The Papago started on a swinging walk a little north of west, the Doc following. They had not gone far when the white man discovered they were not following the road; each step was through loose sand which received the foot with a viscous hold and reluctantly released it. The Doc snarled a query at his companion: why in the name of deletion had he quit the Road of the Dead Men? “Not quit--finding him,” came Guadalupe’s grudging answer. Then Stooder admitted to himself the possibility that during the time the little car had pushed on into the storm he had tooled it off the road. How far he had driven away from the single track which spans Altar he could not hazard a guess. Anyway, he knew one thing: he was dog tired, and if this mangy black coyote thought A. Stooder, M.D., was going to wallow through sand all night without a sleep he had another think coming. Reaction from the excitements of the past two days added extra weight to the Doc’s already none-too-light handicap of alcoholic repercussions. The storm had torn his nerves to tatters; his mouth was as dry as an old church pew cushion; each of his legs felt as if they were dragging an Oregon boot. Stooder’s mind was too dulled to probe down below these afflictions and read the real seriousness of his situation; it dealt only with cogent aches and reluctances. “Hey, Guadalupe! We take a sleep right here.” The Doc halted. Great was his surprise when he saw the Papago striding on. Hot rage bubbled to his lips in an explosive Mexican oath. “Hey, you lizard-eatin’ mozo, hear me? We stop here for the big shut-eye!” The Doc spurred his long legs into a gangling run to overtake the Indian, who had plodded on unheeding. All the arrogance of the white man in his fancied superiority fell with the doctor’s hand on the Indian’s shoulder. Guadalupe wrenched free and turned to face him sulkily. “Sleep here--to-morrow much sun--no water. Maybe to-morrow we die here. Walk!” Guadalupe’s sparse vocabulary of Spanish words was drained; but the manner of his resuming the forward hike was sufficiently eloquent. Guadalupe, born to the desert code and grown to manhood under the inexorable desert law, had in mind but a single impulse--to survive. His mind plumped through the bog of discomforts wherein Stooder’s was mired to read clearly the tablets of the desert’s decalogue: ten commandments in one--live! In extremity throw over loyalty, discard obligations of oath or of blood, strip the soul to its elemental selfishness; but live!