Lashing in the wind, a long tentacle of the giant ocatilla drew its cimeter-set thong across Ban’s horse which incontinently bolted.  The rider lifted up his voice and yelled in sheer, wild, defiant joy of the tumult.  A lesser ocatilla thorn gashed his ear so that the blood mingled with the rain that poured down his face.  A pod of the fishhook-barbed cholla drove its points through his trousers into the flesh of his knee and, detaching itself from the stem, as is the detestable habit of this vegetable blood-seeker, clung there like a live thing of prey, from barbs which must later be removed delicately and separately with the cold steel.  Blindly homing, a jack-rabbit ran almost beneath the horse’s hooves, causing him to shy again, this time into a bulky vizcaya, as big as a full-grown man, and inflicting upon Ban a new species of scarification.  It did not matter.  Nothing mattered.  He rode on, knees tight, lines loose, elate, shouting, singing, acclaiming the storm which was setting its irrefragable limits to the world wherein he and Io would still live close, a few golden days longer.

What he picked from the wire when he reached it confirmed his hopes.  The track was threatened in a dozen places.  Repair crews were gathering.  Already the trains were staggering along, far behind their schedule.  They would, of course, operate as far as possible, but no reliance was to be placed upon their movements until further notice.  Through the night traffic continued, but with the coming of the morning and the settling down of a soft, seeping, unintermittent pour of gray rain, the situation had clarified.  Nothing came through.  Complete stoppage, east and west.  Between Manzanita and Stanwood the track was out, and in the other direction Dry Bed Arroyo was threatening.  Banneker reported progress to the lodge and got back, soaked and happy.  Io was thoughtful and content.

Late that afternoon the station-agent had a shock which jarred him quite out of his complacent security.  Denny, the operator at Stanwood, wired, saying: 

Party here anxious to get through to Manzanita quick.  Could auto make upper desert?

No (clicked Banneker in response).  Describe party.

The answer came back confirming his suspicion: 

Thin, nice-spoken, wears goggles, smokes cork-tips.  Arrived Five from
Angelica held here.

Tell impossible by any route (instructed Banneker).  Wire result.

An hour later came the reply: 

Won’t try to-night.  Probably horse to-morrow.

Here was a problem, indeed, fit to chill the untimely self-congratulations of Banneker.  Should the reporter come in—­and come he would if it were humanly possible, by Banneker’s estimate of him—­it would be by the only route which gave exit to the west.  On the other side the flooded arroyo cut off escape.  To try to take Io out through the forest, practically trackless, in that weather, or across the channeled