Part 3

“That'll do, Bob,” murmured The Wounded Bad Man. “I call upon you an' Tom to witness that I receive that woman's baby--in God's name. If I whimper for water don't give it to me. There's blood poison in my shoulder an' arm an' I'm goin' crazy. I'm burnin' up--but it's comin' to me. Lord, it's comin' to me. I don't complain none, Lord, an' I thank Thee for bringin' me this far--with the little chap--for Thy sake, Lord. Our Father, who art--who art--who art--who art--in Heaven, blessed--I can't remember, Bob. It's a long time.... I'll try another--”

“He's off at last,” muttered The Worst Bad Man. “It's the blood poison. He's been dyin' since we left Malapai Springs. Listen at him, Bob. What kind o' stuff is he talkin'?--listen!”

They bent over The Wounded Bad Man and listened intently, for it seemed to them he was wandering far afield in his delirium. He was. Bill Kearny's body was dying, but his soul was wandering adown the wild and checkered path of his career to its dim and distant starting point.

“Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

If I should die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take.”

“God bless my father and mother and my little sister--and make me a good boy. Amen!”

The Worst Bad Man's face twitched a little “Good Jesus Christ!” he murmured. The words were not a blasphemy. They fell from his blackened lips like a benediction--in his fierce eyes a soft and human light was beaming. “Jesus Christ _is_ good. He's slippin' it easy to old Bill. He's made him a child again.”

Throughout the long, stifling day they sat and watched him, and when he became delirious The Youngest Bad Man took the baby in hand, in case The Wounded Bad Man should suddenly become violent. Late in the afternoon when the baby had been fed and wrapped again in the blanket, preparatory to taking the trail once more, the dying godfather rolled over and opened his eyes. They bent to hear his last message. It was almost unintelligible.

“It's a Christmas baby--it belongs--in Jerus--alem. Stick it out to--finish--good--boys--don't let--my--godson--die--between--two--thieves-----”

They pressed his hand. The Worst Bad Man had the pack ready and slipped it over his weary shoulders. He reached for the baby.

“Gimme the kid,” he cried thickly. “I got ten miles left in me yet. I'll see you across the dry lake.”

The Youngest Bad Man understood now. He handed over the baby, and together the two godfathers passed out of the shack into the great salt desert... And some time during the night the angels came and led Bill Kearny into paradise.

After leaving the cabin The Worst Bad Man, realizing that the next ten miles of their journey across the salt lake offered free, smooth footing, resolved to make the pace while the “going” was good. They were no longer hampered by being forced to suit their gait to that of Bill Kearny, and The Worst Bad Man was resolved to see his godson safe across the dry lake before surrendering.

He swayed considerably as he walked, but The Youngest Bad Man strode beside him, with a hand on his arm, and helped to hold him steady. And as they proceeded The Worst Bad Man talked to Bob Sangster.

It was a short sermon, evolved, in terse, eloquent sentences, from out the bitterness of The Worst Bad Man's dark past and still darker future.

“Bill Kearny never went back on a pal, son, an' when I quit you I want you to say, 'Well, Tom Gibbons, he never went back on a pal nuther.' An' when you come to cash in, you want to have our godson say, 'An' Bob Sangster, too--he never went back on a pal.' Cut out the crooked work, son. Nobody has anythin' on you yet--start straight an' raise this boy straight, an' if ever you spot him showin' signs o' breakin' away from the reservation, just you remind him that a woman an' two men died to make a man outer him. That's all. I ain't goin' to try to talk no more.”

At midnight The Worst Bad Man was very weak. He swayed and staggered and stopped every few hundred yards to rest, but he would not give up the baby.

“I'll last till sun-up,” he told himself; “I got to. I ain't the quittin' kind.”

About two o'clock in the morning the moon came out; from somewhere in the distance a coyote gave tongue, and The Worst Bad Man shivered a little. At three o'clock they came out of the dry salt lake into the sands again, and The Youngest Bad Man held out his arms for the baby.

