He got out his camp plate from a saddle bag and started digging. Ruler and the dogs were already shoveling industriously with eager paws, for their noses smelled the water. Sid grabbed out his plate and fell to, while Scotty held back the horses to keep them from burying their hoofs to the fetlocks in the sand and packing it too tight to dig. After a time it came out damp, then moist, then wet mud. Big John hove out the dogs and stood Sid aside, as they all watched the deep hollow they had made, nine pairs of eyes all trained on the one object of most engrossing interest in all the world,--the seepage of an almost invisible puddle of cool, clear water! “Git me the canvas pail, an’ a cup, Sid--the hosses is first. Git outer thar, Ruler, you ole potlicker!” he roared, batting back the persistent hound. Scotty was struggling with the horses, jamming back on their curbs as they plunged and pawed, wild to get down into the sand and drink, drink, drink! Then three equine noses shoved urgently, fiercely at them, as a few cupfuls in a canvas pail were passed up. “This is nawthin’, boys!” grinned Big John, as the impatient animals were being watered. “Onct I hed to save myself by cuttin’ open a bisanaga cactus and go to poundin’ the inside with a club. Thet pulp is full of sweet water, an’ ye squeezes out the pulp an’ throws it away ontil ye hev maybe a pint of good clear water to drink. No old-timer dies of thirst, the way them writers is allus makin’ ’em do, down south in the barrel cactus country!” It was all of two hours later when the last of the water bags was filled and the party set off toward the southeast. If no accident befell they had water enough for the run to Los Capitanos del Canyon, where a blessed brook awaited them. The sandstorm had delayed them one day; the whole party were now worried lest they should be too late, for Neyani’s fate hung in the balance, and, perhaps, also that of Niltci’s mother and his sister. “That thar letter says the Injuns has took ’em off, somewhere, don’t it, Sid?” asked Big John as they discussed the matter, urging the horses along. “Waal, it’s a leetle deetour over to White Mesa, but I’m going thar, boys. That’s a sacred spot to them Navaho; they’re scairt to death of it, an’ think it’s full of ghosts, but the hull tribe sometimes comes thar to pull off some reeligious stunt, each brave sorta bolsterin’ up the other’s courage. It’s just whar they mought take ole Neyani--an’, of course, the Major, he couldn’t do nawthin’ but follow an’ try to talk some sense inter them, ef he heard tell that was whar Neyani was.” “I’ve heard of the Enchanted Mesa,” replied Sid. “The Navaho call it the ‘Judgment Throne of the Ghosts,’ don’t they?” “I dunno. It’s a skeery place to go by, in the moonlight, even for a white man. It’s as full of howls and roars, and the awfullest sounds a body ever listened to,” said Big John. “But I’ll bet my ol’ lid thet that’s whar Neyani _is_, right now!”