Back on the road, I rounded a curve and came to two more historical markers. These were the first I had seen in quite some time (the one located at the corner of Moreland and Fayetteville appears to have vanished some years ago). They detailed Hardee's pre-dawn arrival at the now long gone Cobb's Mill. Here he procured guides for an upcoming wilderness march, or at least, so read the marker. I am unable to find any indication that either Key Road or Bouldercrest didn't exist in 1864, but I suppose it's reasonable to assume that either or both may have been little more than goat tracks and possibly unreliable or laced with frequent off-ramps. At any rate, it is clear that confusion was beginning to set in for Hardee, and it's understandable why. Even with my fancy iPhone in hand I had difficulty judging the distance to the next convenience store, whereas Hardee and his men lacked not only the convenience store and the iPhone, but also the promise of a ride home once they reached East Atlanta. The greater likelihood for them were permanent resting spots in Oakland Cemetery.

It had been a good hour since I'd last had a drop of liquid, and the cool weather of the early afternoon had given way to a smothering blanket of unbreathable air more or less at the same moment the path began a grueling climb to Bouldercrest Road, still over half a mile distant. I was parched. Perhaps dangerously so.

To my great shock, the next feature I passed turned out to be a water treatment plant.

My natural assumption was that there was no better place in Atlanta to procure a glass of water. As I approached the somewhat intimidating guardhouse, though, I received a rude awakening. One of the guards popped out of the door and she asked me to explain myself even though I was still 50 feet distant. "Can I get some water?" I shouted. Her reply was as terse as it was negative, and I wondered, were I to simply drop dead in front of her, would my body find its way back to my family, or would it slowly make its way, molecule by molecule, into the water of nearby Intrenchment Creek, to be filtered out in this very treatment plant and subsequently be sprinkled in powder form on the farms of South Georgia?

So onward I trudged. I went perhaps 200 yards, and for the first time in the day the wilderness at the side of the road was actually inviting — a large field of clover lay to my left, so into it I went. I gratefully flung my gear and myself to the soft, cool ground.

There I remained for 10 minutes, watching the cars zoom past on their way to purchase jugs of iced tea and bags of candy bars. I was in a bind. I knew I was overheating, and I knew that to go on would probably mean heat exhaustion, with its attendant vomiting and headaches. Perhaps heat stroke would follow, with its attendant coma and death.

Still I couldn’t bring myself to call the rest of the trek off.

At that moment, a big white Cutlass Ciera passed, slowed to a stop, and began to back up. My mind immediately turned to developing cutting remarks in the event, greatly anticipated, that the driver was simply looking for an opportunity to exercise his anti-pedestrian wit.

But the Ciera proved to be the chariot of an angel. The driver, a plump black woman in her late 40s, leaned out the window and shouted, with concern visibly etched on her face, the words I least expected, "Do you want some water?”

I sprang to my feet like I’d been shot out of a toaster and skipped toward the car.

"You have water?" My voice fairly trembled.

"Well, I don't have water, but I have Gatorade."

She handed me a 20-ounce bottle, painfully cold. I told her my mission — she nodded, somewhat blankly but with an amiable smile — and she told me that she and her husband were building a house near the Starlight. She was on her way to pick up supplies of some sort and just happened to be carrying a cooler full of Gatorade. What are the chances?

"Can I take your photo?" I asked. She assented, and I ran back to my piled-up gear, trying to keep my giant buck knife well out of view. I suddenly felt embarrassed to even possess it. I took a couple photos and thanked her as profusely as I was able. Then off she went.

I emptied the entire bottle in one long pull.