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“My revolver was still in my belt, and hastily pulling it I commenced shooting at the running figure, now some sixty or seventy yards distant. The first bullet knocked up a cloud of dust about three feet to his right and a little ahead, the second was still worse, but at the third he turned sideways, staggered on several paces, and fell among some loose rocks in a way that must have been unpleasant. He tried to get up again, but I now had his range pretty well and hit him again with the sixth shot; after that he lay pretty quiet, although I thought I saw him move his arm once or twice. I reloaded, having plenty of cartridges in my belt, and began shooting at him again. This time I hit him three times out of six shots, and as he had not moved for some minutes I concluded that he was dead.

“Then I began to think over how I was going to get down. I was very thirsty and it was tantalizing to see the water down in the valley sparkling in the sunlight. It looked very clear and refreshing.

“I thought and thought, and the more I thought the more hopeless it seemed to me to plan a way to get down alive. There was one ladder still standing,–the second one,–but there was a space of some thirty feet before I could reach it. I had absolutely nothing, not even a string, to aid me in getting down.

“There was no use hoping for help from any one, for the place was rarely visited, and it might be weeks before any person would discover that I was there. I was getting more thirsty all the time, and, at last, I hated to go to the mouth of the cave, hot as it was inside, because the sight of the water nearly drove me mad. I amused myself by occasionally taking a shot at Antonio. I had his range down pretty fine, now, and rarely missed him. It was getting late, and the sun had long since sunk out of sight. Above the mountains there was one tall peak which I could see up the canyon. It stood out in the sunlight bright and shining, even after the canyon had become quite dark.

“As the sun sank lower and lower the darkness crept gradually up until only the very top was left a shining point. For a few minutes it shone a fiery red and then the light was gone like a huge torch which flickers and goes out.

“Then the night noises commenced: the incessant, maddening croaking of the frogs and now and then an owl.

“Did you ever hear the frogs in Arizona?”

I responded in the affirmative.

“Well, then, you know something about what they sound like, and know they can give Eastern frogs cards and spades and beat them easy. But you don’t know what they sound like when you are really thirsty!”

“Probably not,” I answered.

“Well,” continued the curiosity dealer, “I knew nothing could be done until morning, so I lay down and tried to sleep. I was very nervous and could not help fearing that in the night I might walk in my sleep or roll to the mouth of the cave and tumble out. I do not think I really slept at all, but lay in a half-dazed condition until it was light enough for me to see things in the canyon below.

“Strange to say, I was not hungry, although I had eaten nothing since the previous morning. My whole thoughts were concentrated on the one desire–something to drink! I thought and pondered, trying to think of some possible way to get down! At one time I thought seriously of jumping to the ledge below, but I knew that it would be impossible for me to stay on it even if my legs were not broken by the fall, and that to jump meant practically to commit suicide!