He did not mind the heat nor the sand nor the
glare nor the distance nor his burden. He did not tire. He was an engine of
tremendous power.
Slone gained upon Wildfire, and toward evening of that day he reached to
within half a mile of the stallion. And he chose to keep that far behind. That
night he camped where there was dry grass, but no water.
Next day he followed Wildfire down and down, over the endless swell of rolling
red ridges, bare of all but bleached white grass and meager greasewood, always
descending in the face of that painted desert of bold and ragged steps. Slone
made fifty miles that day, and gained the valley bed, where a slender stream
ran thin and spread over a wide sandy bottom. It was salty water, but it was
welcome to both man and beast.
The following day he crossed, and the tracks of Wildfire were still wet on the
sand-bars. The stallion was slowing down. Slone saw him, limping along, not
far in advance. There was a ten-mile stretch of level ground, blown hard as
rock, from which the sustenance had been bleached, for not a spear of grass
grew there.
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