ed at right angles across
the beach. Directly before me lay a piece of sugar cane, and one end
of it had been chewed.

Do you know what that meant? Animals don't cut sugar cane and bring it
to the beach and chew one end. A new strength ran through me, and
actually the grey mist thinned and lifted for a moment, until I could
make out dimly the line of cliffs and the tumbling sea.

I was not a bit hungry, but I chewed on the sugar cane, and made
Schwartz do the same. When we went on I kept close to the cliff, even
though the walking was somewhat heavier.

I remember after that its getting dark and then light again, so the
night must have passed, but whether we rested or walked I do not know.
Probably we did not get very far, though certainly we staggered ahead
after sun-up, for I remember my shadow.

About midday, I suppose, I made out a dim trail leading up a break in
the cliffs. Plenty of such trails we had seen before. They were
generally made by peccaries in search of cast-up fish--I hope they had
better luck than we.

But in the middle of this, as though for a sign, lay another piece of
chewed sugar cane.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE CALABASH STEW

I had agreed with Denton to stick to the beach, but Schwartz could not
last much longer, and I had not the slightest idea how far it might
prove to be to Mollyhay. So I turned up the trail.

We climbed a mountain ten thousand feet high. I mean that; and I know,
for I've climbed them that high, and I know just how it feels, and how
many times you have to rest, and how long it takes, and how much it
knocks out of you. Those are the things that count in measuring
height, and so I tell you we climbed that far. Actually I suppose the
hill was a couple of hundred feet, if not less. But on account of the
grey mist I mentioned, I could not see the top, and the illusion was
complete.

We reached the summit late in the afternoon, for the sun was square in
our eyes. But instead of blinding me, it seemed to clear my sight, so
that I saw below me a little mud hut with smoke rising behind it, and a
small patch of cultivated ground.

I'll pass over how I felt about it: they haven't made the words--

Well, we stumbled down the trail and into the hut. At first I thought
it was empty, but after a minute I saw a very old man crouched in a
corner. As I looked at him he raised his bleared eyes to me, his head
swinging slowly from side to side as though with a kind