“He needs grub mighty bad,” was what The Worst Bad Man tried to say, but the words came only as an unintelligible mumble. There had been no sage on the dry lake and they had been unable to make a fire. For two hours the baby had been whimpering with hunger and cold. The Worst Bad Man slipped out of his pack, gathered some dry sagebrush and lit a roaring fire, while his youthful companion ministered to the baby. And when Bob Sang-ster had finished The Worst Bad Man smoothed a two-foot area in the sand, and by the light of the campfire he wrote with his finger the words that he could not speak:

“You carry baby. I'm good two three miles more with pack. I leave you twelve miles from New Jerusalem. Don't lay up today keep moving put baby half rations savvy.”

The Youngest Bad Man nodded. When dawn began to show in the east they resumed the journey. After the first mile, The Worst Bad Man gave signs that the end was coming very soon. He fell more frequently, barking his hands and knees, filling his mouth and eyes with sand, tearing his flesh in the catclaws. Weary, monotonous gasps came from his constricted throat, but still he staggered along, although his strength had been gone for hours. He was traveling on his nerve now.

Slowly the dawnlight crept over the desert, softening with its magic beauty the harsh empire of death. The Worst Bad Man saw the rosy glow lighting up the saturnine face of the witch of Old Woman Mountain, and was content. He had promised himself to last till dawn. He had kept his word.

He sank to his knees in the sand. Bob, Sangster stooped and lifted him to his feet. He staggered along a few yards and fell again, and when Bob Sangster would fain have lifted him once more, The Worst Bad Man motioned him back with an imperious wave of his hand, for he did not want the boy to waste his strength. He tried to protest verbally, but a horrible sound was all that came from his swollen mouth.

The Youngest Bad Man tarried for a moment, irresolute, standing over him. The Worst Bad Man deliberately removed his hat and handed it to the young godfather, who took it, fitted a branch of sagebrush with three forks at one end into the crown of the wide-brimmed hat, and thus constructed a sort of crude parasol wherewith to keep the sun from the baby. The Worst Bad Man nodded his approbation, and Bob Sangster lowered the baby until its soft little face brushed the bloody bristles on The Worst Bad Man's cheek; a handclasp--and the last of the godfathers turned his young face toward New Jerusalem and departed into the eye of the coming day.

The Worst Bad Man watched him until he disappeared into the neutrals of the desert before he turned his head to glance back, along the trail by which they had come. Away off to the southwest, forty miles away, the Cathedral Peaks lifted their castellated spires, and the gaze of the stricken godfather went no farther. The Cathedral Peaks--how like a church they seemed, standing there in the solitude, sublime, indestructible, eternal, gazing down the centuries. The Worst Bad Man was moved to solemn thought--he who had so little time for thought now. His mind harkened back to the scene in the salt house on the dry lake, to Bill Kearny's challenge to the Omnipotent, to the answers that came to that anguished soul crying in the wilderness of doubt and unbelief; and suddenly a great desire came over The Worst Bad Man. He, too, wanted to know. He, too, would ask a sign. And if there was a God----

He stretched forth his arms toward the Cathedral Peaks. “Lord, give me a sign,” he gobbled; “let me have The Light”; and, as if in answer to his cry, the sun burst over the crest of the Panimints, a long shaft of light shot across the desert and painted, in colors designed by the Master Artist, the distant spires of the Cathedral Peaks. They flamed in crimson, in gold, in flashes of silver light, fading away into turquoise and deep maroon, and in that light The Worst Bad Man read the answer to his riddle.

“Lord, I believe.” The horrid gobbling broke the silence once more. “Remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.”

And then the desert madness smote his brain, and with the sudden, terrible strength of the maniac he scrambled to his feet and started across the waste toward the peaks. Over the long trail to the Great Divide he ran, with arms outstretched; and as he ran the Peaks flamed and flickered in heliograph flashes. Perhaps they carried a message, a message that only The Worst Bad Man could understand--the message of hope eternal sounding down the ages:

“Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.”

Presently The Worst Bad Man fell. It was the end. He had kept the faith.

*****

But Bob Sangster could not wait and watch and speculate. Time pressed; at Terrapin Tanks he had passed his word, and he must be moving on if he would save his godson. He had one can of condensed milk and half a quart of water left. It behooved him to hurry.

