Page:Stewart Edward White--The Rose Dawn.djvu/174

162 brook, climbed a tiny dividing ridge, and so found themselves on the down grade into the back country. Kenneth had often looked abroad over this back country from the ridge, but never had he descended into it. They rattled down with a continuous shrieking and scraping of brakes. On this side of the range the various kinds of chaparral grew to a height and thickness that made of it almost a jungle. The trees, too, were larger—both the live oaks, the white oaks, and the enormous contorted sycamores along the stream beds. It was a rolling land of shallow, wide valleys with streams in them flanked by mesas on which trees grew parklike; and all about were very lofty, dark mountains on which the lighter coloured stratified rocks showed in patterns. The air had here a different quality—very hot, but dry, with an exhilaration in it. Everywhere, but especially along the river down the general direction of which their course lay, was a teeming bird life. The bush was full of them, hopping, perching, chirping; the ground was alive with them, scurrying and scratching; the air was traced with the slow circlings of innumerable stately buzzards or larger hawks. Brush rabbits sitting in the soft dust of the road made two hops to vanish in the bushes; jackrabbits bounded loftily away across sage flats; in every grass opening the ground squirrels scurried to their holes, or sat upright and chirked. Once Kenneth caught a glimpse of some large gray animal as it flashed away.

"What was that?" he cried, excited.

The cowboy spat over the wheel.

"Bobcat, I reckon," said he.

This cowboy was a grave and silent individual, who answered questions politely but very briefly, and volunteered nothing whatever. Yes, there were plenty of quail. Yes, there were plenty of deer. Yes, there's ducks on Pico Lake. Yes, there's trout in the river; rainbows and steelhead.

At noon they drew aside in a little grass flat where a brook ran into the river. The cowboy unhitched the team and provided it with feed. Then he rolled a paper cigarette. To Kenneth's question he replied briefly that he didn't wish for no lunch. Kenneth took his sandwiches in his hand and went down to look at the river.