we moved up the
next rise, he kept looking back and uttering little moans against the
crime of leaving it.

Luckily for us it was winter. We shouldn't have lasted six hours at
this time of year. As it was, the sun was hot against the shale and
the little stones of those cussed hills. We plodded along until late
afternoon, toiling up one hill and down another, only to repeat
immediately. Towards sundown we made the second bay, where we plunged
into the sea, clothes and all, and were greatly refreshed. I suppose a
man absorbs a good deal that way. Anyhow, it always seemed to help.

We were now pretty hungry, and, as we walked along the shore, we began
to look for turtles or shellfish, or anything else that might come
handy. There was nothing. Schwartz wanted to stop for a night's rest,
but Denton and I knew better than that.

"Look here, Schwartz," said Denton, "you don't realise you're entered
against time in this race--and that you're a damn fool to carry all
that weight in your clothes."

So we dragged along all night.

It was weird enough, I can tell you. The moon shone cold and white
over that dead, dry country. Hot whiffs rose from the baked stones and
hillsides. Shadows lay under the stones like animals crouching. When
we came to the edge of a silvery hill we dropped off into pitchy
blackness. There we stumbled over boulders for a minute or so, and
began to climb the steep shale on the other side. This was fearful
work. The top seemed always miles away. By morning we didn't seem to
have made much of anywhere. The same old hollow-looking mountains with
the sharp edges stuck up in about the same old places.

We had got over being very hungry, and, though we were pretty dry, we
didn't really suffer yet from thirst. About this time Denton ran
across some fishhook cactus, which we cut up and chewed. They have a
sticky wet sort of inside, which doesn't quench your thirst any, but
helps to keep you from drying up and blowing away.

All that day we plugged along as per usual. It was main hard work, and
we got to that state where things are disagreeable, but mechanical.
Strange to say, Schwartz kept in the lead. It seemed to me at the time
that he was using more energy than the occasion called for--just as man
runs faster before he comes to the giving-out point. However, the
hours went by, and he didn't seem to get any more tired than the rest
of us.

We kept a sharp lookout for anything to