When the sun was an hour high and the desolate landscape lay baking and shimmering round him, he crept into the meager shadow of a palo-verde tree, undressed the infant, rubbed him with the last of the olive oil and threw the bottle away. Then with new, fresh garments carried from Terrapin Tanks he dressed the baby. He wet his bandana handkerchief and washed the little red face. He was preparing for the final dash.

He abandoned the supply of mesquit-bean bread and jerked beef, the Bible, and Doctor Meecham's invaluable work on Caring for the Baby. He considered a moment, and decided to abandon also the heavy woolen blanket in which they had been carrying the baby. It mea'nt six pounds less weight, and unless they made New Jerusalem before sundown Robert William Thomas would not need it. With or without blankets, they would both sleep cold under the stars tonight, for Bob Sang-ster was once more confronted by the primal necessity of his calling. He had to “take a chance.”

He was about to discard his six-shooter and belt, but a stealthy crackle in the sagebrush caused him to reconsider. He watched the spot whence the sounds came and presently he made out the form of a coyote. The brute was sitting on his hunkers, his red tongue lolling out of the corner of his mouth, his glance fixed in lazy appraisal upon the last of the godfathers and the bundle that he carried.

The boldness of the beast was an insult in itself. It drove Bob Sangster wild with anger. With marvelous brute intelligence the coyote had sensed the weakness of the man, and patiently he had set himself the task of shadowing him to the finish. He sat there now--waiting. In his contempt for the hereditary enemy the gray skulker did not even trouble to conceal his intentions.

“So you're hangin' round for the pickin's already,” snarled Bob Sangster, and fired. The coyote turned a somersault and crawled away through the sage, dragging its hindlegs after it, and two more coyotes sprang up at the sound of the shot and scurried out of range.

“You think I'll drop this boy, don't you?” raved the godfather, blazing away at the fleeing enemy long after it was out of range. He seized Robert William Thomas and, holding his hat parasol over the child, hurried along toward the mouth of a draw. He was getting in among the low, black, volcanic hills and lava beds again, and the reflected heat was terrible. Cautiously he made his way along the shady side of the canon, and for an hour he progressed thus until the sun, having risen higher, sought him out.

Horned toads and lizards scuttled out of his path in fright, chuckwallas blinked their eyes at him, a desert terrapin waddled leisurely by, and once, gazing back over the trail, he saw that the coyotes had recovered from their fright and were following him again. He commenced to see mirages--wonderfully beautiful little lakes, fringed with palms and bright-green rushes. Distinctly he heard the pleasant murmur of water tumbling over rocks. He was tempted to pause and search for this purling brook, but his common-sense warned that it was all a delusion of the heat and his own imagination. He knew that the sun was getting him fast, that he was drying up.

“Cactus,” he kept repeating to himself, as if in that one word he held the open sesame of life; “just one niggerhead cactus.” But the niggerhead cactus, with its scanty supply of vegetable juices, did not grow in the country through which he was traveling, and as the slow miles slipped behind him and his eager glance revealed the entire absence of the shrub that meant life to him and Robert William Thomas, the terrible uselessness of his struggle, the horrible forlornness of his forlorn hope, became more and more apparent. The baby was whimpering continually now, and faint blue rings had appeared under the little sufferer's eyes. He was sick and tired and hot and itchy, and despite the fact that the godfathers had done their best, Bob Sangster knew that the child could not last a day longer without proper attention. It was a miracle that he had survived thus far--a miracle only accounted for by reason of the fact that he was a healthy, hearty twelve-pounder at birth. The last of the godfathers tried vainly to soothe him with the oft-successful Yeller Rose o' Texas, but he was beyond singing now, and in the knowledge that both were going swiftly he mingled his tears with those of his godson. Yet they were manly tears, and no taint of selfpity brought them forth. Only it broke Bob Sangster's heart to think of his helpless godson and of the gray scavengers skulking behind.

