Bloom of Cactus Part 3

"Why? We couldn't hide our tracks. Even if the devils aren't mounted, they'd soon overtake us. An Indian can lope along all day, like a coyote."

Lennon looked deliberately around at the ridge and sat down to clean and reload his rifle. Carmena's eyes flashed.

"You've got the idea," she said. "We'll eat and back up to the spring.

The cave is an easy place to hold. You said you can shoot?"

"Rather well. Very long range rifle, too. I've knocked over a caribou with it at nearly a mile, up on Hudson Bay."

Carmena glanced at the high-power weapon and then raised her flas.h.i.+ng eyes to gaze over the bent head of its owner. Midway out across the desolate Basin, from the top of a craggy hill to the right of the line of Triple b.u.t.te, puffs of smoke were rising into the cloudless steel-blue sky.

The girl hastened to loosen her pony's pack and take from her saddlebags a frying pan, several slices of bacon, and a big chunk of corn pone.

CHAPTER III

THE GILA MONSTER

The bacon was ready almost as soon as Lennon's rifle. Carmena rose from beside the embers of the fire with the pan and corn bread.

"Fetch the canteens," she directed. "We'll eat over here under that overhanging rock."

But at the edge of the shade, below the outjutting cliff ledge, she stopped short with her gaze fixed upon an object close to the sand-sculptured wall of rock.

"Ever see a Gila monster?" she queried.

"No. You don't mean to say--really----"

Lennon had sprung forward beside her. His curious eyes at once perceived the hideous, thickset lizard that lay flattened upon the shadowed sand as if in a torpor. The reptile's dirty orange-mottled black body was as loathsome as its venomous blunt-nosed head.

"Big specimen--almost two feet long," remarked Carmena. "Hold on. Don't shoot. That sure would tell the bronchos where we are."

"But if we are to eat here?" questioned Lennon. "I don't fancy the company of this sweet wiggler--not that I believe the wild yarns about them. All lizards are non-poisonous. No poison glands have ever been found in the mouth of these so-called monsters."

"Just look and see," rejoined the girl. "But look in the lower jaw.

Trouble is, you science sharps expected to find hollow fangs and the sacs above, like a rattler's. Do you know why a Gila monster flops on his back when he bites? It's to let the loose poison in his lower jaw drain into the hollow teeth."

"Really?"

The girl faced him with a challenging look.

"If they turn over, it's as bad as being struck by a six-foot diamond-back. They lock their jaws, and the poison---- But I've seen a man snap the head off one of those big snakes. Let's see if you have the nerve to toss this little lizard outside."

Lennon's smile faded as he perceived that the girl was in sober earnest.

Very naturally he hesitated. He was not given to bravado, and even without her a.s.sertion that the reptile was deadly poisonous, he would have loathed to touch so repulsive a creature.

But there is no spur so galling as the derisive smile of a comely young woman. Lennon dropped his rifle, walked in beside the Gila monster, and suddenly clutching the lizard in mid-body, flung it several yards out upon the sun-scorched sand. The girl's scorn gave place to a look of grave approval.

"You'll do," she said. "Fact is, they're so sluggish in the shade you didn't run the slightest risk. You couldn't know that, though. Yes, you'll do. Only don't try playing with the fellow out there in the sun.

The light livens them up."

The advice was needless. Lennon felt quite ready to sit down beside the girl and start eating, though he first rubbed his hands thoroughly in the sand. Neither had much to say. They were alike intent upon satisfying their keen hunger and keeping a sharp lookout against the chance of an attack.

After a time Lennon noticed that the Gila monster had crawled up on a little sand ridge in the full glare of the mid-day sun. It was viciously snapping its jaws and twitching its thick head from side to side.

Carmena gave no heed to the angered reptile. She was gazing off toward the jagged hill from which had risen the distant smoke puffs.

As the girl finished her share of the hearty food she leaned sideways, with her ungloved hand on the sand at the edge of the cliff shadow. Like the hand, her wrist was white and well rounded. She drew off her old sombrero.

Lennon's gaze lifted to the wealth of dark hair that lay coiled about her shapely head. The girl was neither pretty nor beautiful, yet there was a certain handsomeness about her strong features.

Out of the tail of his eye Lennon caught a glimpse of a black and orange blur streaking toward them over the hot sand. He had seen many darting lizards that day. But none had moved more swiftly than the clumsily built Gila monster now darted at the disturbers of his torpor. There was no time for thought. Lennon sensed that the reptile aimed to strike at Carmena's bared wrist.

"Jump!" he cried, and flung himself forward to block the attack with his out-thrust right hand.

An instant later the Gila monster snapped its gaping jaws together on the fleshy edge of Lennon's palm. It whirled over upon its back. Caught outstretched and almost p.r.o.ne upon the ground, Lennon sought to wrench his hand free and draw away. The heavy lizard was dragged along with its crooked legs futilely clawing the air. But its powerful jaws remained clenched on the hand with bulldog tenacity.

A voice shrilled in Lennon's ear: "Hold still! Hold still!"

Carmena stooped over the writhing monster to thrust the muzzle of a small revolver against the side of its lower jaw. The bullet shattered the jaw and blew it half off. A vigorous kick hurled the now harmless reptile aside.

Lennon had started to raise himself to a sitting position. Carmena flung herself upon her knees and caught up his torn hand to her red lips. She sucked hard at the wounds----

With the suddenness of a dropped veil, the hot, white glare of the desert noon went black before Lennon's eyes. He sank down upon the sand, unconscious.

When the light of returning life glimmered back into his brain, he first was dimly aware of a pale Madonna face that appeared to hover close above him. His clearing gaze gradually made out the girl's features.

There was no colour even in her lips. Her eyes were wide with grief and dread.

She saw the dawning consciousness in his eyes.

"Jack!" she whispered--"Jack!--You haven't left me--you won't leave me!"

"Who--what's the matter?---- Oh, that----"

He sought to raise his right arm. It was strangely numb and heavy. The girl lifted it from her lap, where it had been lying. He saw that her silk handkerchief had been knotted around his bared forearm and twisted very tight with the barrel of the little revolver. From the tourniquet down, the arm and wrist and hand were black, and beginning to swell.

The lacerations torn in the side of the palm by the Gila monster's fangs appeared to be clotted with purple blood.

"I rubbed in snake medicine--permanganate of potash crystals," quavered the girl. "That'll kill the poison and not hurt you a bit. You're all right now--only we'll have to ease off a little on your arm. Take some good deep breaths."

Though sick and giddy and still faint, Lennon forced himself to obey. He rallied sufficiently to sit up. Carmena loosened the tourniquet and briskly rubbed his swollen hand and arm. The tingling pain of returning circulation roused him like a stimulant. But the poison had not all been sucked from the wounds or counteracted in the veins by the permanganate.

Before the girl could again twist tight the tourniquet he sank down for the second time, unconscious.

Out of the utter blankness of oblivion he first dreamed that he was alternately swimming through a rough sea and rocking in a wave-tossed boat---- A gush of water dashed into his face--then the sea appeared to solidify into dry sand. He became conscious that Carmena was violently rolling him from side to side and slapping his face. She paused in this punishment to pump his arms above his head, forcing the air in and out of his lungs.

He struggled feebly to free himself. The girl jerked him to a sitting position and, with a desperate output of lithe strength, grasped his body from behind to heave him upright. He gained his feet, but was far too giddy to stand alone. The girl clasped his left arm about her neck and rushed him out beside the pony.

"Brace up!" she breathlessly implored him. "Grip hold of his mane with your good hand. We'll have to hit out. The broncs are coming."