saddle, his hat on the back of his neck, held by the string of his chin-strap which had slipped to his throat.
Spanish was off to my right -- or so I thought -- and we charged on into the night, some of the horses running wild ahead of us, others scattered to left and right.
We raced on, and somehow the horses found a winding trail to the cap rock and slowed to climb it. I called out, but there was no reply. Finally the black struggled over the rim onto the mesa. There was more light there, under the high stars.
I drew up. Here and there I glimpsed a horse, but none that carried a rider.
Slowly I rode on, talking to the horses and hoping the others would follow.
Daylight was still far away, but none of us would dare to stop. If they were alive they, too, would keep on.
There was no use to try to find anybody. In the darkness a body could be missed, and any one of us would shy from any other rider for fear he was facing an Indian.
Through the night I rode, once lifting my horse to a trot for a few miles, then slowing again to a walk. I reloaded my gun, checked my rifle. Once, worn out as I was, I dozed in the saddle.
Finally, in the gray light of day, I stopped. Carefully, standing in my stirrups, I looked in every direction. I could see for a good distance on all sides, but there was nothing but desert and sky. Wearily, I started the black horse on again, heading north.
By noontime, with nothing in sight, I got down and stumbled on, leading the horse. There was no telling when I might need all that horse had to make a run for it.
There were no tracks. There was only silence. Overhead a buzzard swept down the sky, returned and circled widely above me. After that he stayed with me, and I figured a buzzard had pretty good judgment about where he might get a meal.
The sun was hot, and no breeze stirred. My canteen had been holed by a bullet and was empty. I stumbled along like a sleepwalker, dead on my feet, yet not daring to stop. Finally I gave up and climbed into the saddle again.
Ahead of me, almost lost in the blue of distance, the cap rock seemed to break off. There were mountains beyond, behind me and to the east there was nothing.
Water ... I had to have water, and so did my horse. Under a desert sun a man cannot live long without water.
The mesa ended abruptly, but there was no trail to the rough, rolling land below. Here there was another stretch of the rimrock, nowhere less than thirty feet of sheer wall, then a steep, rock-strewn slope.
Far off I thought I could see a patch of green in a fold of the earth. Skirting the cliff, I rode on. Suddenly I saw the tracks of shod hoofs.
The tracks were familiar. They were the tracks of a horse that Spanish Murphy had ridden, a tough, mountain-bred horse, larger than the average mustang, and weighing almost a thousand pounds. Turning into the trail, I followed it along the rim. We came abruptly to a cleft where the rock wall had broken away and there was an easy though steep descent to the valley below. We made it.
We rode on, the black and me, with the black quickening his pace so as to come up with his friend. Sure enough, we'd gone not over five miles when we saw the bay mustang ahead of us. He had stopped, and was looking ahead, ears pricked.
Well, I shucked that Winchester before you could say aye, yes, or no, and I eared back the hammer and walked the black right up alongside that mustang. I spoke easy to him, and he didn't do more than side-step a mite, knowing my voice. Then I looked where he was looking.
There was a thick clump of ironwood beside the way we were taking, and a horse was standing head down there, just waiting, and sitting up on its back was a man. He was sitting there, hands on the pommel, head hanging like the horse's, and when we started forward, he paid us no mind.
Good reason why. It was Tampico Rocca, and he was dead.
Even before I got to him I could see by the blood on his vest that he'd been shot at least twice, but he'd lived long enough to lash one hand to the saddlehorn and tangle the fingers of the other hand in the turns of the rope.
Rocca had said that if he got into the saddle he would stay there, and he meant it.
Chapter 15
There was no need to stay close to him, and I was wary. Had the Apaches seen me coming, it would have been like them to leave Rocca there, and I wanted no traps.
An arroyo offered some shelter, and after a quick glance I rode into it and waited there, listening.
For several minutes I watched Rocca, the horse, and the rocks around. Mostly, it was the horse I watched, for the actions of the horse would warn me if there was anyone close by.
Following the arroyo a little further, I saw a clump of brush and low trees near the lip of the draw, so I rode up the bank in their shelter. After a while, reasonably sure that it was safe, I went back to the horse and its burden.
The trailing bridle had caught in the brush, and I let it stay there while I lifted Rocco from the saddle after freeing his hands. There was nothing with which to prepare a grave, so I found a shallow watercourse, placed him in it, and covered the body with brush and rocks.
But first, I had taken his guns and ammunition, to leave nothing for the Apaches if they found him. There was a full belt of ammunition as well as some loose cartridges. And there was a swallow of water in the canteen.
In his pocket I found a stub of pencil and some old papers on which he had been learning to write his name. He had gotten somebody to write it for him, or had taken it from something addressed to him, and had practiced, over and over again, on many different surfaces. I had never seen him do so, nor likely had anyone else, for he was a proud man, ashamed to let us know he could not write, and that he cared.
There was no address, nothing to show that there was anyone to whom he belonged.
But there had been a girl he had talked of, so I took what money he had, only a few dollars and some pesos, to give to her.
Scarcely twenty minutes was used in burying the body. Then, leading the spare horse, I went back to the arroyo and followed it for perhaps a mile, the soft sand leaving no tracks that could be recognized. When I came out I started across country.
The sun had gone down by now and the desert was cool. Off in the distance I could hear a quail call ... I hoped it was a real quail.
I felt stiff and cold now, and I worked my fingers to keep them easy for my gun.
Shifting to Rocca's horse, I rode on into the night. There was no trail, but I went ahead, all the time looking for water. The green place I'd seen from afar should be near.
The black horse pulled up alongside me, and Rocca's horse quickened its pace.
They smelled it.
An arroyo opened on my right and I found my way into it, listened, then walked the horses on, knowing the arroyo would end where the water was. The arroyo gaped, and I looked into a small oasis darkening with the cool of evening.
There were a dozen cottonwoods, some mesquite and willows, and slopes green with grass, and through the trees a glimmer of water. I could hear birds twittering.
The horses tugged at their bits, wanting to go forward. Winchester in hand, I walked them slowly, ready with a spur if need be.
Suddenly my way was blocked by a low stone wall that looked to be a part of one of those trincheras the ancient people built to terrace and till their land, or sometimes for dams. I'd seen a lot of them in Mexico.
Dismounting, I led the horses around it and down to a broken place in the wall, and saw something dark and shadowy through the trees. There was no sound but the water, and the rustle of the cottonwood leaves. I walked ahead to an opening among the trees, and came to an ancient ruin. It had once been a considerable structure, built right from the edge of the pool back to the cliffs where it joined the native rock.
Only the floor remained, and a corner of a wall that reached up to six feet, slanting down to no more than three feet near the water. There was green grass all around, and a stillness that came from utter isolation.
First off, I let the horses drink sparingly, and drank myself, and then filled Rocca's canteen. All the while I
