CACTUS AND MEXICANS  
They now came upon bare, wind-swept plains, which alternated with blazing heat and bitter cold. Once they nearly perished in a Norther, which drove down upon them with sheets of hail. Fortunately their serapes were very thick and large, and they found additional shelter among some ragged and mournful yucca trees. But they were much shaken by the experience, and they rested an entire day by the banks of a shallow little brook.
 
"Oh, for a horse, two horses!" said Obed. "I'd give all our castles in Spain for two noble Barbary steeds to take us swiftly o'er the plain."
 
"I think we'll keep on walking," said Ned.
 
"At any rate, we're good walkers. We must be the very best walkers in the world judging from the way we've footed it since we left the castle of San Juan de Ulua."
 
They refilled their water bottles, despite the muddiness of the stream, and went on for three or four days over the plain, having nothing for scenery save the sandy ridges, the ragged yuccas, dwarfed and ugly mesquite bushes, and the deformed cactus.
 
It was an ugly enough country by day, but, by night, it had a sort of weird charm. The moonlight gave soft tints to the earth. Now and then the wind would pick up the sand and carry it away in whirling gusts. The wind itself had a voice that was almost human and it played many notes. Lean and hungry wolves now appeared and howled mournfully, but were afraid to attack that terrible creature, man.
 
They saw sheep herders several times, but the herders invariably disappeared over the horizon with great speed. Neither Ned nor Obed meant them any harm, and they would have liked to exchange a few words with human beings.
 
"They think of course that we're brigands," said Obed. "It's what anybody would take us for. Evil looks corrupt good intentions."
 
The next day Obed was lucky enough to shoot an antelope, and they had fresh food. It was a fine fat buck, and they jerked and dried the remainder of the body in the sun, taking a long rest at the same time. Obed was continually restraining Ned's eagerness to hurry on.
 
"The race is to the swift if he doesn't break down," he said, "but you've got to guard mighty well against breaking down. I think we're going to enter a terrible long stretch of dry country, and we want our muscles to be tough and our wind to be good."
 
Obed was partially right in his prediction as they passed for three days through an absolutely sterile region. It was not sandy, however, but the soil was hard and baked like a stone. Then they saw on their left high but bare and desolate mountains, and soon they came to a little river of clear water, apparently flowing down from the range. The stream was not over twenty feet wide and two feet deep, but its appearance was inexpressibly grateful to both. They sat down on its banks and looked at each other.
 
"Ned," said Obed, "how much dust of the desert do you think I am carrying upon me? Let your answer be without prejudice. Friendship in this case must not stand in the way of truth."
 
"Do you mean by weight or by area?"
 
"Both."
 
"Answering by guess I should say about three square yards, or about three pounds. Wouldn't you say about the same for me?"
 
"Just about the same. I should say, too, that we carry at least twelve or fifteen kinds of dirt. It is well soaked in our hair and also in our clothes, and, as we may not get another good chance for a bath in a month, we'd better use our opportunity."
 
They reveled in the cool waters. They also washed out all their clothing, including their serapes, and let the garments dry in the sun. It was the most luxurious stop that they had made and they enjoyed it to the full. Ned, scouting a little distance up the stream, shot a fine fat deer among the bushes, and that night they had a feast of tender steaks. Obed had obtained flint and steel at the Indian village, at which they had seen the fandango, and he could light a fire with them, a most difficult thing to do. Their fire was of dried cactus, burning rapidly, but it lasted long enough for their cooking. After the heartiest meal that they had eaten in a long time, they stretched out by the river, listening to its pleasant flow. The remainder of the deer they had hung high in the branches of a myrtle oak about forty yards away.
 
"We haven't got our horses," said Obed, "but we're making progress. Time and tide will carry man with them if he's ready with his boat."
 
"Perhaps we've been lucky, too," said Ned, "in passing through what is mostly a wilderness."
 
"That's so. The desert is a hard road, but in our case it keeps enemies away."
 
They were lying on their serapes, the waters sang softly, the night was dark but very cool and pleasant, and they were happy. But Ned suddenly saw something that made him reach out and touch his companion.
 
"Look!" he whispered, pointing a finger.
 
They saw a dark figure creep on noiseless feet toward the tree, from a bough of which hung their deer. It was only a shadow in the night, but they knew that it was a cougar, drawn by the savor of the deer.
 
