poor nut," protested Carver hastily, "it'll be an awful thrip. You'd niver git more'n half-way there. You're too—too weak, parson."

"Sure, weak!" raged Spade. "Why if that dried up little apostle can hike out to where we're goin' I c'n walk to Jerusalem an' back in an hour. Why, you little wart" —Spade glared down at Obadiah—"this is a he-man's game. Trot back to your Bibles, pronto!"

"You'd never make it, preacher," added Moore pacifyingly. "It's a hundred and twenty miles of the roughest, hottest going this side of——. No use your even wantin' to go."

"Oh!" Obadiah's tone expressed real agony. "Oh, boys, let me go along! Please! Let me try, anyhow! I won't ask any favors. If I can't make it I'll drop out quiet-like. I'll take my chances with the rest of you. Just let me go along, please! Then we'll all be together and can stake out the claim in all our names and we'll all have plenty. It's my only chance to make good. I just feel——"

"Shut up, chatterbox," growled Spade menacingly. "You can't go. We can't pack no cripples or babies along. We'll have all we can do to make it ourselves. Come along, fellers."

"Spade's right, parson," added Moore, as they turned to go. "You wouldn't be much force. We'll count you in on it, anyhow. Just keep yore mouth shut about where we went er you'll wish yuh had."

But Obadiah Higgins was not to be so easily talked out of his one great opportunity. He followed, terrified lest he lose his one golden chance to make good. He grabbed Carver and Moore by the sleeves of the soiled undershirts they wore.

"I'm going with you! I'm going too!" he panted, eagerly appealing from face to face, hoping to find a gleam of kindness. Their faces were expressionless and hard. His heart sank. "I'm goin' with you," he insisted doggedly.

Spade Gowdy struck Obadiah's none too firm chin with something like two hundred and twenty pounds back of the blow. Obadiah came up, dusty and weeping with rage. Wordlessly he attacked the astonished Spade with a hail of futile blows that at best reached no higher than Spade's thick, hairy chest.

"Haw," sneered Spade, "you're too white around the gills. Git away!"

With that he heaved with his open hand against Obadiah's meager stomach and doubled him sobbing in the dust.

"Now, here, Obadiah," Carver bent over the cramped little figure. "You gotta go aisy if you hopes to finish out the natural course of yer existence. You're goin' to git hurted if you continue buttin' into this party in this manner. Now I'll tell ye what we'll do. If you'll go home now an' get yer pack ready we'll call along in about ten minutes and git you and we'll all go together. But mind, if you say a word about this to a soul, now or ever, you're a goner!"

"Oh, I won't! I won't tell! I'll go right home and get ready to go along. Oh, I'm so glad!" rejoiced Obadiah, the light of supreme happiness written all over his face. "You'll never be sorry you took me along. Why, I've tramped lots and I can stand the hottest kind of sun. You know I've worked steady around Oro the last six months, and I'm tough as whang leather. I'll go right home and fix up my outfit I been in lots of stampedes, too, and I know just what kind of a pack I'll need."

Obadiah turned back happily and trotted with a surprizingly springy step toward his cabin.

"Well, come on—let's outfit," ordered Moore sharply. "Hustle!"

Together they hurried along the hot, empty street to make ready for their departure. Ten minutes later they appeared, purposefully prodding a single laden burro out of town in the direction of Sandy Spring.

Obadiah Higgins, standing impatiently waiting in his own doorway, saw them go. He watched them as they skirted the few shacks at the edge of the town and turned into the little-used trail that led to Sandy Spring. He watched them until they became but an indistinguishable huddle, bobbing about in the slanting evening sunlight, vanishing momentarily in the choppy gulches only to reappear, a wavering dot, in the white road against the ridges.

"They didn't want me," murmured Obadiah without malice. "They didn't want me to go along."

Turning, he picked up the little bundle he had prepared and started out alone, his gaze riveted on the Jackear Mountains, which showed low-lying and purple across the intervening miles of gashed and broken hills.

