As they walked on, Arvid pulled out his watch; before it got too dark he wanted to know what time it was. His father had instructed him to keep the cylinder watch well cleaned at all times. Now he was afraid that sand might have got into the vest pocket when he fell; if a grain of sand got into the works it might stop the watch.
Arvid held the nickel watch against his swollen, cracked lips and blew on it as it dangled from its chain, blew away the sand. Then he turned the lining of his pocket inside out and brushed it well with his fingers before he put the watch back in again.
Around them cliffs and sandhills donned the black cape of night and assumed nocturnal shapes. Once again they became monstrous creatures: a buffalo ox’s horn-crowned royal head was placed on a mule’s narrow, spindly body, and a desert wolf with a thirty-foot tail opened its deep cliff-jaws in front of them. And the wall of distant hills underwent its metamorphosis and produced camels and dromedaries with humped backs and swaying necks. After the caravan day the desert’s beasts of burden had lain down to rest in a circle under the stars.
They had gone out to search for a pair of stray mules, but a little while ago they had come across another animaclass="underline"
“The horse had just been shod!” said Arvid.
Robert too had noticed this. The horse lay dead, and half eaten away, but his shoes had glittered brilliantly in the sun. It was doubly evil to meet death with new shoes on one’s feet. They gleamed like silver above the rotten flesh. And the separated, lone hind leg had stiffened in the sand in a final vain resistance. It rose in an accusing kick against the Lord in heaven. Poor lone hind leg in the wide plain!
But Arvid had seen something still more lonely than the hind leg; he had almost stepped on it.
“It was a forefinger! It pointed right at us!”
The evening coolness had cleared Robert’s head and he could again think clearly; his thoughts were circling around one single object, one only — the one they were now looking for.
He had thrown away his shoes and the sand felt cooler when he walked barefoot. But inside he was filled with dry, hot, burning embers which had plagued him for more than a day now. In the blisters on his lips this fire burned and stung; his tongue grew into a swollen, smarting lump, tasting of hard, gray earth from the dried-out water holes. It had to be somewhere, somewhere they must find it. It couldn’t have dried up everywhere, somewhere it must still well forth. They must go on searching, they would find it at last.
Before they got lost they had seen water in many places, and the holes had not been dry. It couldn’t have dried up all at once. If they only could find some grass again, then surely they would be close — that short, thick grass, the buffalo grass. . Only yesterday they had seen it on their journey — or was it the day before yesterday? Which morning was it he had awakened and found the two mules gone? Was it yesterday, the day before yesterday, or the day before the day before yesterday?
Somewhere they would find it.
They had traveled many hundred miles to join the gold caravan, the train of the hundred thousand. Now they were looking for something very common: water.
— 2—
Over the biggest dromedary’s dark hump the moon rose. From the moon disc — three quarters filled — a pale, clear light was diffused over the sandy plain. Now they could continue their search, they would be lighted by the night sun.
They had walked only a short distance when they found themselves in a hollow. Arvid was the first one to discover it: something gleamed in the moonlight at the bottom of the hollow. He saw it only for a second — then he let out a hoarse howl.
Violently he pulled his hand from Robert’s, rushed forward a few paces, and threw himself headlong on the ground. Robert had seen nothing as yet, as he came stumbling behind, half asleep. What was the matter with Arvid? Did he see water again? Twice before he had seen it, but only in his imagination; as soon as they had reached the place they found only dry sand.
But now Arvid was lying on his stomach, drinking from a small pool in the bottom of the deep hollow. It had been a big water hole, but had now narrowed to a small pool. And Arvid was guzzling and drinking. It was not imagination this time; at last they had found water.
Robert not only saw the water, he could hear it from the noise his friend made. But when he came closer he could see in the clear moonlight that it was no fresh, gushing spring they had found. It was a mud hole with stagnant, thick, dirty, opaque water. It did not look like good drinking water. In the ash-gray mud around the pool were deep, hardened tracks from animals.
He threw himself on his knees beside his comrade to drink. But such a nauseating odor filled his nostrils that he pulled back. The pool stank from something rotten, cadaverous. His desire to quench his thirst was checked by a feeling of nausea.
But Arvid was stretched out full length on his stomach, his whole chin in the pool, like an animal that drinks by putting its snout into the water. He was lapping and drinking in long swallows — puffing, panting, snorting, drinking. He got water in his windpipe, he coughed, it bubbled in the pool.
“It stinks like hell,” mumbled Robert.
Arvid did not worry about the odor; he was not using his nose; only his mouth and throat were open. He continued to drink, sucking in the water like a cow, gorging himself drinking. For each swallow he let out a deep, muffled, satisfied groan.
“Is it all right? It smells like stale piss.”
Robert again bent down over the pool, driven by his insufferable thirst. His mouth touched the water — he must overcome his nausea, he must drink. Anyone as thirsty as he must drink anything fluid, however nasty it smelled. But in the moonlight it seemed as if the water was cleaner and clearer on the opposite side of the pool. He crawled on his knees away from Arvid to the other side. Here it did seem less nauseating.
Beside him a post had been driven into the ground, with a piece of board nailed to it. There were letters on the board, clumsily written in chalk. After one look at the board Robert was on his feet again:
LOOK AT THIS
Don’t Drink — The Water Is Poison — The Death
The post with the narrow board across it rose beside the water hole like a cross on a grave. Robert looked at the wooden cross for one long, frightened second, then he yelled, “Stop, Arvid! Its death!”
In his fright he was using English words which his friend did not understand.
“Come, Arvid, and look at this post! It says the water is poisoned!”
And at once he could hear what the Mexican had said: the water holes along the trail were not to be trusted. Someone had drunk of this water before and discovered it was poisonous and put up the sign to warn others.
“For Christ’s sake, stop drinking!” He grabbed his comrade by the shoulder to pull him from the water. But Arvid had already raised himself up on his knees. He had drunk a lot, he had satisfied his thirst. Water trickled in big drops from the corners of his mouth; his chin with its scraggy beard looked like a dripping muzzle. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and belched.
“Helluva dirty water. Don’t quench the thirst much.”
“It’s poisoned!”
Robert pointed to the sign where the warning could be read in large letters. But it was in English and meant nothing to Arvid.
“For God’s sake, don’t drink any more!”
“Well, it wasn’t very good water. It’s stinky!”