It was another day of dazzling brightness and intense heat.  Certainly this was a vertical sun.  It shot rays like burning arrows straight down.  The blood in his veins seemed to dry up again.  His head grew hotter.  Black specks in myriads danced before his eyes.  He looked longingly at his palm.  When he first saw it, it stood up, vital and strong.  Now it seemed to droop and waver like himself.  But it would have enough life to fill its veins and arteries through the day and at night he would have another good drink.

He scarcely stirred throughout the day but spent most of the time looking at the palm.  He paid no attention to the sounds below, sure that the Mexicans would not go away.  He fell at times into a sort of fevered stupor, and he aroused himself from the last one to find that night had come.  He took his machete, went to the tree, and cut quickly, because his thirst was very great.

The gash opened, but not a drop came forth.

CHAPTER V

IN THE PYRAMID

Ned stared, half in amazement, half in despair.  Yet he had known all the while that this would happen.  The palm had emptied every drop from its veins and arteries for him, giving life for life.  He had cut so deeply and so often that it would wither now and die.  He turned away in sadness, and suddenly a bitter, burning thirst assailed him.  It seemed to have leaped into new life with the knowledge that there was nothing now to assuage it.

The boy sat down on a small projection of brickwork, and considered his case.  He had been more than twelve hours without water under a fierce sun.  His thirst would not increase so fast at night, but it would increase, nevertheless, and the Mexican force might linger below a week.  Certainly its camp was of such a character that it would remain at least two or three days, and any risk was preferable to a death of thirst.  He could wait no longer.

Now chance which had been so cruel flung a straw his way.  The night was darker than usual.  The moon and stars did not come out, and troops of clouds stalked up from the southwest.  Ned knew that it was a land of little rain, and for a few moments he had a wild hope that in some manner he might catch enough water for his use on the crest of the pyramid.  But reason soon drove the hope away.  There was no depression which would hold water, and he resolved instead to make the descent under cover of the darkness.

When he had come to this resolution the thirst was not so fierce.  Indecision being over, both his physical and mental courage rose.  He ate and had left enough food to last for two days, which he fastened securely in a pack to his body.  Then, machete in hand, he looked over the edge of the pyramid.  There was some noise in the camp, but most of the soldiers seemed to be at rest.  Lights flickered here and there, and the ruined city, showing only in fragments through the darkness, looked more ghostly and mournful than ever.