Page:The little blue devil (IA littlebluedevil00mackiala).pdf/268

hot, the sky was like blue flame, and a fitful, scorching breeze blew little eddies of red dust between him and the horizon. There was nothing else. It would be no joke walking through that to-morrow. Hard luck that it happened to be midsummer. But he could not afford to pick his time.

“I’ll start before sunrise to-morrow,” he said, “and get through the best part of the day’s work in the forenoon. No use walking much in the heat.”

“That’s right. And you’d better take sticks to stretch your blanket on. That’s all the shade you’ll get. The sun’s enough to drive you mad. There was a man last year started to walk to Tanami—just like you—and the waterholes were fuller than they are now. . . . Well, when we found ’im . . .”

Masterly elision! Tony’s eyes smiled. He had heard that story before; odd that it had always happened just last year!

“Stark, staring mad?” he prompted. The publican was a little dashed.

“Yes,” he said, with some severity. “Pretty near as mad as you. And it was the sun that did it—his water-bag wasn’t half empty———”

“Poor brute! Well, if you meet me wandering round in circles with nothing on but a half-filled water-bag, the laugh’s on me. . . . It was pretty lucky that you found him, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, he hadn’t gone far,” said the publican grimly, and there was a short silence.

Tony broke it. “Almost looks as if you wanted to discourage me,” he said. “Isn’t it about time for another drink? What’s it to be?”

He went to bed early that night, and slept peacefully, setting his mental alarm clock for 3 a.m. He could usually