lost and reduced to
obscurity--the whole sky was a milky way. Wiley sank down in the sand
and gazed up sombrely as he wetted his parching lips from his canteen,
and the evening star gleamed like a torch, looking down on the world
he had fled. Across the Funeral Range, not a day's journey to the
east, that same star lighted Virginia on her way while he, a fugitive,
was flung like an atom into the depths of this sea of sand. It was
deeper than the sea, scooped out far below the level of the cool
breakers that broke along the shore; deep and dead, except for the
wind that moved the drifting sand across the plains. And even as he
lay there, looking up at the stars and wondering at the riddle of the
universe, the busy wind was bringing grains of sand and burying him,
each minute by so much.

He rose up in a panic and hurried along the slope, where the sand of the
wave was packed hardest, and he did not pause till he had passed the
last drift and set his foot on the hard, gravelly slope. The wind was
cooler now, for the night was well along and the bare ground had
radiated its heat; but it was dry, powder dry, and every pore of his
skin seemed to gasp and cry out for water. There was water, even yet, in
the bottom of his canteen; but he dared not drink it till the Gateway
was in sight, and the sand-wash that led to the valley beyond.

An hour passed by as he toiled up the slope, now breaking into a run
from impatience, now settling down doggedly to walk; and at last, clear
and distinct, he saw the Gateway in the moonlight, and stopped to take
his drink. It was cool now, the water, and infinitely sweet; yet he knew
that the moment he drained the last drop he would feel the clutch of
fear. It is an unreasoning thing, that fear of the desert which comes
when the last drop is gone; and yet it is real and known to every
wanderer, and guarded against by the bravest. He screwed the cap on his
canteen and hurried up the slope, which grew steeper and rockier with
each mile, but the phantom gateway seemed to lead on before him and
recede into the black abyss of night. It was there, right before him,
but instead of getting nearer, the Gateway loomed higher and higher; and
daylight was near before he passed through its portals and entered the
dark valley beyond.

A gaunt row of cottonwoods rose up suddenly before him, their leaves
whispering and clacking in the wind, and at this brave promise all fear
for water left him and he draine