Suddenly the godfather thrilled with a great feeling of relief and joy. He had come to an Indian water sign; he read it at a glance. Five little rock monuments in a circle, with a sixth standing off to the right about thirty feet from the others. In that direction the water lay, and bearing due southwest Bob Sangster saw a draw opening up. The journey would take him a mile or two out of his way, but what mattered a mile or ten miles, provided he found water? The prospect gave him renewed hope and strength. He forged steadily ahead and when the canon narrowed he knew he was coming to a “tank.” Up the wash he ran and sank, sobbing, on the edge of the water-hole. It was quite dry.

It was a long time before he could gather his courage together and depart down the canon again. He had traveled two miles for nothing! He wept anew at the thought, marveling the while that there should be so much moisture still in his wretched body.

At the mouth of the canon he halted and prepared the last of his condensed milk and water for the baby. When he proffered it, however, the child screamed and refused the horrid draught, and as he lay on the man's knees with his little mouth open Bob Sangster dropped in the last dregs of his canteen.

“You need water, too, son,” he mumbled sadly. “This sweet dope is killin' you.”

He replaced the feeding bottle in his pocket, paused long enough to kill another coyote that had ventured too close, and resumed his journey toward New Jerusalem. He had left the dry tank at noon. At one o'clock he was two miles nearer New Jerusalem; at three o'clock he was within five miles of the camp and had fallen for the first time. But even as he fell he had thrust out his left hand, thus fending his weight from the baby, and the child had not been injured. So the godfather merely covered the child's tender head with Tom Gibbons' old hat, and together they lay for a while prone in the sand. The man was not yet done, but he was exhausted and half blind and very weak. He was striving to get his courage in hand once more, and he needed a rest so badly. So he lay there, trying to think, until presently the whimpering of the infant aroused him, and he sat up suddenly.

Seated in a circle, of which Bob Sangster and the baby formed the axis, were half a dozen coyotes. They were closer now--too close for comfort and, cowardly as he knew them to be, there were enough of them present to fan their courage to the point where a single rush would end it. He fired at them and they scampered away unharmed.

“I can't shoot any more,” the man wailed. “I'm goin' blind. Come, son, we must move on or they'll get us to-night.”

He picked the child up and plodded on, and once more the coyotes fell into line behind him. The godfather began to feel afraid of them. He was obsessed with a horrible fear that they might sneak up and snap at him from behind, or rush him en masse and tear the baby out of his arms. He kept glancing back and firing at them. But all of his shots went wild and gradually the tracing brutes grew bolder. Whenever he sat down for a few minutes to rest they surrounded him, and it seemed to the godfather that each time they edged in closer. He decided to save his cartridges until the final rush.

He tottered along until four o'clock before he fell again. This time he twisted in time to land on his back, with the baby uppermost, and as he lay there, stunned and shaken, the godfather was almost proud of himself for his forethought. He closed his eyes to rid his vision of the myriads of red, yellow and blue spots that came dancing out of the sand and shooting into the air like skyrockets. The spots still persisted, however--for the skyrockets were in his brain, and as he lay there it came to him that this was to be the end after all. He was too weak to carry the baby further. Sooner or later he would fall upon it and kill it, so why struggle further----

The baby was leaving him! He could feel it being slowly dragged from his protecting arm, and with a moan that was intended for a shriek he sat up and reached for his gun. So close to him was the coyote, dragging gingerly at the infant's clothing, that the godfather dared not fire. He merely threw up his arms to frighten the beast away, and reluctantly it trotted back and rejoined its companions of the slavering, red-tongued circle.

The godfather knelt in the sands beside the baby and searched for the marks of teeth, but found none. The horror of their situation was brought forcefully home to him now. He had hoped before, but hope was vanished. New Jerusalem could not be more than three miles away, but it might as well be three hundred, for Bob Sangster could never make it with the baby. He thought no longer of life. He wanted to cheat the coyotes, and in his agony he forgot that he was a Bad Man and cried aloud to a Supreme Being of whom he knew nothing.