"Don't shoot," whispered Obed. "He can't get our meat, but we'll watch him try."
 
They lay quite still and enjoyed the joke. The cougar sprang again and again, making mighty exertions, but always the rich food swung just out of his reach. Once or twice his nose nearly touched it, but the two or three inches of gulf which he could never surmount were as much as two or three miles. He invariably fell back snarling, and he became so absorbed in the hopeless quest that there was no chance of his noticing the man and boy who lay not far away.
 
The humor of it appealed strongly to Ned and Obed. The cougar, after so many vain leaps, lay on the ground for a while panting. Then he ran up the tree, and as far out on the bough as he dared. He reached delicately with a forefoot, but he could not touch the strips of bark with which the body was tied. Then he lay flat upon the bough and snarled again and again.
 
"That's a good punishment for a rascally thief," whispered Obed. "I don't blame him for trying to get something to eat, but it's our deer. Let him go away and do his own hunting."
 
The cougar came back down the tree, but his descent was made with less spirit than his ascent. Nevertheless he made another try at the jumping. Ned saw, however, that he did not do as well as before. He never came within six inches of the deer now. At last he lay flat again on the ground and panted, staying there a full five minutes. When he got up he made one final and futile jump, and then sneaked away, exhausted and ashamed.
 
"Now, Ned," said Obed, "since the comedy is over I think we can safely go to sleep."
 
"Especially as we know our deer is safe," said Ned.
 
Both slept soundly throughout the remainder of the night. Toward morning the cougar came back and looked longingly at the body of the deer hanging from the bough of the tree. He thought once or twice of leaping for it again, but there was a shift of the wind and he caught the human odor from the two beings who lay forty yards away. He was a large and strong beast of prey, but this odor frightened him, and he slunk off among the trees, not to return.
 
Ned and Obed stayed two days beside the little river, taking a complete rest, bathing frequently in the fresh waters, and curing as much of the deer as possible for their journey. Then, rather heavily loaded, they started anew, always going northward through a sad and rough land. Now they entered another bare and sterile region of vast extent, walking for five days, without seeing a single trace of surface water. Had it not been for their capacious water bottles they would have perished, and, even with their aid, it was only by the strictest economy that they lived. The evaporation from the heat was so great that after a mouthful or two of water they were invariably as thirsty as ever, inside of five minutes.
 
They passed from this desert into a wide, dry valley between bare mountains, and entered a great cactus forest, one of the most wonderful things that either of them had ever seen. The ground was almost level, but it was hard and baked. Apparently no more rain fell here than in the genuine desert of shifting sand, and there was not a drop of surface water. Ned, when he first saw the mass of green, took it for a forest of trees, such as one sees in the North, but so great was his interest that he was not disappointed, when he saw that it was the giant cactus.
 
The strange forest extended many miles. The stems of the cactus rose to a height of sixty feet or more, with a diameter often reaching two feet. Sometimes the stems had no branches, but, in case they did, the branches grew out at right angles from the main stem, and then curving abruptly upward continued their growth parallel to the parent stock.
 
The stems of these huge plants were divided into eighteen or twenty ribs, within which at intervals of an inch or so were buds, with cushions, yellow and thick, from which grew six or seven large, and many smaller spines.
 
Most of the cactus trees were gorgeous with flowers, ranging from a deep rich crimson through rose and pink to a creamy white.
 
The green of the plants and the delicate colors of the flowers were wonderfully soothing to the two who had come from the bare and burning desert. There their eyes had ached with the heat and glare. They had longed for shade as men had longed of old for the shadow of a rock in a weary land. In truth they found little shade in the cactus forest, but the green produced the illusion of it. They expected to find flowing or standing water, but they went on for many miles and the soil remained hard and baked, as it can bake only in the rainless regions of high plateaus.
 
They found the forest to be fully thirty miles in length and several miles in width. Everywhere the giant cactus predominated, and on its eastern border they found two Indian men and several women and children gathering the fruit, from which they made an excellent preserve. The Indians were short in stature and very dark. All started to run when they saw the white man and boy, both armed with rifles, approaching, but Ned and Obed held up their hands as a sign of amity and, after some hesitation, they stopped. They spoke a dialect which neither Ned nor Obed could understand, but by signs they made a treaty of peace.
 
