Part 2 (1/2)

He laughed a little as he picked her up. She gasped with pain.

”I can't help hurting you,” he said gently.

”It's all right,” she answered, putting her arm around his neck so that he might the more easily bear her. ”We are off on our great adventure.

The halt and the blind! Such a mad pair!”

He smiled, and started slowly up the beach.

”I shall have to develop a system of one word guides,” she mused.

”Left--right--slow--ahead--all right--and so on,” he admitted.

Suddenly she laughed out merrily. ”My friend, a stranger pilgrimage the world never knew. What is your name?”

”Lawrence,” he said.

”Mine,” she answered, ”is Claire. Go a little to the left.”

He turned slightly, and plodded through the sand.

CHAPTER II.

THE WATER OF LIFE.

Still exhausted from his recent battle with the waves, Lawrence was not in the best condition for this new struggle. Before he had gone far, he was forced to rest. He lowered Claire to the ground carefully and dropped beside her. His effort in carrying her had made him breathe hard, the sun was beating down on them, and his throat was dry and parched. Speaking was becoming difficult.

”If we don't find water soon, we're ended,” he managed to say.

”I'm afraid we are,” she admitted. ”Do you know, Lawrence, you shouldn't try to carry me. I weigh over a hundred and thirty pounds. That is too much for any man. Without me, you might make it, even though you couldn't travel so steadily ahead.”

”Perhaps,” he agreed. ”I've thought of that. But, you see, I would have to feel my way. At best I'd get a lot of falls. I might walk off a precipice. That doesn't appeal to me, now that I've set myself to winning.”

”And yet you are almost certain to wear yourself out to no purpose if you carry me,” she repeated. ”If you could do it and get me through, I'd never stop you. I've a husband in America who loves me, and I want to get back to him, but you aren't equal to it. I see no advantage in dying a mile or ten miles inland. For one's grave, this is as good a place as any.”

She spoke of dying in a matter-of-fact way that made him feel strange, though he thought of it in exactly the same way himself. He believed that he was a mere animal and that death was a mere cessation of energy.

”I wonder if she feels just as I do about it,” he pondered. ”Perhaps not. But it can't matter anyway. Here we are, and death does seem fairly certain.”

He was breathing more regularly now, though his throat burned and his tongue stuck to his mouth disagreeably.

”We'd better be moving,” he said, rising with an effort.

”As you please,” she a.s.sented.

Then, as he lifted her: ”My ankle is swollen dreadfully. If we could find water, I'd bathe it and put a stick splint on it.”

He did not answer. Silence fell between them while he plodded ahead.

They started up the mountainside, and the way became increasingly difficult. There was a dense undergrowth through which he was compelled to shove his feet. There were rocks which she could not see, down which he was constantly slipping. Her directions barely kept him from b.u.mping into the trees that grew closer and closer together. Occasionally she pushed a branch aside from before him, and laughed as he stooped to pa.s.s under, throwing her forward so that she had to cling to his neck to keep her position.

On and on he forced his way, his teeth clenched, his breath broken by the strain. She made herself as easy to carry as she could, but beyond that she showed no sign of sympathy. Again and again he was obliged to stop and put her down while he rested. His head was throbbing frightfully. He gave up trying to talk.