Chapter 11. Ned Sees Something

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_ CHAPTER ELEVEN. NED SEES SOMETHING

"No luck yet, Griggs," said the doctor, riding up to the head of the little caravan one morning, after many, many days of travel since the party made its first plunge into the unknown, untraversed wilds, to keep trudging on at the rate dictated by the mules, which, laden as they were, could not be hurried. Sometimes when the track they made for themselves was easy and level a good many miles were got over; at others the hindrances seemed to multiply, and Griggs laughingly said it never rained but it poured, and then the tale of miles traversed became very few at the end of the day.

But the American worked harder than any one, and always with unfailing good-humour. There were times when he seemed to be furious, raging out in language especially his own, the vocabulary being wonderful, the names he called astounding in their fluency, novelty, and peculiarity; still the objects of these displays of temper were never his fellow-travellers, but the mules, and as soon as he had roared himself hoarse he stood wiping his perspiring face, smiling contentedly, to say to one, the other, or both of the boys, "I feel a deal better for having got rid of all that nasty stuff. It kinder eases my mind, youngsters, and now look at 'em," he continued, pointing at his obstinate charges; "see how nicely they go. Don't you ever tell me that mules have no brains. Look at Skeeter, how he's listening to my voice, and you wait a moment and you'll see him begin working those ears of his about. There, do you see? That's his way of telegraphing his opinions about what he has heard to all the rest. There's a deal more in mules than people think."

Be this right or wrong, the baggage-carrying animals did their best when Griggs was near them, and a few absurd words from his powerful lungs stopped kicking, biting, and squealing when a revolution seemed to be on the way, and a fight of heels had begun, to the imminent risk of disaster to the packs.

"No luck yet, sir?" cried Griggs, when the doctor had spoken on that particular morning. "Why, I was just thinking how lucky we had been."

"How?" said the doctor, and the boys pricked up their ears to listen to the conversation.

"Haven't lost a mule; always got over some of the ground to bring us nearer to the place we're looking for; and the way in which we are enjoying ourselves in this compound frolic of a picnic is wonderful."

"Enjoying, eh? Well, I'm glad you take it so."

"Oh, I think we're been wonderfully lucky, seeing what might have happened."

"Do you hear, boys?" said the doctor. "That's the spirit to take our journey in. But look here, Griggs, we've been trenching too much on our stores, and that's bad."

"The mules don't think so, sir," said the American, laughing; "but as we can't buy fresh, going on in this way, perhaps we had better be on the lookout a little more for the pot, and leave the stores as much alone as we can."

"Yes," said the doctor. "I say, don't let anything eatable go by. By the way, you're deviating a little from the course we laid down this morning."

"Just a little, sir," replied Griggs. "It was Skeeter's doing."

"Oh, I did not know that the mule took the lead."

"He doesn't always, sir, but sometimes he stops short, lifts up that muzzle of his, lays his ears flat down, and sings one of those pleasant little airs of his; and when he does that I've noticed more than once that it means he smells water somewhere. So this time when he snapped at a fly trying to lay eggs in his skin, and bore off a little to the left, I didn't interfere."

"But the lookout forward does not seem promising," said the doctor, raising his double glass to his eyes and sweeping the horizon.

"No, sir, it looks like warm stuff out of the kegs to-night, and none to spare for a wash."

"I'm afraid so," said the doctor, closing his glass and drawing rein so as to let Wilton and Bourne close up. "Tired, Chris--Ned?"

"Oh no," they replied.

"It's soon in the day yet, father," added Chris.

"That seems a pity about the water, Griggs," said Ned, as they rose slowly on. "Oh how I should like a good swim in a clear river!"

"Wouldn't be amiss; but when you can't get beef, mutton ain't bad."

"I knew that," said Chris dryly.

"But you don't seem to know that when you can't get plenty of water for bathing, nice clean sand isn't a bad thing for a good dry wash. It's better without soap too."

Chris laughed.

"Ah, you may grin, but it's a nasty habit, I think, that of rubbing grease turned into what you call soap all over your skin. Look yonder on that patch of sand," he continued, pointing, for his keen eyes seemed to miss nothing.

"Snakes!" cried Chris, bringing his rifle sharply round.

"Nay, nay, don't shoot. What's the good? You might scare something better."

"Better!" said Ned, with his upper lip curling up and the corners of his mouth going down.