The combined gaze of Moore, Carver and Spade was also turned upon that purpling heap that rimmed the far horizon. Somewhere on the slope of that rugged range lay a tiny, rain-gutted canon with a blind wall—and a million-dollar prize. Eagerly the three strained their vision toward the distant peaks and prodded the jack purposefully. Thirty miles would the beast carry their packs; the remaining distance of almost impassable country each man would carry his own pack and canteen.

THE next morning the great sun poked his hot orb over the desert rim and smote them hotly with his first rays. Still they plodded the trail to Sandy Spring. It was an hour later when they reached their goal. Thirty miles they had come. Almost without conversation they unpacked the burro, released him and, in the shade of the mesquite and luxuriant water-weed, they wearily cooked and ate their first meal of the trip and lay down to sleep. Their packs, to be light as possible, permitted of "no blankets, so the three determinedly scooped hollows in the sand.

The sun hung low in the west that evening before they resumed their journey. They had rested, eaten, arranged their packs and filled their canteens. Eagerly, each with his burden, they resumed their difficult progress. Each hill-top they reached, every canon-crest they topped, gave them a glimpse of their goal—the Jackear Peaks, a purple and white phantasm far to the southwest. It speeded their steps like the sound of running water to a thirsty man.

Their muscles, unused to heavy work, protested against the pace and each broke into an unhealthy perspiration. With the sweat streaming from them, the setting of the sun was as welcome as a cooling rain. They paused on a barren hog-back to catch the faint breath of air that stirred the sea of heat about them. The country that lay between them and the Jackears spread a gashed and cañoned maze of gravel hills and precipitous cliffs. The entire hundreds of square miles of watershed sloped to the" southeast, and countless canons and washes had carved their gulches in the same direction, pouring their periodical rushes of water into the boulder-strewn channel that drained the watershed into the Gila.

To reach the Jackears without going completely around the vast watershed, they would necessarily be obliged to cross every one of the myriad gulches. Thus, each time they topped a ridge, it was only to scramble down the opposite slope, then across the canon floor and up the other side. Up and over, across, up and over— constantly.

It was like going across a great city without using the streets. They would climb up the front of the first row of dwellings, zigzag across the roof-tops, avoiding skylights, air-shafts and chimneys; thence slither down the window-ledges and waterpipes at the rear; cross the alleyway only to be confronted by the necessity of climbing up the rear of the next row and across the roof-tops and down the fronts into the street. Once across the street, it would he up and over again and again. Well, that was the sort of a situation Moore and his companions were in.

Added to their difficulties were the tangled growths of mesquite, greasewood and cactus, the loose boulders and hot sands underfoot, coupled with the lack of water and the great abundance of heat. So, with a sigh of regret, the three resumed their march, stumbling down the slope, kicking loose gravel into their shoe-tops and battling with the thorny brush that tore them mercilessly in the growing dusk.

Throughout the interminable night they toiled. They had decided to travel at night, thinking the cooler air without the sun's burning heat would enable them to make better time. They figured they could make the remaining ninety miles in at least three nights' travel. "Walk nights and rest days," they had agreed. So in the darkness they fought their way; crossing the canons and laboring over the ridges; laying their course as best they could by the stars. Though there was a moon, it was waning and the far-distant Jackear Peaks were not visible as a guide, and the light the moon afforded was negligible. Long before the sun rimmed the eastern horizon with red, Spade Gowdy felt the need of a drink.

"Didn't anybody bring some whisky along?" he growled petulantly. "By ——, this is the first time I ever went anywhere without whisky. I'd give ten bucks for jus' one shot, right now. Carver, why'n —— didn't you think to bring some whisky?"

"Why'n't you?" snapped Carver. "I feel mysilf a dhrink or two wouldn't harm a body. But what's the use discussin'? We wouldn't carry it if we had it. I got a plenty to pack as it is; fifteen pound I must have, an' it feels like a ton. No, we don't want whisky."

"I do," insisted Spade. "I do! An' I gotta have a drink, I tell you!"

"Aw, take a drink of water," broke in Moore. "You're lucky to have that. Better go easy on it, too. It may not last."

