at there under the shade of our ragged
hide, gaunt, browned by the sun, hatless, ill-clad, animals freed from
the yoke of society, none the less were not free from the yet more
perpetual yoke of savagery.

For myself, weakened by sickness, such food as we had was of little
service. I knew that I was starving, and feared that she was doing
little better. I looked at her that morning, after we had propped up our
little canopy of hide to break the sun. Her face was clean drawn now
into hard lines of muscle. Her limbs lay straight and clean before her
as she sat, her hands lying in her lap as she looked out across the
plains. Her eyes were still brown and clear, her figure still was that
of woman; she was still sweet to look upon, but her cheeks were growing
hollow. I said to myself that she suffered, that she needed food. Upon
us rested the fate of the earth, as it seemed to me. Unless presently I
could arise and kill meat for her, then must the world roll void through
the ether, unpeopled ever more.

It was at that time useless for us to think of making our way to any
settlements or any human aid. The immediate burden of life was first to
be supported. And yet we were unable to go out in search of food. I know
not what thoughts came to her mind as we sat looking out on the pictures
o; the mirage which the sun was painting on the desert landscape. But,
finally, as we gazed, there seemed, among these weird images, one
colossal tragic shape which moved, advanced, changed definitely. Now It
stood in giant stature, and now dwindled, but always it came nearer. At
last it darkened and denned and so disappeared beyond a blue ridge not
half a mile away from us. We realized at last that it was a solitary
buffalo bull, no doubt coming down to water at a little coulee just
beyond us. I turned to look at her, and saw her eyes growing fierce. She
reached back for my rifle, and I arose.

"Come," I said, and so we started. We dared not use the horse in
stalking our game.

I could stand, I could walk a short way, but the weight of this great
rifle, sixteen pounds or more, which I had never felt before, now seemed
to crush me down. I saw that I was starved, that the sap was gone from
my muscles. I could stagger but a few yards before I was obliged to stop
and put down the rifle. She came and put her arm about me firmly, her
face frowning and eager. But a tall man can ill be aided by a woman of
her stature.

"Can you go?" she said.