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Show They hacked a hole in the shale to bury Leland up to his neck. Laura Scott was dimly aware she probably was digging a grave for her family. replied. IU go out and round them up." , For two hours he searched around the deserted lookout Then he drove back to Moab and called Sheriff John Stock. In a few minutes Stock had flashed an alarm to highway patrols and was .on his way to lead a search of tourist scenic attractions near Moab. Says Stock, "Even we natives are afraid of .that White Rim canyon country. This time of year the sun and heat are so terrific in there that you don't find a living thing not a snake, not a rat, not a toad." By radio telephone from his car he called Glen Haren, operator of the local flying service and member of the Utah Air Police.. "We may have some people down in the canyon,' he said. "I'd like to fly with you in the morning." the steel In the moonlight, the Scott children cool to their burning slept draped over hood, fenders and roof of the car. Vjrl and Laura Scott made every moment of darkness count Sighting on the North Star, they marked in their minds every ledge and rock that might provide a few minutes of shade from the sun. In the desert the day comes with a rush. By 5 a.m. it was daylight By 7 a.m. the Scotts' battle for survival was begun. As the sun found the car, Laura and her children crept under an overhanging ledge and lay still. Down in the canyon Virl braved the merciless heat and he knelt and flashed the Ford's mirror futilely at high-flyijet bombers. Soaking his road map in a spray of gasoline from their camp stove, le ignited it and tucked the burning paper around the galoshes' and spare tire. He was still laboring to get his signal' fire going when a small plane appeared. Furiously Scott punished himself in the sun to build up his beacons. He burned the galoshes and the tire's inner tube. The pyre gave off a plume of black smoke, but an errant breeze directed it into a shadow beside a canyon wall. The plane vanished and he waited in vain for others. To counter the despair that now filled their hearts bodies, ng the Scotts turned to another weapon. Steadfast Mormons, they had molded their lives to the tenets of their religion. In their temple Laura played the organ. Virl was a member of the priesthood. "Come, everyone," he now said. "Let us have a word of prayer together." Kneeling in the dirt the children and Laura joined in as he prayed to God for the strength and will to survive the day. From then on, whenever he sensed that hysteria was seizing his family, Scott would say, "Come now, children, let us pray together." Since dawn the search operations in Moab had been pressed with desperate urgency. But as the day wore on distant dry thunder squalls made the desert air so turbulent that rim searching was out of the question. Search parties were restricted to the ground. Over all hung One inescapable fact: if the Scotts were stranded in the desert without water, Ihey would be dead or dying before the sun set the next day. In the scorching heat of the canyon, the Scotts crouched motionless under their ledge, peering into the sky, straining their ears for the sound of auto or aircraft engine. From her pocketbook Laura took her lipstick and coated the blistered, swollen lips of her husband and children. To their mouths she held spoonfuls of the bitter radiator fluid. On their faces she patted rouge from her compact Absently thrusting his fingers into the dirt, Virl started violently: it was cool.' Sitting up, he cried, "Laura, children,, get down into the dirt. Cover yourselves with it. Rub it on your arms and faces never mind how dirty you get!" bare hands, the Digging feverishly with-th- eir family scooped, scraped, showered each other with handfuls of dirt as one would with water. The cat and mouse game with the sun continued. Minute by minute the shade shrank as the sun's rays reached deeper under the ledge. As the children cowered closer together, Virl said, "I'm taking up too much room. I'm getting out" Raising her head, Laura saw her husband in the . WATER" on scorching sun, scrawling "HELP a huge flat rock. He brought branches ripped from a bush cedar to the children. "Peel the bark and suck the wood," he said "There may be a bit of " moisture." By midday the canyon was an inferno. After a without water in the searing day and one-ha- lf the children were dehydrating rapidly. No heat, moisture showed on their bodies. Throats parched, tongues and lips swollen, they lay listlessly still. ... his wife now undertook a measure Virl scott had put off as long as possible. Earlier, in and tones, they had announced everyone would urinate only into the empty milk pail. It now was about half full. Dipping her children's shirts matter-of-fa- ct and blouses into the pail, Laura bathed their bodies and faces with the fluid, wrung out the garments and replaced them on the children. The desert breeze blowing through the damp clothing cooled their chests and arms. Filthy with dirt, and weirdly theatrical in their lipstick and rouge make-u- p, they lay under the ledge like animals, numbly enduring the suffocating heat and pitiless glare of the sun. . In Virl Scottas roused by. his children running toward the car. They squirmed into the sand beneath and waved to him to join them. Scott was too weak to move. He had become afraid of the car. With a small amount of gasoline still in its tank and a few drops of water inside the engine block, it teased, "Get in . . . drive me . . . anywhere . . get the kids out of here!" The night before Scott had resolved he would not drive no matter what happened. To leave was certain death. "Don't let those kids get away from you," he shouted to his wife. Keep them in the shade. Ill throw stones at anybody who moves!" His cracked voice had a frenzied quality to it, foul-smelli- mid-afterno- ng on ' and Laura Scott realized that her husband, exhausted by his struggles in the desert sun, was sinking into delirium. If there wasan atom of (Continued) f Family Weekly, September 27 ,IS59 5 |