Page:The Pacific Monthly vol. 14.djvu/106

 he was still a couple of hundred feet in advance, and seemed visibly uneasy, for again and again he turned liis head to look back at his insane companion. And, while McNuUy Avas strugghng through the sand in contemplation of the bloody deed, Donaldson drew the canteens around upon his breast and trudged more rapidly forward. Finally, after several minutes, he returned them to their former position, but still kept his hands in front of him. McNully was now gaining rapidly. The terror of death consumed him, and so —

Nervously, but cautiously, McXuUy lifted the rifle to his shoulder and ran his bloodshot eye blindly along the barrel. Finally, when he feared that Donaldson would look back, he pulled the trigger. Donaldson, with a smothered cry, fell for- ward on the parching sand — face downward, with his hands beneath him. Now, as in the last delirium of insanity, McNully staggered wildly to his side and kicked the body. There was no response, no movement of the limp, still limbs. The bullet had reached its mark.

But McNully did not observe the absence of a bullet-hole. lie was too eager to taste the water. Like a maniac he tore the vessels rudely from their place, and started, with a groan, as he observed how light they were. There were only a few pitiful drops in each canteen, which he drank exultantly. Then he gazed down at the outstretched body of his companion. So, he had been a traitor, and after all, had deserved to die ! He had stolen the water of the two canteens, and drank it when McNully was not observing him. No wonder Donaldson had been able to walk so fast ! Well, McNully had avenged himself.

A buzzard, appearing magically from some unknown quarter, circled lazily in the air above him, with its eye fastened upon the prostrate body of the prospector. Once or twice it flapped its greasy wings, and then flew on until lost in the far firma- ment. McNully gazed after it and smiled; he took the knapsack from Donaldson's sliouldcrs and trudged wearily on into the white vastness of the valley. He did not look back, for suddenly, before him, lay a land of fruit and water — a vision of heaven outstretched on the grim, hot desert. A great, wide emerald river over- shadowed by Hesperian groves of fruit and semi-tropic trees invited him to health and rest — to life — to water. Ah, God, how thankful he was that he had reached the river! But — what river was it? Perhaps a stream that had never been discovered — a river unknown to the nomads of the desert.

These were among the tangled thoughts of the crazed McNully, as he stag- gered faintly in the direction of the wood-fringed river. There was nothing to tell him that he was pursuing the dread mirage — the fatal, death-delusion known as the Desert Lie. Only when the sun went down, and he found himself staring vacantly into an endless, unbroken desert of desolation did he realize that it was all a phan- tom of the sun's creation — an iridescent picture of Tantalian mockery.

The fever was eating at his brain. A mixture of sand and alkali whirled in an eddying cloud before him ; and a blast of air — like the breath of some bantering devil — arose from the white bosom of the parching barrenness, seeming to sap the last remnant of strength from his brain and body. He lay upon the sand and breathed with difficulty. Finally his head fell back, and his eyes closed wearily. Again tlie buzzard appeared, soaring in wide circles, and exulting at the wretch whom it knew must soon become its feast.

The sun descended and soon the air became more tolerable, but McNully was now resigned. The despair and anguish had given place to apathy — a dumb, cold feeling of indifference. But as the moon arose above the far, gray hills of the hor- izon, scanning the desert with its spectral, ghastly face, IMcNully discerned a visitor, a black, restless phantom that moved uncertainly among the sands, at times dis- appearing behind a near-by knoll, and later appearing in another portion of the descrt^now behind him — now before him — going slowly and furtively around him. and drawing nearer and nearer as it went, until at last it vanished and was visible no more. Tie could not stand, l)ut he grasped the rifle, which he still carried, and lay there, watching eagerly, deliriously, for the spectre.

Gradually the moon ascended and the lifeless, lustre-lacking stars came out