When he had passed it he had his own country under
foot. In the heat of midday he halted in the shade of a rock, and,
lifting the Yaqui down, gave him a drink. Then, after a long,
sweeping survey of the surrounding desert, he removed Sol's saddle
and let him roll, and took for himself a welcome rest and a bite
to eat.
The Yaqui was tenacious of life. He was still holding his own.
For the first time Gale really looked at the Indian to study him.
He had a large head nobly cast, and a face that resembled a
shrunken mask. It seemed chiseled in the dark-red, volcanic lava
of his Sooner wilderness. The Indian's eyes were always black
and mystic, but this Yaqui's encompassed all the tragic desolation
of the desert. They were fixed on Gale, moved only when he moved.
The Indian was short and broad, and his body showed unusual
muscular development, although he seemed greatly emaciated from
starvation or illness.
Gale resumed his homeward journey. When he got through the pass
he faced a great depression, as rough as if millions of gigantic
spikes had been driven by the hammer of Thor into a seamed and
cracked floor. This was Altar Valley. It was a chaos of arroyo's,
canyons, rocks, and ridges all mantled with cactus, and at its
eastern end it claimed the dry bed of Forlorn River and water
when there was any.
With a wounded, helpless man across the saddle, this stretch of thorny
and contorted desert was practically impassable.
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