Dean Wolcott tried it; he tried it faithfully. He was willing and eager to try anything which would alleviate his wretchedness, but there was no looseness in him anywhere. Everything was taut, shrieking with painful tension. If he leaned forward, if he leaned back, if he shifted the weight from the stirrups to the saddle, from the saddle to the stirrups, it was worse in another strained or bruised or blistered locality. He knew that his stirrups were too short but he would not dismount to change them; he doubted if he could get on again. “How many miles have we come, Estrada?” He knew they must be almost at their destination, but it would be a comfort to hear it from the Spaniard’s lips. Estrada considered. “Oh, maybe seex mile, _Señor_. Maybe leetle more; maybe not so moach.” “Then we have twelve still to go?” “Well, we call eet eighteen mile from Dos Pozos, _Señor_. The time pass very queek now, _Señor_.” But it seemed to the _señor_ that no day in his life, even in the trenches, had ever been so long. It was hot, now, blazingly, glaringly hot; it was incredible that he had ever been shivering. It would last for hours yet, this personal misery, this unendurable monotony; brown, twisting, turning bodies, tossing horns, wild eyes; ceaseless bellowing; dust--stifling, choking, blinding dust; the smell of sweating hides. Shortly before eleven o’clock they took their lunches out of their pockets and ate, in the saddle, but at any rate they were stationary. The _vaqueros_ held the herd, loosely, in a shallow valley where there was water for them. The neighboring ranchers rode up with Ginger and hoped heartily that Mr. Wolcott was all right after his spill, and they were cordial and kind. As a matter of fact, though he did not dream it, they were very well aware of his plight, and they were feeling a good deal of respect for his sporting endurance. The word had passed more than once, that morning--“Pretty game bird, that boy of Ginger’s!”--“Say, that feller’s not quittin’ any, is he?--sickly lookin’ as he is, too!” A couple of the older men had sharply criticized ’Rome Ojeda for putting a stranger and a guest on a horse like the red roan, and they wondered at Ginger’s permitting it. The girl rode close to her lover, bright-eyed and glowing and spoke softly. “All right, Dean? Are you all right?” He told her he was all right. (Could he sit like an old woman at a summer resort and catalogue the number and character of his aches and strains?) He swallowed one sandwich with difficulty; no one had thought to bring a drinking cup, and besides, the steers had hopelessly muddied the creek. Well, they would be at Santa Rita in about an hour.