Page:Frank Stockton - Vizier of the two-horned Alexander.djvu/37

TWO-HORNED ALEXANDER of immortality for which I have been searching; but it cannot be such now, for there is no water in it. Then he stooped down and looked carefully at the hollow. 'There has been water here, said he,' and that not long ago, 'for the ground is wet.'

"A horrible suspicion now seized upon me. Could I have drained the contents of the spring of inestimable value? Could I, without knowing it, have deprived my king of the great prize for which he had searched so long, with such labor and pains? Of course I was certain of nothing, but I bowed before Alexander, and told him that I had found an insignificant little puddle at the place, that I had tasted it and found it was nothing but common water, and in quantity so small that it scarcely sufficed to quench my thirst. If he would consent to camp in the shade, and wait a few hours, water would trickle again into the little basin, and fill it, and he could see for himself that this could not be the spring of which he was in search.

"We waited at that place for the rest of the day and the whole of the night, and the next morning the little basin was empty and