iction.

"These American governments!" groaned Schmidt. "Vat a stupidness! In
Germany such a foolishness is impossible. Vell, I come for a veek and
bring my own grub. I haf a leetle money, enough to feed me. Vat I lack
is vork--vork to keep me from going crazy with the heim-weh in this
ocean of sand, and some one mit brain to talk to. The baggage-man--the
storekeeper--the Chinaman--Gott! I know their every mind like a primer,
so long have I talked to them."

There was to Roger something irresistibly likeable about Schmidt's
sentimental, jovial face.

"Come ahead, then!" he said. "You'll have to bunk in the cook-tent, and
bring your own bed with you, but we'll be delighted to have you with
us."

Schmidt rubbed his stubby hands together. "I go at vonce and pack up,"
he exclaimed. "Ve vill drive by my place in the morning and pick me up,"
and he started for the door.

At five o'clock the next morning the two heavily laden wagons crawled
out on the desert trail, campwards. It was slow going, particularly
after they struck the deep sand which began ten miles out of the town.
Gustav Schmidt was rather silent when they stopped at noon, to water and
feed their horses and to eat the lunch the Chinaman had put up for them.
He was heavily coated with dust and his face had burned badly.

Half way through the second sandwich he said: "Ve'll get even with that
sun, eh? Ve harness him and make him pump vater on us and on this damn
sand, eh? Gott, vat a country!"

"What's the matter with this country?" asked Roger, blowing the sand off
a ripe olive. "It's exactly the kind of country I want to make solar
power with and it's exactly the kind of country you want to cure your
bad lungs. If you don't like it--"

"Vait! Vait!" interrupted Schmidt. "I know vat you vill say. If I don't
like it, go back to Germany. Some day I do go back, but not yet. Ven I
go, I try to take you and young Wolf mit me. This is the land of
nature's opportunity. In the Fatherland, the government gif the
opportunity. This is the land for the adventure, for the exploitation,
nicht wahr? Germany the land for the thinker, like you? Nicht wahr?"

Roger shook his head. Nevertheless, his eyes were wistful. Many times
during the afternoon he thought of Schmidt's remark. Roger's education
and reading had long ago persuaded him that Germany was the land for the
thinker, that there a man would not have to struggle for ten years to
give birth to an idea such as his.