Their progress was necessarily slow, and Nevada’s “mile or so” seemed longer. Johnny Buffalo remained no more than half-conscious and breathed painfully. Nevada invented a makeshift sunshade for him, breaking off and trimming a drooping greasewood branch and borrowing the squaw’s apron to spread over it. This Rawley held awkwardly with one hand while he steadied the swaying figure with the other, and so they came at last abruptly to the river he had left at sunrise.
The trail dipped down steeply to a small basin that overlooked the river possibly a hundred feet below. The canyon walls rose bold and black beyond—sheer crags of rock with here and there a brush-filled crevice. Around the barren rim of the basin two or three crude shacks were set within easy calling distance of one another, a
