and bandaged it. Then she pillowed his head upon her lap, and bending over him made of her body an additional shelter from the swirling clouds of dust.
From the insensibility induced by that blow upon his temple the man passed quietly into slumbers of profound physical exhaustion. And for hours on end Judith nursed him there, scarce daring to move; save to minister to his needs. In the course of the first hour she was once startled by the spectral vision, through the driving sheets of dust, of a horse that plodded up the arroyo bearing two riders on his back.
Weary with the weight of its double burden, it went slowly, and passed so near to Judith that she was able to recognize the features of her sister and Tom Barcus. Riding with heads bowed to the blasts they passed without seeing the fierce-eyed woman who crouched there over the body of a man who lay so still that he might have been dead.
Be sure she made never a sign to catch their attention.
This hour, at least, was hers; Rose would never grudge it to her when it had passed!
Within the next succeeding hour twilight stole athwart the desert, turning its heat to chill, its light to violet. Then night shut down upon the world. Not before that hour did the storm subside and give place to a bright, clear night of stars and moonlight.