"Yes; I don't care about snake," said the American dryly, "but I hev heard that some of the Injuns cut the rattlers' heads off and roast them in wood-ashes, and that they're uncommonly good."

"Ugh!" ejaculated Ned.

"Yes, that's just how I feel, my lad," continued Griggs, in his calm, dry manner. "I'm like that countryman of mine who was hard up for tuck, out in the backwoods, and when some one asked him afterwards how he managed to live, he said he shot and cooked the crows."

"Horrid!" cried Ned.

"Yes, that's what t'other one said; and then he says, 'But surely you don't like crows?' 'No,' says the first one, 'I don't kind o' hanker arter them.' It's the same here, I don't kind o' hanker arter snake; but it's all a matter o' habit."

"Oh, ugh!" cried Ned.

"Ah, you may say ugh, but it all depends; when a fellow's hungry he's got to eat something, and I don't see why a snake shouldn't be as good to eat as an eel."

"But they're poisonous," cried Chris.

"Only in the head, and it's easy to cut that off. Now, look yonder; there lie four fine fat rattlers, fast asleep on that patch of sand. We're not exactly short of food, but a little extra would be very useful, and as rattlers are so plentiful it seems almost a pity that we can't make them good to eat, and knock over all we come across."

"How can you talk in that horrid way, Griggs!" cried Chris, with a shudder.

"I don't see nothing horrid about it. Snake's a nice clean enough sort of thing; and, as I say, it's all a matter of habit. They tell me frogs are delicious, but I'd as soon eat snake."

"Reptiles! Ugh!" cried Ned.

"So's turtle reptile," said Griggs. "Nasty-looking thing too. Might just as well eat alligator. I've a good mind to get down and cripple two or three of those rattlers, so as to try how they eat."

"No, no, don't!" cried the boys in a breath, and before the others grasped what he was about to do, Chris pulled up, slipped off his mustang, gathered up a handful of small stones, and sent a shower amongst the sleeping reptiles.

In an instant there was a scattering of sand and a rush for safety, the snakes taking refuge amongst the brush around, leaving not a sign of their presence.

"There goes dinner for six," said Griggs dryly. "I say, there's plenty of those creeping gentry about here."

"Almost the only inhabitants," said Chris. "Well, if we do have to come to eat 'em, perhaps we shall get monuments set up to us in our honour for introducing a new kind of useful food of which there's plenty being wasted in the far west. Pity they're so small. They'd shrink too in the cooking. Why, a hungry man would be able to polish off one easy."

"Do you want to make me ill, Griggs?" said Ned, shuddering.

"Certainly not, my lad."

"But I say, Griggs," cried Chris, "how big do those things grow--how long were the largest you ever saw?"

"Oh, they don't come quite up to boa constrictors. Let me see, the largest I ever saw measured was--was--"

"Twenty-five feet?"

"Nay, nay, nay, not quite as long as that, but quite six feet, which is bigger than I like, after all. Most of 'em's little, like those. Dangerous sort of things, and don't the horses and mules understand! Don't catch them going near a rattler if they know it."

"My nag has shied four times this morning at the poisonous brutes," said Chris.

"Seems to me," said Griggs, "that they like this part of the country. I'd be pretty careful about walking about when we get down. It'd be as well to ride about a bit when we stop for camping, so as to scare the beggars away. We don't want to get bitten."

But from that time, oddly enough, they saw no sign or trace of the reptiles. The sun grew hotter and hotter, but neither in sandy level nor rugged stony patch was a snake seen basking. Nothing was visible but lizards, and they disappeared when the doctor called a halt in the most rugged part of a stony waste where there was an overhanging cliff and a broken gully which promised at a distance to be the home of a spring; but though it had evidently been at one time a pool overhung by rocks, there was not a trace of moisture. It afforded a little shelter, however, in an overhanging part where there was a rugged projecting shelf, and there being nothing better, the halt was made there, only to prove too hot a one for endurance, the rocks seeming to glow, and keeping off such air as was astir as well as the sun; so after a short time the doctor decided to go on once more in search of some more likely place.

In those hot, weary hours the elasticity and cheerfulness of the boys died away. In the early morning it had been all laugh and chat and notice of everything they passed that seemed novel, but with the coming of noon quite a change came over them, and Ned took to sighing from time to time, then to murmuring, and at last after a long, low expiration of the breath--

"Oh dear," he cried, "I am getting so tired of this!"