“O God, save me, save me! Not for myself, but for this poor little baby. I'm old and tough, Lord, but save the baby. You were a baby yourself once, Lord, if the Bible don't lie. Now save my baby. Don't go back on me, Lord. Help me, help me to keep my word to raise him right----”

He clasped the child in his arms and kissed it passionately for the first time since his assumption of the duties of a godfather And then, because he was a fighter and could not quit while there was life within him, he reeled onward with dogged persistence. He fixed his fading glance on some unimportant landmark ana nerved himself to last until he should reach it. Queer thoughts kept obtruding themselves upon him. Once he thought a chuckwalla addressed him, saying: “Hello, Bob Sang-ster, what are you runnin' away from? You can't dodge them coyotes. They're goin' to get that infant, sure. Better chuck 'em the kid an' see if you can't make it alone to New Jerusalem. That baby's weight is killin' you, boy. After all, what is he to you? He's only a three-day-old baby. Why don't, you drop him an' beat it in to New Jerusalem? You can make it without the baby.”

He had cursed the chuckwalla and stamped it into the earth for the insult. But a moment later a horned toad advised him to drink the milk that still remained in the feeding bottle. “Of course it's none o' my business,” remarked the horned toad, “but if the baby won't drink it, you should. It's foolish to let it go to waste. It's only a couple of mouthfuls, but it'll give you strength to make that black lava point a mile ahead.”

“Horned Toad,” replied the godfather, “you're a sensible little critter an' I'll take your advice. It ain't manly to do it, but nothin' matters any more.”

He drank the milk that the baby had refused, tossed the bottle aside and nerved himself to last until he should reach the black lava point. That was to be the last goal. If he fell before he reached it he resolved to climb into a palo-verde tree, wedge himself and the baby in between the limbs, kill the baby and himself, and thus dying have the laugh on the coyotes.

He fell. For the third time the child escaped being crushed. The palo-verde tree was only fifty yards away, the black lava point seventy-five yards, but when the godfather could scramble to his feet again he made for the palo-verde tree. Here, to his disgust, he found himself too weak to climb the tree. So he leaned against it and wept, dry-eyed, with rage and horror and disappointment. The horned toad had followed and now offered more advice.

“Sangster, you're a chump. Why climb the tree? The buzzards will get you, so what's the difference?”

“I'll make the lava point,” replied the godfather. “They can't come at me in back there, an' I can keep 'em away for a while anyhow.”

He lurched away. Foot by foot he approached the black lava point. He resolved to round it; there was shade on the other side. Staggering, reeling, muttering incoherently, he rounded the lava rock and collided with something soft and hairy. He leaned against it for a moment, resting, while something soft and warm and animallike nuzzled him and nickered softly in the joy of the meeting. When Bob Sangster opened his eyes he found himself leaning against a trembling old white burro with a pack on his back.

“Water,” thought the godfather, “water. There ought to be a canvas waterbag,” and he went clawing along the burro's side, feeling for the waterbag but unable to find it. The little animal was standing patiently in the shadow of the rock, and Bob Sangster stood off and looked at him. The burro's eyes were red and dust-rimmed; evidently he had traveled far. His legs trembled, his tongue, dry and black, protruded from his mouth. The burro, too, was dying of thirst.

“You poor devil,” mused Bob Sangster. He gazed at the pitiable little animal, the while his memory strove to recall some other incident in which a burro had figured. There had been some talk of burros recently with Bill Kearny and Tom Gibbons. What was it? Well, never mind. It didn't make any difference. This burro was dying and useless; there was no water bag----

_And when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem... then sent Jesus two disciples, saying unto them, Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied...._

The words of the Gospel according to St. Matthew flamed in letters of fire across the failing vision of the last godfather. He remembered now. He had read a chapter from the Bible to Bill Kearny and Tom Gibbons back there at Terrapin Tanks--and it was all about Christ riding into Jerusalem on an ass. Here, in the shadow of this black lava, he had found a burro waiting!

Bill Kearny had asked for a sign----

The last of the godfathers thought of his frenzied prayer of an hour before. He had asked for help. Could it be possible that here stood the answer?

“There's a chance,” he mumbled. “This critter has stampeded from some prospector's pack outfit He's been lookin' for water, and the Lord sent him our way, sonny. He's sure sent him.”