to
discuss the drought and the water problem.

"Now, down in Oklahomy," he began, "it was hotter than brimstone and the
Sooners didn't draw ice water from faucets when they settled there."
Sooners, we took it, were those who got on the land sooner than the
others. "Water was imported in barrels. Buying water was like buying
champagne and worse to drink than cawn liquor."

"What did they do?"

"Well, suh," he went on, the long mustache twitching, "one of the
fellahs down there was a water witch. He pointed out where the water
could be got. Divining rods. That's the solution for the Strip."

But finding expert water witches was almost as difficult as finding
water. They had to be imported from some remote section of the West. The
witches, as we called them, went over various parts of the reservation,
probing, poking, with their forked sticks.

The divining rod was a simple means of locating water, and it had been
in common use through the ages, especially in arid regions. It was used
in some instances to locate other underground deposits. These rods were
pronged branches, sometimes of willow, but preferably of witch-hazel or
wild cherry.

If there were water close to the surface, the divining rod would bend
and turn with such force that it was hard to keep the prongs in hand. It
was said to work by a process of natural attraction, and was formerly
regarded as witchcraft or black magic.

Our divining rods refused to twist or bend. If there were water on the
Strip, the witches missed it; either that, or it was too deep for the
rods to detect. One of the experts said there was indication of some
kind of liquid deposit far underground.

The settlers shook their heads and said there must be something wrong
with the witches or the divining rod, and Ma Wagor declared, "I never
did have any faith in them little sticks."

* * * * *

The hot winds swept the plains like blasts from a furnace. There was not
a shelter as far as the eye could see except those little hot-boxes in
which we lived. As the sun, like a great ball of fire, lowered to the
horizon, a caravan topped the ridge from the north and moved slowly
south across the strip. A wagon and a wobble-wheeled buggy, its dry
spokes rattling like castanets, went by. Following behind were the few
head of stock--horses whinnying, cows bawling, for water. A panting dog,
tongue hanging out, trotted beside the wagon. They were shipping out.
T