Cactus and Rattlers/Chapter 4

UNRISE found Haywire serving an early feed to Tompkins and Sagebrush, while the laden flivver rested out in front of the hotel awaiting them. Tompkins expected to drive the flivver—in fact, he was forced to drive it. When they had about finished their breakfast, Hassayamp appeared, yawning.

"You gents sure are industrious critters," he observed casually. "Which way you headin' for?"

"West," said Tompkins promptly. "We shall impersiflate the great and boundless expanses of the arid lands beneath the setting sun."

"That's good." Hassayamp bent a significant eye on Sagebrush. "It's right healthy out in the flat country. I got to go east my own self today. Well, so long, and good luck to you, Puffesser! Hope you find lots of bugs."

"Travelin' with me," said Sagebrush, "the Perfesser wont find nothing else."

"I believe it," returned Hassayamp acidly. "I sure believe it."

"Meanin' what?" demanded Sagebrush, one hand slipping toward his waistband.

"Meanin' that you sure know the desert, o' course! What else would I mean?"

Sagebrush grunted and departed, while Hassayamp muttered inaudibly and glared.

Tompkins climbed into the flivver; Sagebrush climbed in after him; and with a roar the little car started out of town. One mile north of Stovepipe Springs the main highway turned abruptly to the right, for the Chuckwalla range, and beyond it, the civilized purlieus of Chuckwalla City, thirty miles away. The desert highway continued on ahead, and ran, a flea-bitten track, straight over the northern horizon.

"I suppose," asked Tompkins as they rattled out of town, "you never happened to meet up with a large pink granite boulder, halfway up a cañon, split in two, with three piñons growing out of it, and a little spring at the foot of the piñons?"

"Nope," said Sagebrush after a moment. "Nope, can't say that I have, but that don't signify much. Aint no piñon trees around yere except toward the Chuckwallas. Pink granite is most anywheres. I'm right disappointed you aint headin' east. I'd kind o' set my notions on looking over that there Pinecate section."

Tompkins chuckled. Then, as they approached the turn in the highway, he swung the car to the right and headed for the distant peaks of the Chuckwallas.

"That's where we're going, Sagebrush."

"How come you told Hassayamp—"

"Because I was telling Hassayamp."

Sagebrush grinned, got out a black plug of navy cut, and bit happily at it.

"You and me sure is goin' to get on, Perfesser. Whoop her up!" Then he grunted. "You heard what he said 'bout it bein' healthy out to the desert? Durn him! Durn him and Sidewinder and all the rest o' them galoots! They been tryin' to keep me out o' the Chuckwallas for quite a spell back. I bet Hassayamp's got some claims over there hisself."

"Why have they been trying to keep you out of there?"

"Dad-blamed if I know. Jest plumb ornery, I reckon. Maybe they're afraid I'd meet some o' the pilgrims they gets located over there, and talk. They allus locates some over there this time o' year, when there's lots o' water and things look good."

OMPKINS, who had removed his yellow blinders, squinted out at the desert with frowning eyes, and drove on in silence. He was reasonably sure that in Sagebrush Beam he had chanced upon the one man who might be of incalculable value to him. However, he was not disposed to take any premature chances. His own real business, here was a matter for himself alone.

The flivver ate up the miles rapidly, ever advancing upon the Chuckwalla hills, which appeared to recede as it approached. To one acquainted with the desert only from the window of a railroad car, this morning's ride would have been a tremendous surprise. Under close inspection, what appeared to be ground flat as a billiard table was shown to be in reality dissected by almost invisible arroyos and crowned by slight rises. The blinding white desert glare was in fact a spectrum of brilliancy, only visible to accustomed eyes. The eastern horizon was barred by the Chuckwallas, a rather high range which on their western slopes presented only a bleakly dun expanse streaked with purple. To west and north were scattered buttes in splendid colorings of scarlet and lavender and gold, while the patches of cacti across the desert floor made brilliant carpet-spots of vivid green, sprinkled with the raw yet blending hues of an Oriental rug. Here were ocatilla sprays, towering up many feet in glowing blossom; here were opuntias gorgeous with red and yellow clusters, gaunt Joshua trees gay with bloom—all the brief flower-time of the desert was at its height. In a few more days the blossoms would be gone, the myriad flowers springing from the earth would be withered, and the white glare would break only over the brownish-green verdure of brush and cactus in summer garb.