"Water!" scoffed Spade. "Dishwater! Tastes like a chip. I'd rather drink the washings from the bar-sink. —— any man that'd go off on a trip like this without whisky."

"Cut out the hard luck tale, Spade. 'Twill be hot enough in an hour an' we c'n slape. Kape your eyes open fer wather sign—canteens'll be dhry by night—Howlee Moses! Moore, where're ye headin'? Look, man, Jackear Mountains are down that way—-not as ye're goin'!"

Moore, in the lead, paused and followed Carver's pointing finger to where, far down the horizon, loomed the purple maze of the Jackear range. He had been leading them almost due west instead of southwest. They had been crossing the canons at an almost imperceptible slant to the west.

Moore cursed vividly.

"Well, this ends night travel. How long we been off the track I don't know—eight mile—maybe ten. You bet we'll travel by daylight if it scorches the inside edges of my gizzard. Henceforth we plow straight for that peak. It's up and down like this all the way anyhow, so we might as well try to save by going it straight. Here we are, out maybe six miles of the hardest going this side of forty years in the wilderness."

"Howly Mither!" groaned Carver. "An' what's worse, we gotta walk 'em yet to catch up to where we'd 'a' been if we hadn't walked 'em already. Howiver, there's a consolation—the farther we go, the more likely we be to find a watherin'-place," he finished hopefully.

"Come on, Spade; wake up!" Moore shook Gowdy, who had wilted against a boulder. "You're a hot specimen to go prospectin'." He kicked Spade to his feet.

Two hours hard travel down a cañon brought them upon a tiny seep at the base of a sheer canon wall, where a cupful of water could be extracted at half-hour intervals.

Exhausted, they prepared to sleep the day out, taking turns watching the water that their canteens might be replenished. Continually Spade bewailed the lack of liquor. His body, so long steeped in drink, craved it to an excruciating degree. Neither food nor water could satisfy; it was whisky that Spade Gowdy craved; his face and the palms of his hands already had begun to swell; his thick speech and strange eyes told of the torture he was suffering.

His companions, distressed, but in a lesser degree, did not seek to ease his misery. Better for them, they reasoned, Spade should drop out. Spade was a burden; with him out of the way they could make better time, and the riches at the end could be divided fifty-fifty. A two-way split meant a half million dollars, and a half million dollars will buy—yes, quite a lot of things.

At evening the discussion arose as to whether they should travel this night or await the dawn. Their rapacious minds reasoned for haste, but their sore muscles parleyed for rest. In the end they decided to abide by Moore's advice and resume the journey at dawn rather than chance going astray in the darkness.

IT WAS Jim Moore who insisted upon the delay and it was Jim Moore who, an hour later, assuring himself the others were asleep, took his canteen and slipped away in the direction of the Jackear range. He was not afraid of losing his way; Jim Moore could lay a straight course in any country by night. Deliberately he had planned to abandon his companions and gain the prize alone— a million dollars and a oneway split.

The discomfort of lying on a gravel bed with muscles stiff and aching from unaccustomed use, together with several hours of sleep during the day, left Carver a trifle wakeful. He had been lying in the sand wooing slumber when he heard Moore's slight stepping. When he was satisfied Moore had not merely gone to the seep for a drink, Carver raised his head and peered after the huge figure that showed darkly against the stony face of the canon wall. Without emotion Carver impassionately drew his gun from its holster and fired. The range was not long, yet Carver missed. Moore wheeled to return the fire, but Carver beat him to it—two shots in quick succession.

"Cut it out!" yelled Moore. "You got me in the leg! I'm cornin' back anyhow."

"You'd better!" grunted Carver savagely.

"Why, what's the matter?" Moore whined. "I was just huntin' a place for us to get out of this canon in the morning."

"Yis, wid yer outfit all on yer back."

Spade had awakened at the shots.

"What's the shootin'. What's goin' on here?" he gabbled. "Who'n ——"

Moore's voice from the darkness answered the question.

"That's all right, Carver," he compromised ingratiatingly, "I want to come in. Cut out the shootin', Carver; my leg's hurtin' somethin' powerful. Third of a million'll do me, anyhow."