"Well, you are a fellow!" grumbled Chris. "Only an hour or two ago you talked as if you liked it."

"Ah, I wasn't so hot and fagged out then. It gets so jolly monotonous. Here we go on, ride and tramp, ride and tramp, day after day, seeing nothing but sand and sage-brush, sand and sage-brush. Always tired, always being scorched by the sun till one's giddy, and--"

"Here, father!" cried Chris, but without turning his head.

"What are you going to do?" said Ned, in a hurried whisper.

"Call father up, for you to grumble to him."

"Nonsense!" whispered Ned. "Don't be a stupid donkey. Can't I say a word or two without you wanting to tell tales?"

"I don't want to tell tales; I want for you to tell father yourself. You talked as if you had had enough of it, and wanted to go back."

"Who wants to go back?" cried Ned angrily. "Nice thing if one can't say what one likes about one's feelings! I only said what I did because I was hot and tired, and it is so tiresome, one day just like another, and not a bit of adventure to go through. Why, I expected no end of fun in that way--I mean, no end of excitement."

"Do you understand what he means, Griggs?" said Chris. "I think you've upset him by talking about cooking and eating snake."

"It wasn't that," said Griggs. "He must have got out of bed the wrong way this morning."

"Yes; a nice sort of bed! Nothing but rough sage-brush, crumbling up as soon as it's moved, and looking like so much gritty imitation tea."

"Same sort of bed as we had, squire, and we don't grumble. Why, you're not half a fellow. Like to go back perhaps?"

"That I shouldn't!" snapped out Ned, so suddenly that his mustang started and had to be checked and soothed. "Can't a fellow speak? I don't want to grumble, but it is so monotonous."

"You said that before," cried Chris banteringly.

"I know, Clevershakes!" retorted Ned. "And now I say it again. I've as good a right to speak as you have. If you don't like the word monotonous, I'll say dull and stupid. It's ride and walk, ride and walk."

"And walk and ride, walk and ride," said Chris, imitating his old companion's words and tones. "No adventures--nothing to see."

"Not even a rattlesnake," said Griggs softly.

"Look here, Mr Griggs," snapped out Ned, "I wish you wouldn't keep interrupting me when I'm speaking. It's precious rude."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Griggs politely.

"Well, don't do it again," said Ned shortly.--"Phew! How hot it is! I'm sure it's ever so much hotter than it has been before."

"Much," said Chris, with his eyes twinkling, but he looked straight before him. So did Griggs, and Ned went on--

"It's just as if the sand got to be red-hot and all the heat was reflected back in one's face. I wouldn't care, though, only it's so dull and monot--dreary!" the boy snapped out, looking sharply from one to the other as if to see whether another remark was about to be made respecting his repetition; but neither of his companions moved a muscle of his face, and he went on murmuring in the same irritable way--

"There seem to be no fish to catch, no birds to shoot. I wouldn't have believed that there could have been so much miserable desert if I hadn't seen it. I quite thought that by this time, after getting right away from all settlements and into the wildest of the wild country--"

"What!" said Griggs sharply. "Oh, nonsense! Wildest of the wild? Why, this is nothing to what we've got to come. We haven't seen a regular good mountain yet."

"No, nor yet a wild beast. I thought we should have had plenty of adventures with them by now."

"Oh, that's what you mean, is it?" cried Griggs, with mock seriousness, giving Chris a peculiar look at the same time, as if asking him to back up any assertions that he might make. "You expected that we would spend half our time shooting lions and stalking tigers?"

"Yes," said Ned, passing his hand over his eyes and shaking his head, as if the heat had made him sleepy and giddy. "_No, no_!" he added hastily. "Of course I know that there are no lions and tigers here. You're laughing at me."

"Well, it's enough to make a cat laugh to hear you go on finding fault, when here we are in a regular wonderful country, such as I should never have expected to find so soon. Of course I know that it wouldn't do for a plantation, but here we are, just at the beginning of rising ground, and a mile or two further we shall be all amongst rocks and stones, and, for all we can tell, we shall come upon the sugar up yonder among those mountains rising up as if they were growing out of what was a plain."

"Sugar? What sugar?" said Ned, staring.

"Well, the gold amongst the three sugar-loaf mountains shown on the chart."

"I only wish we could find it," said Chris.

"Well, have patience, and the more patience you use up the more you'll want. We shan't find the gold without."

