Chapter II Sweetwater and Lou were no more than 20 miles away when Kid met up with the storm. As the choking dirt and sand began to blind him, he realized that there was no way he or Katy could make the last leg of the journey without one or both of them suffocating. Reluctantly, with the grime of the storm beating its way into his clothes and eyes and hair and every possible chink in his armor, he turned his pinto toward the nearest canyon and rode to relative safety beneath a outcropping of sandstone boulders.
He emptied one of his canteens into his hands for Katy to drink and after wetting down a rag which he tied over her soft nose, he took shelter himself behind the strong horse's body.
"Please, God, let Lou be alright," he whispered before coughing violently on the sand he'd swallowed.