ntil
they bled.

He had heard it said that to remain motionless in such a tempest means
death; for wherever the wind meets with an obstruction, there it piles
the sand in huge mounds, and his father had told of more than one
hunter who had thus been buried alive.

It was death to remain motionless, and yet to move seemed impossible.

Whether he turned to the right or the left the whirlwind struck him
with a fury which it was difficult to withstand. It was as if the wind
swept in upon him from every point of the compass--as if he was the
centre of this whirling, dancing, blinding, murderous onrush of sand.

The boy's throat was dry. He was burning with thirst.

The dust-laden air seemed to have literally filled his lungs, and it
was with difficulty he could breathe.

Despite the protection he sought to give, his eyes were inflamed, and
the lids cruelly swollen.

He sank ankle-deep at every step, and above him and around him the
wild blasts shrieked, until there were times when he feared lest he
should be thrown from his feet.

Pulling his hat down over his aching eyes, the bewildered, terrified
boy tried to gain some relief from the thirst which assailed him.

He understood that the contents of his canteen must be guarded
jealously; for if he lived there were still several miles of the
desert journey to be traversed, and the walking would be even more
difficult than before the storm set in, because of the shifting sand.

His distress rendered him reckless; and regardless of the future, he
drank fully half the water in the canteen, bathing his eyes with a
small quantity poured in the hollow of his hand.

It would have been better if he had not tried to find relief by this
last method, for the flying particles of sand adhered to such portions
of his face as were wet, forming a coating over the skin almost
instantly.

He attempted to brush it off, and the gritty substance cut into his
flesh as if he had rubbed it with emery-paper.

Then came into Dick's mind the thought that he should never more see
his parents on this earth, and for the instant his courage so far
deserted him that he was on the point of flinging himself face
downward upon the sand.

Fortunately there appeared before his mental vision a picture of his
father lying in the wagon with the certainty that death would come
unless his son could bring relief, and this nerved the boy to yet
greater exertion.

With his arms over his face, he pushe