Hot as that glare might be, the motion of the car kept its occupants comfortable; and the flivver itself, specially equipped with water-pump for desert use, made no complaint as the miles dropped behind. Now and again Tompkins asked a question, Sagebrush responding curtly. Garrulous as he was at times, the old desert rat was for the most part silent as the desert itself, whose quiet was broken only by the angry chattering of cactus wrens or the occasional shrill call-whistle of a thrasher.

Twenty miles had been covered, and the Chuckwalla slopes, apparently as distant as ever, were now broken up into foothills and deep cañons, all a dead dun glare under the white sun, when Sagebrush touched the arm of the driver.

"Half a mile ahead the trail branches off to Pinecate Mesa. That's it, off to the left—reg'lar saddletop. Look out for a dry wash, soon's ye leave the road."

Tompkins looked at Pinecate. This was a great gaunt saddleback that ran off into the range; he set it down as about ten miles distant, and well to the left. The cañon which gave access to the mesa itself was, as Sagebrush informed him, on the north side and therefore out of sight at present.

The turnout was almost invisible, but Tompkins caught it, swerved the car into the looser sand, and was aware of a grunt of assent from beside him. Then he jammed on the brakes and slid into a "dry" wash which at the moment was a foot deep in water, splashed through, and climbed out on the other side.

"Hold on a minute," spoke up Sagebrush. "Let's have a look at this yere trail."

The car halted, and both men got out. Here, off the highway and sheltered by the mesquite on either hand, the loose earth would bear any "sign" indefinitely, for nothing less than a sandstorm would wash over the tracks. Sagebrush examined the sand attentively, then expectorated and turned to Tompkins, who had donned his yellow blinders as a protection against the glare.

"What d'ye make of it?"

"Automobile," said Tompkins. "How long ago, I can't say."

AGEBRUSH grunted at this, and pointed to a series of scroll-like markings which followed the right-hand tire-rut. Then he indicated further prints in the shape of a Maltese cross, which had obviously been made over the scrolls.

"Flivver come along yere yestiddy," he stated. "Last night a sidewinder come along and follered the ruts. Then this mornin' early a roadrunner come along likewise."

"All obvious but the time, Sherlock," said Tompkins gravely. "How do you know it was yesterday and not last week?"

"'Cause I seen that thar cuss Hassayamp ridin' out this-a-way yestiddy morning as I was comin' in to town to mail my post-cards. Some skullduggery goin' on."

"Hm!" Tompkins frowned. "Sagebrush, that mesa up ahead would make a fine place for a chicken-ranch, wouldn't it?"

"Hell of a fine place," affirmed the desert rat, squinting at the long saddle-back. "Danged fine place, Perfesser! Every wildcat and coyote in the Chuckwallas would be pointin' that way, inside of a week. If a gent was feelin' real philanthropic and wantin' to help out the pore desert critters, I'd say start him a chicken-and-egg factory right up yonder. Yessir. That's like Haywire Johnson done, time he was livin' down to Meteorite. He started him a egg-ranch—done it to get ahead of some other folks and kep' it real quiet. Got all his chickens clear from Phoenix and Yuma, danged near a hull car-load of 'em, and set up incubators and all that truck. Then he begun to figger on how rich he'd be. Every oncet in a while he'd go out to look for eggs, but dad blame if he got any. He fed them chickens on everything from ground-up lizards to egg-plant, and nary a egg come along. Finally he got desp'rit and called in help—and durned if all them birds wasn't roosters! Yessir, not a female chicken in the lot. That's how come Haywire went broke and had to come over yere to work for Hassayamp."

