midnight
A medical man was on the seat beside him . Progress was maddeningly slow , incredibly tedious ; creek beds , long dry , had become foaming torrents ; in places even the level roads were belly deep and the horses floundered . When one of them fell , it required infinite labor and patience to get it upon its feet again . It was after midnight when Buddy and his miserable companion gained the comparatively easy going of the last ridge , that flinty range beyond which lay the Briskow farm . Here they drove in the glare of lightning and under a sky that rumbled almost steadily , for a frightful electric storm had broken . Here it was that they saw what havoc was being wrought -- they counted several blazing wells ahead of them . Buddy stopped at a drilling camp where lights showed the occupants to be astir , and there he received confirmation of his fears .