With that he set the man down and, swinging a powerful blow, laid him stunned upon the sand. Whereupon it was easy to lift him and throw him over a shoulder like an empty sack. Not for a long distance over the sand did that task become prodigious. But at length the burden of a heavy weight and the dragging sand and the hot sun brought Adam to a pass where rest was imperative. He laid the unconscious man down while he recovered breath and strength. Then he picked him up and went on. After that he plodded slower, rested oftener, weakened more perceptibly. Meanwhile the hours passed, and when he reached the huge gateway in the red iron mountain wall the sun was gone and purple shadows were mustering in the valley. When he reached the more level field where the thick-strewn bowlders lay, all before his eyes seemed red. A million needles were stinging his nerves, running like spears of light into his darkened sight. The limit that he had put upon his endurance was to reach the shack. He did so, and he was nearly blind when the woman’s poignant call thrilled his throbbing ears. He saw her--a white shape through ruddy haze. Then he deposited his burden on the sand. “Oh!” the woman moaned. “He’s dead!” Adam shook his head. Pity, fear, and even terror rang in her poignant cry, but not love. “Ah!... You’ve saved him, then.... He’s injured--there’s a great bruise--he breathes so heavily.” While Adam sat panting, unable to speak, the woman wiped her husband’s face and worked over him. “He came back once--and fell into a stupor like this, but not so deep. What can it be?” “Poison--air,” choked Adam. “Oh, this terrible Death Valley!” she cried. Adam’s sight cleared and he saw the woman, clad in a white robe over her gray dress, a garment clean and rich, falling in thick folds--strange to Adam’s sight, recalling the past. The afterglow of sunset shone down into the valley, lighting her face. Once she must have been beautiful. The perfect lines, the noble brow, the curved lips, were there, but her face was thin, strained, tragic. Only the eyes held beauty still. “You saved him?” she queried, with quick-drawn breath. “Found him--miles and miles--up the--valley--crawling on--his hands and knees,” panted Adam. “I had--to carry him.” “You carried him!” she exclaimed, incredulously. Then the large eyes blazed. “So that’s why you were so livid--why you fell?... Oh, you splendid man! You giant!... He’d have died out there--alone. I thank you with all my heart.” She reached a white worn hand to touch Adam’s with an exquisite eloquence of gratitude.