OMPKINS grinned despite himself. Then he sobered.

"Look here, Sagebrush. Remember that young woman at the hotel? They've framed up a deal on her. They're trying to sell her a chicken-ranch on this mesa."

"Sounds like them city fellers. Dad blame, they'd rob a dyin' man! Serves the female right, too, for havin' that much money. Females ain't got no right to have money. Oncet when I was married and livin' down to Umatilla, my ol' woman got ten dollars from one of her relations and went to Phoenix, and durned if she didn't spend it all in three days. When I trounced her for it, she up and run off with a Mormon from Yuma, and that's the last of her. Twenty years ago that was, and I been happy ever since, and ain't looked twice at no females."

"That's a novel argument, certainly," said Tompkins. "But I'm going to try and keep Miss Gilman from getting robbed. Are you with me?"

Sagebrush rubbed his whiskers, squinted at the sand, expectorated over an unwary Chuckwalla lizard, and then responded without enthusiasm.

"Nope! Quicker that there female gits skun and gits out o' this country, better off I'll be. I don't hanker after no females spoilin' the scenery. Besides which, I aint pinin' to start no argument with Sidewinder Crowfoot and his crowd, not witout they force me into it. Leave the other feller alone, I says, so long's he don't crowd ye none."

"All right, then," said Tompkins briskly, and turned to the car. "Let's get moving."

HEY drove on in renewed silence. Tompkins had a new angle on his companion, and was not sure that he liked it; at all events, he perceived that Sagebrush knew his own mind and was not to be depended upon as an assistant under the present completion of things. The desert rat had a certain peculiar philosophy of his own, like all old prospectors, and arguments against it would be as useless as the teeth of a coyote against the shell of a tortoise. So Tompkins held his peace.

The flat desert gave way to hills and depressions as they drew closer to the range, and by the action of the engine Tompkins knew that they had been on a steady climb. Also, he began to sight scattered piñon trees, indicating a higher altitude, and was conscious that they were following an ancient road. Presently the car was climbing along a well defined valley, which Sagebrush called Mint Cañon.

"Ol' stamp-mill ahead of us," he announced. "Fellers used to bring quartz down to it from all around, in the ol' days. Got to leave the car there. Job Carter put up that there mill; four-stamp crusher, she was—dad blame, how Job did like his licker! Used to make mint juleps in a bucket. That's how come he growed mint. Job, he used to whiff the mint and then throw down the licker while he held his breath. One night he wakes up with a pain in his stummick and mixes him a julep in the dark, and got him the cyanide bottle by mistake, and he's buried somewhere back o' the mill right now. That's what comes o' not stoppin' to appreciate your licker as it goes down."

They rounded a low hill and halted by the remains of the stamp-mill—a structure of weather-beaten boards, open in front, with the remains of a shed adjoining. The machinery was rusted and strewn about the place haphazard, and the whole place was the epitome of desolation. To one side was a board floor—the only relic of what had once been a roadside saloon, adjoining the mill.

Sagebrush pointed out that by leaving the car here in shelter of the shed, they could then shoulder packs and cover the last three miles to Pinecate Cañon on foot. The Professor took one look at the duffle in the rear of the car, and threw in the gears.

"Not by a blamed sight!" he said cheerfully. "Looks like Hassayamp's car has gone ahead, so we'll do likewise. Did I mention that Hassayamp is bringing Miss Gilman out today to look over the cañon for a chicken-ranch site?"

"Dad blame it!" groaned Sagebrush. "Then I'm goin' to take my pick and go look over the north end o' the mesa. You can pester around that female if ye like, Perfesser, but not me. Send up a smoke when they're gone and I'll come in."

"Agreed," and Tompkins laughed as he sent the car ahead in the faint tracks left by the other flivver.