The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-09-19

Greeks using both the bridge and the furnace soon if I didn't get move on.
 As I quickened my pace something wavering and misty rose out of the center of the alkali flat. It was small mesa raising it's lonely head in the desert.
 Thinking to get some fresfer air above the dead level of the plain I climbed the mound, where I did get a breach of mountain wind. But as. I glanced through the trembling air of the broad. hot country, I quckly threw myself on the ground with hoarse cry that sounded strange in my own ears.
 I'd seen a blur of dust right below me, and through it three men on broncos galloping straight toward the mesa. Had they seen me standing there? Perhaps it was the smoke Of their camp fire I'd sighted from the top of the butte that morning. And between thinking of Morehard's old warning and Reedy Gibbs words and the face I'd seen 1eering at me Tn the mirror at Rioville. It was in a bad place, because l didn't Know what danger might be coming.
 I wanted to get out of observations way. anyhow, so I crawled down from the mesa, took up my pedograph, slung my bag on my shoulder. ana waited, listening for the coming hoof- beats and the voices of the riders
 kept on listening and waiting as I hid there, but not a sound rose in the desert Then I got out from living thing in sight. The dust-cloud had settled, and the empty flats spread out before me without a sign of life.
 was the most surprised man you ever saw. I climbed back to the top of the mesa, and there was the still country below me and not a horse man in sight.
 As left the mesa on a fresh track
 of two thousand paces toward the
 east I felt my head was getting queer. I was plumb unnerved by the sud- den disappearance of those horsemen | and I began to realize that it wasn't hard for a man to go crazy in the
 desert.
 At the finish of the mile, I swerved west again on a grand curve right towards the depths of the Ganado flats. I went on, panting, for a, good two miles or more. The sand had been drinking the sun for hours, and now sent a furnace-like blast toward the torrid sky. I had to open my pack at times to wet my lips and
 bathe my eyes.
 And all this while in the back of | my dizzy head I was wondering how all this was going to end, and whether
 I'd meet with some big success. | Now I uttered a cry and stood mock still, for a man was coming | toward me across the plain. Through the shimnering haze he was outlined 1 in a dull, gray shadow. Hold up''! I cried, moistening my dried lips. He stopped, and we glared 1 at each other. I thought he was | laughing at me, and I stealthily drew l my Mauser. I must have been getting l light-headed. I was dangerous man to meet just then, and not respon- sible for my actions.
 The fellow suddenly retreated ! walking backward. And then he crouched as if for a spring. His actions were so crazy that ] | fired pointblank at him. My bullet
 passed clean through him, and still
 he crouched there, glaring. I fell to my knees. I thought I'd | gone stark mad. And then because of the revolver shot and the drifting
 parted, for the figure faded away, and
 nothing was left in front of me but 8
 clump of sagebrush.-
 Luckily just then I recollected what l I'd heard about the desert mirage | and how one sees these queer sights
 which men can't explain. And that | also accounted for the fantom horse. men. All this had been nothing but
 fancy and illusion. Maybe the quiv, | ering desert air is like a looking glass
 and reflects objects that aremiles
 away.
 It took me some time to chase away
 the horror of that shadow figure | because, in spite of it's being mirage | I couldn't get over a notion that i
 had been Morehard's ghost watching
 his treasure. I talked out loud, ar guing with myself that I was a foo | for thinking so. You see was get ting crack-brained.
 | But anyhow, I gripped the pedo. 1 graph and started on my last lap I This was the final, big, swinging
 curve on top of the diagram. It led
 me northeast and was bringing me tc
 the end of Morehard's chart. | It was the hottest hour of the after | noon, but the idea that I was nearins
 the finish worked me up to a. crazy
 pitch. I went along for half an hour staggering. shouting, ree1ing, but witl | just sense enough left to keen my
 chart straight.
 To Be Continued Tomorrow. Copyright 1922. Thompson Feature | Service.