Evening star., 1927-11-13
Of
ndS SlvaBe oFut Recorded

| remainder Of the day with the hope
of passing Navajos.
That night coyotes began to howl
| far up the canyon. but instead of their
| usual drunken hlariouSneSs they seem
ed to be laughing at me, taking de-
| lcious delight in the predicament of
| one who had so often taken their lives
| and was soon to have his own taken
| by subtler and more horrible method.
| / was awakened before dawn the
| next day by a din of harsh, raucouS
| noises, and turned slowly over to see
| five crows staring at me from the
edge of the cliff. When l moved. they
| leaped into the air, cawing shrilly,
and alighted farther up, and when
settled back again they cawed even
more fiercely, hopping close and chal-
| longing me angrily. / threw piece
| of stone at them. hoping 10 kill one,
| but they jumped up and flew across
the canyon.
All day long I lay quietly upon the
ledge, guarding my strength, watching
| the two ends of the canyon for the
moving black specks that would be
| Navajos. And all the while crows
| few about me from cliff to cliff, from
ledge to jut of rock, cawing and scold-
| ing. Overhead a buzzard sailed in
wide circles through the hot air, and
, by noon there were five of them cross
ing and criss-crossing directly above
me.
1 was fearfully thirsty. and dry
| desert air and the sun had drawn
every particle of moisture from my
body. The steady glare Of the sur
rounding white and cream-colored
walls threw the heat waves back and
| forth like breaths from a furnace
That morning had drawn my mouth
dry of saliva by sucking at button
from my shirt.
| * X y X
| AT'the end of the day the heat was
so great that 1 could no longer
see the floor of the canyon clearly.
My weakened condition and the sun
light had affected my eyesight, and a
haze of dancing heat waves hung be-
tween me and the stream bed, 500 feet
below. That morning my horse had
disappeared; very likely he had hop
ped away with his hobbies to find
water. / slept fitfulIy and gruesomeIy
that night. chilled by the cold night
air, my mind full of the visions of
buzzards and the NANCY coyotes that
| noWleu on through the night.
l awoke the next morning possessed
OF the conviction that there was one
means Of escape 1 had overlooked
In my mind / could not locate it
yet l was certain that il l made
another complete inspection Of the
: cleft L could find the hidden way OF
escape l realize as l write this that
the idea was a hallucination of the
mind. OF course, there was no way
out. yet l continued my inspection
certain that 1 would eventually find it
1 reached the south end of the
cleft, the end of my prison domain
and looked longingly at the grape
vines that grew on the opposite ledge
| Although scarcely thicker than my
thumb. they looked to be strong, sub
stantial ropes. l was elated will
them, confident that they were Ions
enough to be knotted together into
line. which would lead me to free
: dom.
The chasm. too, looked ridiculously
, easy to leap over. A child could dt
1t, l thought. But a moment Later
2 | sobered down to the actual danger
of the attempt. and for an hour ol
more debated the gamble with myself
, occasionally shouting down into the
: canyon to attract the attention Of any
Navajo who might be passing.
: Suddenly, scarcely realizing what
was doing, l ran to the edge of the
cleft and leaped across the chasn
l toward the ledge. My shoulder strucl
D the wall, my feet clattered agains
5 the rock and fell away; but with m!
, arms and elbows 1 hooked mysel
e over the edge and slowly, with black