So
far, fortunately, she had kept her head, and she retained
sufficient reason to deny the fanciful apprehensions which
clamored for audience. If she once allowed herself to become
panicky, she knew, she would fare worse--far worse--and now, if
ever, she needed all her faculties. Somewhere to the northward,
perhaps a mile, perhaps a league distant, lay the water-hole.
But the country was of a deadly and a deceitful sameness, devoid
of landmarks and lacking well-defined water-courses. The unending
mesquite with its first spring foliage resembled a limitless
peach-orchard sown by some careless and unbelievably prodigal
hand. Out of these false acres occasional knolls and low stony
hills lifted themselves so that one came, now and then, to
vantage-points where the eye leaped for great distances across
imperceptible valleys to horizons so far away that the scattered
tree-clumps were blended into an unbroken carpet of green. To the
woman these outlooks were unutterably depressing, merely serving
to reveal the vastness of the desolation about her.
At the crest of such a rise she paused and studied the country
carefully, but without avail.
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