He could have fixed me right then, but for
some reason he didn't."
Beverly's face grew sad.
"He made six jumps six ways, and caught my pony's lariat. I can hear his
yell still as he tore a hole in the horizon and jumped right through.
Then I began on that spring. 'Dig or die. Dig or die.' I said over and
over, and we are all here but Bill. I wish I'd got that Apache, though."
Jondo and I looked at each other.
"The thing is clear now," he said, aside to me. "That single trail I
found back yonder day before yesterday was Santan's running on ahead of
us to poison the water for us and then steal a horse and make his way
back to the mountains. An Apache can live on this cactus-covered sand
the same as a rattlesnake. He fixed the upper spring and came down here
to drink. Only Beverly's conscience saved him here. Heaven knows how
Fred Ramer got out here. He may have come with some Mexicans on ahead of
us and left them here to drop his poison in this lower spring. Then he
turned back toward Santa Fe and found his doom up there at Santan's
spring.
"I'm like Bev. I wish he had gotten the Apache, now. I don't know yet
how I was fooled in him, for he has always been Fred Ramer's tool, and
Father Josef never trusted him.
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