They slept that night by the fire of their new friends and the next day they were fortunate enough to shoot a deer, the greater part of which they gave to the Indians. The older of the men then guided them out of the forest at the northern end, and indicated as nearly as he could, by the same sign language, the course they should pursue in order to reach Texas. They had gone too far to the west, and by coming back toward the east they would save distance, as well as pass through a better country. Then he gravely bade them farewell and went back to his people.
 
Ned and Obed now crossed a low but rugged range of mountains, and came into good country where they were compelled to spend a large part of their time, escaping observation. It was only the troubled state of the people and the extreme division of sentiment among them that saved the two from capture. But they obtained news that filled both with joy. Fighting had occurred in Texas, but no great Mexican army had yet gone into the north.
 
Becoming bold now from long immunity and trusting to their Mexican address and knowledge of Spanish and its Mexican variants, they turned into the main road and pursued their journey at a good pace. They were untroubled the first day but on the second day they saw a cloud of dust behind them.
 
"Sheep being driven to market," said Obed.
 
"I don't know," replied Ned, looking back. "That cloud of dust is at least a mile away, but it seems to me I saw it give out a flash or two."
 
"What kind of a flash do you mean?"
 
"Bright, like silver or steel. There, see it!"
 
"Yes, I see it now, and I think you know what makes it, Ned."
 
"I should say that it is the sun striking on the steel heads of long lances."
 
"So should I, and I say also that those lances are carried by Mexican cavalrymen bound for Texas. It may not be a bad guess either that this is the vanguard of the army of Cos. I infer from the volume of dust that it is a considerable force."
 
"Therefore it is wise for us to leave the road and hide as best we can."
 
"Correctly spoken. The truth needs no bush. It walks without talking."
 
They turned aside at once, and entered a field of Indian corn, where they hoped to pass quietly out of sight, but some of the lancers came on very fast and noticed the dusty figures at the far edge of the field. Many of the Mexicans were skilled and suspicious borderers, and the haste with which the two were departing seemed suspicious to them.
 
Ned and Obed heard loud and repeated shouts to halt, but pretending not to hear passed out of the field and entered a stretch of thin forest beyond.
 
"We must not stop," said Obed. "Being regular soldiers they will surely discover, if they overtake us, that we are not Mexicans, and two or three lance thrusts would probably be the end of us. Now that we are among these trees we'll run for it."
 
A shout came from the lancers in the corn field as soon as they saw the two break into a run. Ned heard it, and he felt as the fox must feel when the hounds give tongue. Tremors shook him, but his long and silent mental training came to his aid. His will strengthened his body and he and Obed ran rapidly. Nor did they run without purpose. Both instinctively looked for the roughest part of the land and the thickest stretches of forest. Only there could they hope to escape the lancers who were thundering after them.
 
Ned more than once wished to use his rifle, but he always restrained the impulse, and Obed glanced at him approvingly. He seemed to know what was passing in the boy's mind.
 
"Our bullets would be wasted now, even if we brought down a lancer or two," he said, "so we'll just save 'em until we're cornered—if we are. Then they will tell. Look, here are thorn bushes! Come this way."
 
They ran among the bushes which reached out and took little bits of their clothing as they passed. But they rejoiced in the fact. Horses could never be driven into that dense, thorny growth, and they might evade pursuers on foot. The thorn thicket did not last very long, however. They passed out of it and came into rough ground with a general trend upward. Both were panting now and their faces were wet with perspiration. The breath was dry and hot and the heart constricted painfully. They heard behind them the noise of the pursuit, spread now over a wide area.
 
"If only these hills continue to rise and to rise fast," gasped Obed White, "we may get away among the rocks and bushes."
 
There was a rapid tread of hoofs, and two lancers, with their long weapons leveled, galloped straight at them. Obed leaped to one side, but Ned, so startled that he lost command of himself, stopped and stood still. He saw one of the men bearing down upon him, the steel of the lance head glittering in the sunlight, and instinctively he closed his eyes. He heard a sharp crack, something seemed to whistle before his face, and then came a cry which he knew was the death cry of a man. He had shut his eyes only for a moment, and when he opened them he saw the Mexican falling to the ground, where he lay motionless across his lance. Obed White stood near, and his rifle yet ............