Army and Navy Weekly — page 39: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

(Copyrighted, American Publishers’ Corporation.) (“TOM FENWICK’S FORTUNE’’ was commenced in No, 19. Back numbers can be obtained from all newsdealers. ) CHAPTER XII. OVER THE HILLS AND FAR AWAY. And now did the hard discipline of the past months begin to show its fruit. Day after day was spent in the saddle, with only a noonday halt between sin and sun, Sometimes they went speeding over patches of samly barren, where the only signs of vegetation were lion- strosities of prickly cactus or patches of sage brush, from which long-legged jack rabbits scuttled with a speed outstripping the fleetest greyhound. Sonietimes they were toiling upward over steep di- vides where great bowlders and fallen timber made the way almost impassable; then again urging the sturdy broncos over long undulations of prairie, just taking on the first shading of green, There were small rivers to swim without number, Once they crossed a branch of the Rio Colorado in a_ flat-bottomed ferry boat, whose owner did not see a white face from one month’s end to another—his passengers, few and far between at best, being for the most part reservation Indiaus and Mexican ‘‘greasers.’? Had he heard or seen anything of a party—two par- ties in fact—of whites in pursuit of a band of Indians who had stolen a white girl from a cattle ranch in Nevada? Yes, be had. Jim Luders of Lodeville headed one of the gangs, didn’t he? Exac’ly. Weli, Jim and his par- ty gave up the clase some’res west of the Vilgin Pass, He—the speaker—ferried ’em acrost on their back tracks only two days before. Jim = said Blueskin’s lot with the gal took the river at the shallers ten mile above the ferry with the gal’s father and some cow- boys after ’em bot foot. But once them redskins got into the mountings it was ‘‘good-hye, John.’’? Though Jim allowed that Bruton never’d come back without his gal, or Blueskins skelp, or mebhbe both—ef sech a thing was posserble. Well, even this was better than no news at all. It is true the chances of finding Bruton’s party were about one ina hundred. But as Tom said, they would work that one for all it was worth. Neither of the two were foolish enough to think for a moment that by them- selves they could follow up and rescue Dolly from her captors by some of those marvelous bits of strategy recorded in fiction. Only by acting in concert with _ experienced border men did they hope to do their part toward restoring the girl to her father. 3 Though the dry season bad fairly set in, occasional thunder tempests occurrea as the higher lands were - reached after crossing over into Arizona, where the horizon line was broken by purpling mountain ranges - Yising higher and higher in irregular terraces till their summits blended with the haze of distance. Passing the night under tarpaulin stretched on stakes, in a terrific downpour of rain, with heaven’s artillery in full play, is not among the most agreeable of border and creeks to ford uy experiences. For dry blankets were substituted a soaked oue, with tie unpleasant addition of sheets of water and a drenched saddle for a pillow. But on the other band they possessed rugged health and sjlendid con- stitutions; and there was. some compensation in the clear, rarefied air, and warming rays of the sun on the following morning. And having accustomed them- sel\es sonewhat to privation, Tom and Phil were not a bit the worse for these little episodes, It was on a morning after such an experience as this I have mentioned that the two, feeling their enthu- siasin rather dampened, were trudging over the soaked prairie—taking asa landmark the double or ‘‘twin’’ peaks of the Virgin hills, which rise like huge portals | on eitler side the pass. Over the backs of the broncos, by whose side each was walking, were thrown the wet blackets and ‘‘slick- ers’? tonat they might dry in the morning sun. Both young fellows were ravenously Lungry, after their supply of bard tack was exhausted, ana the coffee was all gone. Breakfast had consisted of some rain- soaked jerked beef, procured the day before from a friendly Moqui on his way to the hills on a hunting trip. , Neither seemed much inclined for conversation. Phil plodded along with downcast eyes, occasionally hum- ming under his breath some tune which was the reverse of lively. Tom trudged onward drearily, wondering if after all they would not have been wiser never to have under- taken their present expedition. Far wiser, indeed, if he had never left a life of ease and comfort! It was hard to realize that he was the Tom of other days. Hard to—— ‘Say, Tom, what under the sun do you call that?’? Under the sun literally, was the peculiar phenoime- non which, abruptly terminating Pbhil’s melody, had suggested the question. Against masses of fleecy clouds, shot through with gulden beams, appeared a fantastic moving panorama. ‘The outlines of a giant, apparently fifty feet high, carrying on his shoulder what seemed a tree trunk of corresponding length, stalked on with prodigious strides behind a tilted cart as high as a house, drawn by an elephantine monster with ears like church steeples! It was a weird and wonderful sight! Slowly the two figures moved on, till finally they were blended with tlhe cloud wreaths, which gradually dissolved into nothingness under the increasing strength of the sun rays. ‘<Tt’s what the plainsmen call ‘mirage,’ I suppose,’’ said Tom, finally. Andas well as be could, he ex- plained to his companion what he bad heard and read of these fantastic atmospheric effects. As the mists cleared away, the nearer hills, more thickly wooded than any they had seen since leaving Nevada, came into view. And they saw dots slowly crawling up a distant slope toward the girdling timber line. It was their magnified shadow against the clouds eIs@Ool CO OOKS «CO