No longer did it wait. No longer did it in passive, latent malignance. Now the evil unsheathed its thorns, like a knife-thrower drawing his dirks for the first time. Now the adder-toothed retama struck from beneath the disguise of yellow flowers which had caused the Mexicans to call it flower of gold. Now the deadly Spanish of the devil's head thrust and parried and lunged like a fencer.
 
Ever since Crawford had returned to the Big O, the brasada had filled him with a strange, sense of its time, out there, surrounding them with its , purring, waiting destruction. And now, as if this was what it had anticipated, it seemed to leap in all its deadly, ruthless , like a beast . Never before had it fought him so, blocking his way impenetrably, cutting and stabbing and striking every foot of the way. And Crawford met its challenge, taking a wild, savage delight in pitting all his skill and strength and experience against the brasada's violent, cunning, .
 
And he had a horse! Knowing it would take something more than an ordinary brush horse to catch Huerta, he had chosen Africano. It had not been broken to the spade bit yet, but would work with a hackamore, and the fact that they had first captured it in the brasada indicated a life of running the , which would make it a good brush horse even without training. Just how good, Crawford realized the first they traversed. The puro negro met the brush with a fearless, skill, something uncanny about the way it could sense whether the mogotes were actually impenetrable or whether they held a weak spot which could be run through. It found holes in thickets Crawford would never have guessed were there, running headlong through the most ramaderos without a moment's . The kind of a horse a brush-popper dreamed about. It was a constant battle, and Crawford fought it with the wild abandon to the brasadero when he was riding the brush like this, shouting at the horse and himself and anything else that wanted to listen, and cursing in two languages at every stabbing, clawing thicket which tried to drag him off.
 
And the names passed by, as they had before. Silver Persimmons. Turtle Sink. Rio Diablo. Chapotes Platas. He had tried to follow Huerta's trail for a while, but when he had seen the undeviating direction it was taking he had quit tracking and had let the black out. Finally he came crashing through the fringe of chaparral into the clearing above Rio Diablo and swung down off the , heaving horse, and ran toward the jacal. A man was trying to crawl across the threshold of the .
 
"Crawford," he . "I knew it was you. I heard you coming ten miles off. There never was anybody could match you cussing the brush. I guess that's 'cause there never was anybody loved it the way you do." He tried to rise , his eyes opening in a way as he stared past Crawford. "Dios, Africano!"
 
Crawford had reached him by then. "What happened, Del? They did this to you?"
 
Dried blood darkened the old man's face, and the soles of his bare feet had a red, look. "You got a hackamore on it," said Delcazar vacantly, still staring at the black. "You can't ride that with a hackamore. You're loco—"
 
"Who did it? Tell me who did it!" almost shouted Crawford.
 
"Merida—"
 
"She did this!"
 
"No, no," Delcazar weakly. "Merida come first. She say she needed help. Say you weren't with her any more for some reason. Had an idea I knew about Snake Thickets. While she was still here, Huerta came. Followed her, I guess. He thought I knew about Snake Thickets too. Those cigarettes of Huerta's. I'm a viejo, an old man. I couldn't stand much. The woman try to stop him. She couldn't do it."
 
"How do you get in, Delcazar?" Crawford's voice shook with its low .
 
Delcazar's eyes widened. "Crawford, you ain't going to try and follow them. It's suicide. Even if you know how to get in. Those serpientes. You been there. You heard them. Please, you and I been amigos too long. Let those fools kill themselves after a chest of pesos. Who wants pesos—"
 
"How do you get in?"
 
Crawford's voice held a , driven stridor that Delcazar. The old man stared at him a moment, mouth open slightly. Maybe it was the pale, set look to Crawford's face.
 
"Rio Diablo. You know how it goes underground about a mile above here. Nobody's ever been able to find where it comes up again. It comes from the Nueces past here and then drops out of sight and there ain't nothing left but the dry bed going on south to Mogotes Serpientes. I'll tell you where it does come up again. Right inside Snake Thickets. That's why nobody ever found it. You know how water in a place like Turtle Sink dries up during the day. Then, come night, it rises to the surface again. That's what happens inside Mogotes Serpientes. During the day, the part of Rio Diablo that surfaces inside the thickets is all dried up. Then when evening sets in, it comes up again. That's how you get in. You got to run a short stretch of the thicket before you reach water. That's why you have to time it right. The snakes sleep during the day, and start to stir around at sundown. That's about the same time the water starts rising. If you start in just a few minutes before the sun sets, you can run that stretch of thicket between the outside and the water while the snakes are still asleep. Naturally you'll wake them, but you got a bigger chance of reaching the water than if they were already wide-awake and waiting for you. Once you're in the , you're safe. The snakes will come down to drink, but rattlers like dry land too much to go swimming in that muck. Time it wrong by one minute either way and you're done. If you go in too early and the water ain't risen yet, you're setting right in the middle of a million rattlers. And if you go in too late and the snakes are stirring around, they'll probably get you before you reach water. I found it out from an old Comanche a long time ago, Crawford. I was afraid to tell. I was afraid to go in myself and I was afraid somebody would make me show them the way if I tell, and I couldn't do that, Crawford, nobody could. It's suicide. Maybe those Mexicans do it once, with the chests. It couldn't be done again in a million years."
 
"Still got those boots?"
 
"Crawford, please, you ain't going to—"
 
"I'll want your batwings too."
 
Delcazar began to cry without sound, and the words came between his lips with a resigned audibility. "In the jacal. Under my ."
 
Crawford stepped past the man, the decision hard and crystallized in him now, permitting no other considerations. He hauled out the old pair of boots someone in Delcazar's family had worn with Diaz, and unhooked a pair of batwing chaps from the bunk post, a rarity in this border section where most men preferred chivarras. He pulled the ancient Chimayo from the bunk and began cutting it in strips with the bowie. Then he wound the strips about his legs like puttees, up to his crotch, till they formed three or four layers; he had trouble pulling the jack boots on over this thickness.
 
"Pechero?" he said, swiftly th............