Chapter Three The Northern Waste

He remembered the sentence in his father's journal. Find the mine first. A man without money owns nothing, not even his anger. Jack gritted his teeth and wrapped the rope tighter around his wrist. By morning, the wind stopped. The waste had been remade into a stranger country. The riverbed was gone. Half the scrub lay buried. One of the new horses had died in the sand, only its stiff neck showing. Old Bill lived. The other horse lived too, though both could barely stand. Jack shook sand from his coat and unfolded the map. The edges had frayed, but the red-rock mark remained. He looked up. Far ahead, as the dusty haze thinned, a wall of red stone appeared. Its shape was like a broken hand. Jack stood still as light entered his eyes.