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While Bill manipulated the makings, I examined the prospects. This was that kind of a wash; no doubt of it!

“How far is the nearest crossing?” I asked, returning.

“About eight feet,” said he.

My mind, panic-stricken, flew to several things–that bottle (I regret that I failed to record that by test its contents had proved genuine), the cornered rock we had so blithely charged, other evidences of Bill’s casual nature. My heart sank.

“You ain’t going to tackle that wash!” I cried.

“I shore am,” said Bill.

I examined Bill. He meant it.

“How far to the nearest ranch?”

“‘Bout ten mile.”

I went and sat on a rock. It was one of those rainbow remnants of a bygone past; but my interest in curios had waned.

Bill dove into the grimy mysteries of under the back seat and produced two blocks of wood six or eight inches square and two strong straps with buckles. He inserted a block between the frame of the car and the rear axle; then he ran a strap around the rear spring and cinched on it until the car body, the block, and the axle made one solid mass. In other words, the spring action was entirely eliminated. He did the same thing on the other side.

“Climb in,” said he.

We went into low and slid down the steep clay bank into the waiting sand. To me it was like a plunge into ice water. Bill stepped on her. We ploughed out into trouble. The steering wheel bucked and jerked vainly against Bill’s huge hands; we swayed like a moving-picture comic; but we forged steadily ahead. Not once did we falter. Our wheels gripped continuously. When we pulled out on the other bank I exhaled as though I, too, had lost my muffler. I believe I had held my breath the whole way across. Bill removed the blocks and gave her more water. Still in low we climbed out of the malpais.

It was now after two o’clock. We registered 29,328. I was getting humble minded. Six o’clock looked good enough to me now.

One thing was greatly encouraging. As we rose again to the main level of the country I recognized over the horizon a certain humped mountain. Often in the “good old days” I had approached this mountain from the south. Beneath its flanks lay my friend’s ranch, our destination. Five hours earlier in my experience its distance would have appalled me; but my standards had changed. Nevertheless, it seemed far enough away. I was getting physically tired. There is a heap of exercise in many occupations, such as digging sewers and chopping wood and shopping with a woman; but driving in small Arizona motor cars need give none of these occupations any odds. And of late years I have been accustoming myself to three meals a day.

For this reason there seems no excuse for detailing the next three hours. From three o’clock until sunset the mirages slowly fade away into the many-tinted veils of evening. I know that because I’ve seen it; but never would I know it whilst an inmate of a gasoline madhouse. We carried our own egg-shaped aura constantly with us, on the invisible walls of which the subtle and austere influences of the desert beat in vain. That aura was composed of speed, bumps, dust, profane noise, and an extreme and exotic busyness. It might be that in a docile, tame, expensive automobile, garnished with a sane and biddable driver, one might see the desert as it is. I don’t know whether such a combination exists. But me–I couldn’t get into the Officers’ Training Camp because of my advanced years: I may be an old fogy, but I cherish a sneaking idea that perhaps you have to buy some of these things at the cost of the aforementioned thirst, heat, weariness, and the slow passing of long days. Still, an Assyrian brick in the British Museum is inscribed by a father to his son away at school with a lament over the passing of the “good old days!”