Think I'll stay away until Uncle Sam's boys thin 'em out a
little more."
"Can I obtain a five or ten gallon keg of you, Mr. Hopkins?" I asked.
"Ours was accidentally smashed on the road."
"Haven't a keg to my name, lieutenant. One way 'n' ernuther all's been
smashed, give away, or lent."
The ride from the ranch to the edge of the desert plain was twelve
miles, a portion of it over a rugged ridge. To the point where we were
to ford the creek was two miles, and there the hired men, pack-mules,
and ranch cattle turned off on the Bill Williams Fork route to the
Rio Colorado.
Once on the level of the Xuacaxella our team broke into a brisk trot,
and we rolled along with a fair prospect of soon crossing the one
hundred miles between Date Creek and La Paz. Messrs. Gray, Rosenberg,
and Hopkins shortly turned into a bridle-path which led into a mine.
Before taking leave of us Mr. Gray told me that my camping-place for
the night would be at the point of the third mountain-spur which
jutted into the plain from the western range.
We had not travelled long before we realized our misfortune in having
smashed our water-keg.
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