Warren went
blind from the glare, and Cameron had to lead him. At last Warren
plunged down, exhausted, in the shade of a ledge.
Cameron rested and waited, hopeless, with hot, weary eyes gazing
down from the height where he sat. The ledge was the top step
of a ragged gigantic stairway. Below stretched a sad, austere,
and lonely valley. A dim, wide streak, lighter than the bordering
gray, wound down the valley floor. Once a river had flowed there,
leaving only a forlorn trace down the winding floor of this forlorn valley.
Movement on the part of Warren attracted Cameron's attention.
Evidently the old prospector had recovered his sight and some of
his strength, for he had arisen, and now began to walk along the
arroyo bed with his forked peach branch held before him. He had
clung to the precious bit of wood. Cameron considered the prospect
for water hopeless, because he saw that the arroyo had once been
a canyon, and had been filled with sands by desert winds. Warren,
however, stopped in a deep pit, and, cutting his canteen in half,
began to use one side of it as a scoop. He scooped out a wide
hollow, so wide that Cameron was certain he had gone crazy. Cameron
gently urged him to stop, and then forcibly tried to make him.
But these efforts were futile. Warren worked with slow, ceaseless,
methodical movement. He toiled for what seemed hours. Cameron,
seeing the darkening, dampening sand, realized a wonderful possibility
of water, and he plunged into the pit with the other half of the
canteen.
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