Long before sunrise they had taken up their painful journey. They calculated they were sixty miles from their prize. Sixty miles may not be a great distance over a well-defined road or trail, but it can lengthen out into a horror when cut and gashed by canons and barricaded by thickets of thorny brush and great gravel ridges. Those sixty miles up and over, down and through, detouring rocky gorges and clambering over craggy precipices, doubly hampered by Moore's injured leg and Spade's growing delirium, were full of toil and pain.

The day passed in laborious misery. They traveled possibly fifteen miles in ten agonizing hours. The night was spent in fitful sleep and on the morrow they took up their task. Moore's injury grew steadily more painful. Of the three, only one, Carver, was in anything like fair shape.

Spade Gowdy had long since ceased to think, and traveled erratically, battling with invisible monsters and reptiles. His craving for whisky was only equaled by his craving for rest. He ate almost nothing, and what he did eat he could not assimilate; his figure became emaciated and his muscles responded slowly. Only occasionally was his mind rational. At such times he begged piteously for liquor and cursed them vehemently for their negligence in coming,. away without whisky. Yet he hung m fine, staggering awfully to keep up, grimly, clinging to the almost forgotten hope of sharing in the prize that lay in the little canon of the Jackear Mountains.

Jim Moore hobbled at the rear, partly because of his injury but principally to prevent Carver from going on alone. There existed armed peace between Moore and Carver, with the latter constantly alert to seize any opportunity to slip off and leave the slower pair. Moore was equally vigilant to prevent him. Each, therefore, slept but little.

There were hours when they all suffered agonies of thirst. Water was scarce, yet it existed in sufficient quantities that the travelers might, by making miles in futile search, find enough to keep them alive as they went along. For food they cared little, but water—water they must have. Sometimes they came upon water when their canteens were already full. Then they would drink as much as their empty stomachs could possibly hold, and stagger on, harboring the sloshing fluid in their heavy canteens for fear of not finding water again.

Then at times they would find water-only after their canteens had long been dry and their tongues and throats parched and gummy. They would fling themselves down beside or even in the lifesaving seep and drink and gorge until they lay cramped and vomiting upon the sands. These were not true men of the desert. They had lived to grow fat from the labor of others.

Four days later—the seventh from El Oro—their search led up admail canon, one of hundreds that came down out of the Jackear Mountains. Following this, they reached a blind wall, a sheer white cliff jutting abruptly from the cañon floor.

Carver eyed Moore calculatingly.

"This is the cliff Henry Blane told us about," he said.

"Sure is," replied Moore, his hand upon the butt of his heavy six-shooter. "Go ahead."

"What about him?" Carver indicated Spade.

Moore indifferently regarded the swollen face and dull eyes of the once hearty leading citizen of Oro Gulch. Spade was beyond hope of being able to appreciate the great consequences of the moment. Moore's eyes roved over the emaciated, puffed figure arid he scratched the back of his hand reflectively.

"He's all in," he remarked lightly "Let's leave him here."

"All right," agreed Carver. "Fifty-fifty?"

"Sure, fifty-fifty. Just right!"

"Half a million," gloated Carver. "I'm goin' up." He started to climb.

"Not too —— far ahead of me, you ain't," snarled Moore painfully dragging his injured foot into step. "I'll set the pace, pardner; you can go ahead, but see to it you don't go too fast. We're close to taw an' I don't stand for no monkeyin'. I'm goin' to see that my name goes on that discovery notice whether we either one of us ever makes it back to El Oro or not, sabe?"

WORDLESSLY they climbed over the cliff. Then for a quarter mile they followed the sand wash that, during the rainy season, poured its flood over the break behind them. Rounding one of the countless crooks, they came in sight of an open glade with a spring and a grassy spot about it. Two burros nodding under the thick mesquite put their ears forward inquisitively.

"Henry's burros," exulted Carver. "We're in the right place. Henry left his jacks at the spring. 'Tis only a step to the big find."

"Not so fast, there," warned Moore. "I'm dry. That spring looks like a million dollars to me. I'm goin' to drink first."