"But I'm like Ned," said Chris thoughtfully; "I think as he does, that it does seem wonderful that there should be such a lot of regularly useless land in the world. Look at this: as far as we can see it's so salt and dry that nothing will grow. Stones and sand, and sand and stones, and all of no use at all."

"Who says so?" said Griggs coolly.

"Why, I do; you heard me."

"Yes, you say so, but what do you know about it? You say it's of no use because it's of no use to you; but you know nothing at all about what may be underneath all this sand and stone."

"Nothing at all; not even water," cried Chris.

"You don't know. There may be gold or silver or lead, tin or copper, or some of those minerals that chemists and such folk use. I don't like to hear you grumble, my lad, about things when you've only just looked and not tried. What about precious stones--diamonds and rubies?"

"Or pearls perhaps," said Ned, with a sneer.

"Yes, or pearls," said Griggs, and the boys both burst out laughing heartily.

Ned's tide of ill-humour had turned.

"Got me?" said Griggs gravely. "I say, you are clever ones!"

"Well, I like to hear you make a blunder sometimes, Griggs. You often have the laugh at us; now we've got one at you."

"Yes, you are clever ones," said the American grimly, "but you're wrong this time. You're both grinning and looking at one another as much as to say, Hark at old Griggs! He's forgotten that pearls come out of oysters and oysters live in the sea."

"Of course," cried the boys together.

"Yes, of course, and I don't know that there mayn't be fossil oyster shells somewhere about here with pearls still in them. I've seen shells sometimes looking quite pearly inside though they've been buried in rock no end of time. You didn't hear your father say only day before yesterday that all this salt desert land must at one time have been the bottom of the sea. What do you say to that?"

"Oh!" said Chris thoughtfully, and Ned pushed his broad-leaved hat a little on one side so as to scratch his ear.

"You're right, though, after all, about lions and tigers, and so was I. Only they're American lions and tigers--pumas and jaguars, and pumas without any manes, and jaguars with spots instead of stripes. Wait a bit, and we shall come upon some of them. Not here, though; it's not likely sort of country for them, but there's mountain land yonder piled-up higher than we shall be able to take our mustangs and mules. We shall find watercourses soon, and that means trees and grass and quite a different climate. The sort of place where we're quite likely to find Uncle Ephraim at home."

"What, grizzly bear?" cried Chris excitedly.

"That's the gentleman," replied Griggs; "and as like as not after crossing a ridge or two we may come upon buffalo."

"What, in the mountains?"

"Perhaps. More likely in the plains. There, don't you chaps grumble any more. Your fathers have got quite enough to think about without having to talk to you about being a little more plucky and patient."

"Yes, I know," cried Chris, wincing; "we're only grumbling to you."

"Oh, then I don't matter?"

"Not a bit. You're such a good-tempered, patient chap, and you seem like one of us. But I say, Griggs, do you really think we are going to find a change in the country soon?"

"Certain."

"Oh come, that's better! We have had enough of sand and sage-brush, and we do want a regular change."

"You'll get it, then, and I dare say before night. Can't you see that we're on the slope of the mountains now?"

"No, not a bit of it."

"But we are; just slowly rising, and by night we shall find that we are in quite a different place, hundreds of feet higher than where we had breakfast this morning."

"Well, I hope you're right," said Chris.

No more was said then, the two boys sometimes riding, sometimes walking, till after some hours Griggs pulled up, to point to the fact that they had reached what seemed to be the summit of an enormous land-wave heaved up and rising for miles either way across the desert, but right in front descending slowly into a vast hollow plain which glistened in its desolation as if frosted with silver.

"Why, it must be silver," cried Ned enthusiastically.

"Nay, nay, only salt, my lad. Looks like a dried-up lake."

"Yes; where's your herd of buffaloes?" cried Chris. "Oh, shouldn't I like for us to shoot one and have some beef!"

"Yes; buffalo hump isn't bad," said Griggs. "It's rich and tender and gravyish."

"But where is it?" said Ned.

"Higher up, I suppose, where there's prairie-land and grass. You don't expect to see buffler where there's nothing to graze on, do you? Look at the stones, though. Regular rocky ridges rising up one above the other on the other side of that frosty lake part. Shouldn't wonder if we found something fresh there."

He pointed to his left, where there was a manifest change in the scenery as seen through the shimmering haze which hindered the view.

