Brand Blotters

The tenderfoot, slithering down a hillside of shale, caught at a

greasewood bush and waited. The sound of a rifle shot had drifted across

the ridge to him. Friend or foe, it made no difference to him now. He had

reached the end of his tether, must get to water soon or give up the

fight.

No second shot broke the stillness. A swift zigzagged across the cattle

trail he was following. Out of a blue sky the Arizona sun still beat down

upon a land parched by æons of drought, a land still making its brave show

of greenness against a dun background.

Arrow straight the man made for the hill crest. Weak as a starved puppy,

his knees bent under him as he climbed. Down and up again a dozen times,

he pushed feverishly forward. All day he had been seeing things. Cool

lakes had danced on the horizon line before his tortured vision. Strange

fancies had passed in and out of his mind. He wondered if this, too, were

a delusion. How long that stiff ascent took him he never knew, but at

last he reached the summit and crept over its cactus-covered shoulder.

He looked into a valley dressed in its young spring garb. Of all deserts

this is the loveliest when the early rains have given rebirth to the hope

that stirs within its bosom once a year. But the tenderfoot saw nothing of

its pathetic promise, of its fragile beauty so soon to be blasted. His

sunken eyes swept the scene and found at first only a desert waste in

which lay death.

"I lose," he said to himself out loud.

With the words he gave up the long struggle and sank to the ground. For

hours he had been exhausted to the limit of endurance, but the will to

live had kept him going. Now the driving force within had run down. He

would die where he lay.

Another instant, and he was on his feet again eager, palpitant, tremulous.

For plainly there had come to him the bleating of a calf.

Moving to the left, he saw rising above the hill brow a thin curl of

smoke. A dozen staggering steps brought him to the edge of a draw. There

in the hollow below, almost within a stone's throw, was a young woman

bending over a fire. He tried to call, but his swollen tongue and dry

throat refused the service. Instead, he began to run toward her.

Beyond the wash was a dead cow. Not far from it lay a calf on its side,

all four feet tied together. From the fire the young woman took a red-hot

running iron and moved toward the little bleater.