"Yis, an' me, too. Shure I'm as dhry as a conthribution box, almost. I'll drink wid ye."

"But we ain't goin' to run for it."

They approached the spring and, flat on their bellies, they drank of the cool trickle. Presently Moore raised his head and peered intently at a reflection in the water. What he saw caused him to look about, and there, on the side of the huge rock that overshadowed and was reflected by the spring, appeared in the big, boyish letters they had learned to know so well:

Be not Deceived; God is not Mocked.

A few steps farther up the wash, where the cold ashes of a day-old camp-fire spread white against the smoke-blackened base, a great boulder bore the holy legend:

God giveth Power to the Faint. To them that Have No Might, He increaseth strength. Isa. 40.

In silence the two men stared at each other. Moore broke the spell.

"If he's up there I'll shoot him like killin' sheep," he whispered hoarsely, jerking his head in the direction of the ledge.

Carver nodded approvingly.

In silence they arose, their six-shooters naked in their hands, and stole up the wash to where a ledge of inestimable richness cut across the rock-ribbed canon, its gleaming content seemingly mocking them in their utter powerlessness, for their quarry was not there. Minutely they scanned all that was visible of the place. The rock monuments and discovery stake placed by Henry Blane were in view to the right, and to the left were the neatly erected monuments of another locator. On the huge, rounded boulders about the discovery stake were printed righteous sentences:

Thou art my Hope.
Exalt ye the Lord.

Carver stooped to pr a nugget from the rich vein.

"Goin' to take a sackful?" inquired Moore, himself breaking off a huge chunk with a stone.

"Sack, nothin'," exploded Carver. "I got all I c'n do to get back to Oro. I'm out o' grub, almost." Regretfully he gazed at the vein. "Million!" he muttered, calculating the seamed ledge. "Million! If thot ledge is ten feet deep there's ten million."

Carver swore and slammed his heavy gun down among the sand and stones of the canon floor.

"If thot little runt was here now I'd shoot 'im into a million scraps. I'd make him look like a nickel's worth of sausage shot from a cannon. Well, I'm goin' up an' look at his —— location notice; mebby the fool didn't have sense enough to get it straight at all."

He cursed again, vehemently, as he strode across to the location monument.

Moore followed. Together they drew forth the folded paper from the piled stones. Written upon it in a prim, stilted hand was the description, according to the legal form, of the location. The length and width of the claim was set forth, and the distance in feet from the point of the notice to each end of the claim, together with the general course of the claim, the date, and the locality with reference to the Jackear Peaks. The name of the claim was set down as "The Crazy Man's Dream" and the names of the locators were recorded therein as:

Obadiah Higgins
Spade Gowdy
Jim Moore
Dan Carver.

Obadiah Higgins had made good.

The two men cursed vividly.

"He's half-way to the recorder now," roared Moore, seizing the paper and rending it into bits, "but by ——, if I catch him before he gits thar, there'll be one less name on that paper. Here, Carver, you catch up Henry's jacks. Let's see if we c'n make it back to Oro. I can go without eatin', but I can't hoof it. Git 'em! Let's go. Spade's done for; leave 'im lay. No! Don't you try pickin' up yore gun. I'm th' gunman now. I'll teach you how to shoot a pardner in the leg'n' cripple 'im. Git them jacks."

A WEEK later two patient burros swayed into El Oro. Dried sweat stood on their shoulders and flanks and they sucked thirstily at their lolling tongues. The hair on their backs was rumpled; evidently there had been riders the day before or, perhaps, the week before that. Straight to the little trough beside the new well-curb they went and thrust their parched muzzles gratefully into the cool water.

Henry Blane, standing protectingly "at the side of Obadiah Higgins, who was conversing with a group gathered in front of the recorder's office, shaded his eyes with a gnarled hand.

"Why," he exclaimed suiprizedly, "them's my burros!"

Satisfied, the two burros stood before the new well-curb placidly shooing the flies with their bristly tails. Above their drooping heads and contentedly waving ears was the holy reminder—

God is not mocked.