"Yes," he cried eagerly, "if you look hard you can just get a glimpse of a great ridge, and just beyond--_ragh_! There are the mountains at last!"

"I can't see them," said Chris thoughtfully. "Are they near?"

"No; but near enough for us to reach to-morrow night."

"But what about to-night? I say, that isn't salt. I can see it glittering quite plainly; it's water."

"No, my lad; no water there. I wish there was," added Griggs to himself.

"Then what are we to do for water to-night?"

"There'll be enough to make our tea."

"But the horses and mules?" said Chris.

"We must try and find a hollow with some shrubby stuff that they can chew, poor beasts, for they'll get nothing else. What are you pointing at, squire?"

Ned made no answer, but sat fast where he had checked his pony, pointing to where hundreds, perhaps thousands, of heavy grey stones lay scattered widely about over the sandy slope.

"Well, I can see them; stones, looking as if a mountain had crumbled all away in an earthquake, or in some volcanic explosion which had shattered it all to pieces."

"No, no," said Ned huskily; "not there. More to the left. It is that tree I mean."

"Tree? There's no tree there."

"Yes, that great one that was turned over in the earthquake, and all of the trunk and top buried in the stones."

"I say, my lad," said Griggs anxiously, "has the heat been too much for you?"

"Yes, it made my head ache."

"That's it, then. Made you fancy you can see a tree upside down."

"'Tisn't fancy," said Ned huskily. "I can see plain enough, but it isn't natural. It's all alive, and the roots are twisting and twining about as if the tree was alive and in pain."

"Here, don't stare at it. Shut your eyes for a bit, my lad. I'll take your mustang's rein."

"But I must look at it," cried Ned excitedly. "I can't help it. Horrid! Here, you two are not looking the right way."

"I'm looking at you, my lad," said Griggs kindly.

"And so are you, Chris. Don't--please don't. Look there; I want you to see what it means."

"Ugh!" gasped Chris, as he turned his eyes in the direction pointed out by his companion, and that which he saw then was evidently seen now by his nag, which started violently, and but for the tight hand the lad had upon the rein it would have dashed off.

"Here, have you got it too?" cried Griggs. "There, sit still till the water-kegs come up, and you must have a drink apiece. The sun has been too much for you, and--"

He said no more, but sat staring in one direction with his mouth wide open and his eyes seeming ready to start out of his head.

"Hallo, here! hallo!" cried the doctor, cantering up, closely followed by Wilton and Bourne, leaving their position in the rear unguarded. "What's the matter--the boys taken ill?"

"Snakes," cried Griggs hoarsely. "Look yonder."

Griggs' words were unnecessary, for the doctor's eyes had lighted upon the extraordinary sight that had startled Ned into his wild announcement.

The next moment his companions had grasped the phenomenon, and had hard work to keep their mounts from dashing frantically away.

For about a hundred yards from them, half-hidden among the stones, was something which pretty well warranted Ned's comparison to a tree turned wrong way up, so that only its roots were visible above the ground, the object being, in fact, a monstrous knot of hundreds of snakes twined together as if they were all engaged in the attempt to get their heads into the centre of the tangled mass which, all in motion, heaved and sank and rolled from side to side, the lower portions of the serpents' bodies and their tails being free to lash and writhe about in the air, while at a second glance the spectators began to realise the fact that all around, gliding in and out amongst the stones, were hundreds upon hundreds more of the reptiles, apparently urged on by some savage instinct to form other knots, till the whole of the hollow in front seemed to be alive with the loathsome creatures.

"Did you ever see anything like this before, Griggs?" said the doctor, who was the first to speak.

"Never, sir; but an old gold prospector once told me that he had seen just such a sight, only I put it down to being a yarn told to cram me."

"But they're not poisonous--not rattlesnakes, surely?" said Bourne.

"They surely are," cried Wilton. "Hark! Can't you hear? It's like a dull thrilling sound. Here, I don't want to be the first to run, but I can't stand this; I'm off."

"We'd better all be off," cried the doctor. "Here, Griggs, head round your bell-mule and let's get away. You seem to have led us right into the empire of snakes. Quick, look alive, or the poor brutes will be right amongst the reptiles."

"Not they, sir; they smell 'em now. Come and help, or we shall have a stampede." _

Read next: Chapter 12. Chris Has A Fit

Read previous: Chapter 10. On The Way

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