So they continued until the sun was well up; dug their holes with the sun strong against their backs; and tumbled into their damp earth beds with a twitching of overtaxed muscles. Mackenzie had a final look back toward the mountains they’d crossed. He saw nothing remarkable and he was asleep instantly.
He awakened once with the sun just past zenith: it was the rush of a jet that had alerted him but by the time he lifted his head the plane was retreating toward the horizon. He saw no buzzards, no Duggai; he sagged into the cool bunker and slept.
He was awake again by three or so; he spent an hour repairing his frayed moccasins with rawhide but they wouldn’t last the night and there remained only one spare pair each.
Well, we’ll keep the ruined ones and try to stitch them together to make new ones.
They were fed and moving again well before sundown; by nightfall they’d crossed several miles; moonrise found them in the passage between ranges.
It was going better than he’d hoped: if their muscles and moccasins held out they were going to make it. But he itched terribly where the sun had baked his already punished skin and he was conscious of the dry scratch of the hard leather breechclout.
They walked without hurry, not letting impatience force the pace; they’d settled down to the march of soldiers, one pace at a time and no thought of anything beyond it. The water sack swung from Mackenzie’s fist, the palm tacky with sweat, and every hundred yards or so he shifted it from hand to hand.
They emerged from between the ranges. The moon was perceptibly stronger tonight: it threw a steel-hued glow across the flats and by its light Mackenzie could make out distinctly the canyon contours of sierras some miles away. To the northeast the plain stretched away to a level horizon many miles distant. At other compass points there were cairns and hummocks and mountain ranges that brought the horizons closer. Due north stood a forbidding rampart of boulder cliffs. No point going up against that: they struck off to the right and followed the flats.
Underfoot they traversed pebbles and clay and the dry-rotting remains of crumbling plants. The trick was to stay a good distance from any shrubbery big enough to cast a shadow. The bare earth ran in contours of washboard unevenness but it made firm footing and the journey was easy so long as you watched where you were putting your foot down.
The occasional coyote yapped distantly; the occasional rodent or jackrabbit bolted away. Mackenzie thought of the bonepiles of bleached remains that had been strewn across this desert a hundred years ago-pioneers trying to reach California across the infamous Jornada del Muerte: the trail had been signposted with cattle skulls and human skeletons.
Well, they didn’t have plastic raincoats in those days.
Judderingly weary; but he felt good. Triumph filled him, kept him moving even when spasms ran uncontrollably along his punished legs. Jay kept up-it was an evident struggle but he voiced no complaint and halted only when Mackenzie called a rest.
By midnight the moccasins had given out; they changed to the last ones. The new footwear was stiff and painful but they kept on.
As they approached the horizon a massive range climbed into sight and Mackenzie diverted the course again, swinging west of north. They were zigzagging in long arcs and it was adding to the distance but it wasn’t as severe as he’d expected: the ranges stood far apart and rarely extended more than a few miles in length. Off to the west he could see a great humping granddaddy sierra that covered an entire quadrant but it didn’t lie across their path. When they stopped to drink he said, “I think we may strike the highway sometime tomorrow night.”
“That soon?”
“We’ve covered at least twenty-five miles since we left camp. A lot better than I expected. It may not be much more than fifteen, twenty more miles.”
It perked Jay up. When they continued Mackenzie saw him searching the plains ahead for headlights.
Toward morning the earth began to tilt; they faced a gradual upward climb. It was a shallow slope but it extended miles and they could see nothing beyond it but sky.
The climb sapped them; they had to stop every quarter hour, then every ten minutes.
“Maybe we should call it a night?”
“I want to see what’s on the far side.”
“You’re stumbling like a drunk, Sam.”
“So are you.”
“If we burn ourselves out we won’t get far tomorrow night.”
“Earle needs help as fast as we can get it to him.”
“All right. You know best.”
Dawn, then daylight. He’d long since stopped counting the days of the ordeal. The earth ran uphill endlessly in front of them: they would reach something that ought to be the top but beyond it they would find a shallow dip and then more climb. The horizon was never more than a few hundred yards away. It was as if the demons were putting them to the ultimate test of patience and endurance.
“It’s getting hot.…”
“Keep going.”
They must have climbed at least a thousand feet, he thought. A wind soughed across the desert; dust rose into his teeth. Twice Jay spoke to him and went unheard. Finally Jay struggled around in front of him, flapping both arms in his consternation. “We’ve got to stop. We’ll broil.”
“All right. The top of that rise right there-we’ll stop there.”
“No farther,” Jay warned.
“No farther.” His unfeeling feet propelled him toward the top. Long steady climb: Jay scuttled behind him, hands on knees to thrust against the tilt of the earth, knees splaying every which way. Mackenzie switched the water bag from right hand to left hand. He could feel the skin frying on his back: his mind must have gone away for a while-he didn’t remember the past two hours. It had been dawn, sunrise, then abruptly it was midmorning. Jay was right. We ought to stop right here. We’ll kill ourselves.
But he walked. Just to the top there.…
Agonizing to walk. But the top was in sight-he homed on the tufted flagpole stalk of a century plant. That’s as far as we go. A hundred feet, seventy-five, fifty.
Beyond the top was a trough that ran crosswise to their course: it was half a mile across; beyond it another ridge rippled right to left.
But there was a gap through the ridge and he could see the long dry plains beyond. This was indeed the top.
And far out across that desert he saw an object crawling at steady speed. A tiny rectangle rolling eastward.
“Look.”
“What-where?”
Mackenzie’s arm lifted, trembling. He sighted along his extended finger. “That’s a truck.”
“The highway.”
They stared for the longest time. The truck disappeared behind a roll of ground. Something winked then-a flicker of painful light that appeared and disappeared along a westward trajectory. Sunlight against a car’s rear window. Then behind it another.
“Sam-”
“Forget it. We’ll dig in here.”
“But the highway.…”
“That’s twenty miles away.”
“But we’ll make it tonight, right?”
“Bet your ass we will.”
They grinned at each other ludicrously.
He tried to dig in the shade of a bush but the roots stopped him and he kept having to slope the pit farther out until the sun again cooked his back but he closed his mind against it and kept clawing earth out of the hole: sunburn could be treated.
“That’s got to be deep enough.”
“No. At least another six inches. You don’t want to die this close to the end.”
“I can’t even pick up this rock anymore.”
“Dig, damn you.”
Eventually the pits were done to his satisfaction and the bottoms were invitingly damp. They sat mostly in shade now; they portioned out meat and salt and finally a good deal of water. It left only a couple of quarts in the bag but that would do-they’d drop the bag somewhere along the downslope and cover the last few hours without water. They wouldn’t need to carry anything on the last lap.