At length she opened her eyes again, only to find that she could make out nothing familiar.  Undoubtedly she was lost; the water-hole might be anywhere.  She listened tensely, and the very air seemed to listen with her; the leaves hushed their faint whisperings; a near-by cactus held its forty fleshy ears alert, while others more distant poised in the same harkening attitude.  It seemed to the woman that a thousand ears were straining with hers, yet no sound came save only the monotonous crescendo and diminuendo of those locust-cries coming out of nowhere and retreating into the voids.  At last, as if satisfied, the leaves began to whisper softly again.

Away to her left lay the yellow flood of the Rio Grande, but the woman, though tempted to swing in that direction, knew better than to yield.  At least twenty miles of barrens lay between, and she told herself that she could never cover such a distance.  No, the water-hole was nearer; it must be close at hand.  If she could only think a little more clearly, she could locate it.  Once more she tried, as she had tried many times before, to recall the exact point where she had shot her horse, and to map in her mind’s eye the foot-weary course she had traveled from that point onward.

Desert travel was nothing new to her, thirst and fatigue were old acquaintances, yet she could not help wondering if, in spite of her training, in spite of that inborn sense of direction which she had prided herself upon sharing with the wild creatures, she were fated to become a victim of the chaparral.  The possibility was remote; death at this moment seemed as far off as ever—­if anything it was too far off.  No, she would find the water-hole somehow; or the unexpected would happen, as it always did when one was in dire straits.  She was too young and too strong to die yet.  Death was not so easily won as this.

Rising, she readjusted the strap of the empty water-bag over her shoulder and the loose cartridge-belt at her hip, then set her dusty feet down the slope.

Day died lingeringly.  The sun gradually lost its cruelty, but a partial relief from the heat merely emphasized the traveler’s thirst and muscular distress.  Onward she plodded, using her eyes as carefully as she knew how.  She watched the evening flight of the doves, thinking to guide herself by their course, but she was not shrewd enough to read the signs correctly.  The tracks she found were old, for the most part, and they led in no particular direction, nowhere uniting into anything like a trail.  She wondered, if she could bring herself to drink the blood of a jack-rabbit, and if it would quench her thirst.  But the thought was repellent, and, besides, she was not a good shot with a revolver.  Nor did the cactus offer any relief, since it was only just coming into bloom, and as yet bore no fruit.