AFTER the departure of Dene and his comrades Naab decided to leave White
Sage at nightfall. Martin Cole and the Bishop's sons tried to persuade him
to remain, urging that the trouble sure to come could be more safely met
in the village. Naab, however, was obdurate, unreasonably so, Cole said,
unless there were some good reason why he wished to strike the trail in
the night. When twilight closed in Naab had his teams ready and the women
shut in the canvas-covered wagons. Hare was to ride in an open wagon, one
that Naab had left at White Sage to be loaded with grain. When it grew so
dark that objects were scarcely discernible a man vaulted the cottage
fence.
“Dave, where are the boys?” asked Naab.
“Not so loud! The boys are coming,” replied Dave in a whisper. “Dene is
wild. I guess you snapped a bone in his arm. He swears he'll kill us all.
But Chance and the rest of the gang won't be in till late. We've time to
reach the Coconina Trail, if we hustle.”
“Any news of Snap?”
“He rode out before sundown.”
Three more forms emerged from the gloom.
“All right, boys. Go ahead, Dave, you lead.”
Dave and George Naab mounted their mustangs and rode through the gate; the
first wagon rolled after them, its white dome gradually dissolving in the
darkness; the second one started; then August Naab stepped to his seat on
the third with a low cluck to the team. Hare shut the gate and climbed
over the tail-board of the wagon.
A slight swish of weeds and grasses brushing the wheels was all the sound
made in the cautious advance. A bare field lay to the left; to the right
low roofs and sharp chimneys showed among the trees; here and there lights
twinkled. No one hailed; not a dog barked.
Presently the leaders turned into a road where the iron hoofs and wheels
cracked and crunched the stones.
Hare thought he saw something in the deep shade of a line of poplar-trees;
he peered closer, and made out a motionless horse and rider, just a shade
blacker than the deepest gloom. The next instant they vanished, and the
rapid clatter of hoofs down the road told Hare his eyes had not deceived
him.
“Getup,” growled Naab to his horses. “Jack, did you see that fellow?”
“Yes. What was he doing there?”
“Watching the road. He's one of Dene's scouts.”
“Will Dene—”
One of Naab's sons came trotting back. “Think that was Larsen's pal. He
was laying in wait for Snap.”
“I thought he was a scout for Dene,” replied August.
“Maybe he's that too.”
“Likely enough. Hurry along and keep the gray team going lively. They've
had a week's rest.”
Hare watched the glimmering lights of the village vanish one by one, like
Jack-o'-lanterns. The horses kept a steady, even trot on into the huge
windy hall of the desert night. Fleecy clouds veiled the stars, yet
transmitted a wan glow. A chill crept over Hare. As he crawled under the
blankets Naab had spread for him his hand came into contact with a
polished metal surface cold as ice. It was his rifle. Naab had placed it
under the blankets. Fingering the rifle Hare found the spring opening on
the right side of the breech, and, pressing it down, he felt the round
head of a cartridge. Naab had loaded the weapon, he had placed it where
Hare's hand must find it, yet he had not spoken of it. Hare did not stop
to reason with his first impulse. Without a word, with silent insistence,
disregarding his shattered health, August Naab had given him a man's part
to play. The full meaning lifted Hare out of his self-abasement; once more
he felt himself a man.
Hare soon yielded to the warmth of the blankets; a drowsiness that he
endeavored in vain to throw off smothered his thoughts; sleep glued his
eyelids tight. They opened again some hours later. For a moment he could
not realize where he was; then the whip of the cold wind across his face,
the woolly feel and smell of the blankets, and finally the steady trot of
horses and the clink of a chain swinging somewhere under him, recalled the
actuality of the night ride. He wondered how many miles had been covered,
how the drivers knew the direction and kept the horses in the trail, and
whether the outlaws were in pursuit. When Naab stopped the team and,
climbing down, walked back some rods to listen, Hare felt sure that Dene
was coming. He listened, too, but the movements of the horses and the
rattle of their harness were all the sounds he could hear. Naab returned
to his seat; the team started, now no longer in a trot; they were
climbing. After that Hare fell into a slumber in which he could hear the
slow grating whirr of wheels, and when it ceased he awoke to raise himself
and turn his ear to the back trail. By-and-by he discovered that the black
night had changed to gray; dawn was not far distant; he dozed and awakened
to clear light. A rose-red horizon lay far below and to the eastward; the
intervening descent was like a rolling sea with league-long swells.
“Glad you slept some,” was Naab's greeting. “No sign of Dene yet. If we
can get over the divide we're safe. That's Coconina there, Fire Mountain
in Navajo meaning. It's a plateau low and narrow at this end, but it runs
far to the east and rises nine thousand feet. It forms a hundred miles of
the north rim of the Grand Canyon. We're across the Arizona line now.”
Hare followed the sweep of the ridge that rose to the eastward, but to his
inexperienced eyes its appearance carried no sense of its noble
proportions.
“Don't form any ideas of distance and size yet a while,” said Naab,
reading Hare's expression. “They'd only have to be made over as soon as
you learn what light and air are in this country. It looks only half a
mile to the top of the divide; well, if we make it by midday we're lucky.
There, see a black spot over this way, far under the red wall? Look sharp.
Good! That's Holderness's ranch. It's thirty miles from here. Nine Mile
Valley heads in there. Once it belonged to Martin Cole. Holderness stole
it. And he's begun to range over the divide.”
The sun rose and warmed the chill air. Hare began to notice the increased
height and abundance of the sagebrush, which was darker in color. The
first cedar-tree, stunted in growth, dead at the top, was the half-way
mark up the ascent, so Naab said; it was also the forerunner of other
cedars which increased in number toward the summit. At length Hare, tired
of looking upward at the creeping white wagons, closed his eyes. The
wheels crunched on the stones; the horses heaved and labored; Naab's
“Getup” was the only spoken sound; the sun beamed down warm, then hot; and
the hours passed. Some unusual noise roused Hare out of his lethargy. The
wagon was at a standstill. Naab stood on the seat with outstretched arm.
George and Dave were close by their mustangs, and Snap Naab, mounted on a
cream-colored pinto, reined him under August's arm, and faced the valley
below.
“Maybe you'll make them out,” said August. “I can't, and I've watched
those dust-clouds for hours. George can't decide, either.”
Hare, looking at Snap, was attracted by the eyes from which his father and
brothers expected so much. If ever a human being had the eyes of a hawk
Snap Naab had them. The little brown flecks danced in clear pale yellow.
Evidently Snap had not located the perplexing dust-clouds, for his glance
drifted. Suddenly the remarkable vibration of his pupils ceased, and his
glance grew fixed, steely, certain.
“That's a bunch of wild mustangs,” he said.
Hare gazed till his eyes hurt, but could see neither clouds of dust nor
moving objects. No more was said. The sons wheeled their mustangs and rode
to the fore; August Naab reseated himself and took up the reins; the
ascent proceeded.
But it proceeded leisurely, with more frequent rests. At the end of an
hour the horses toiled over the last rise to the summit and entered a
level forest of cedars; in another hour they were descending gradually.
“Here we are at the tanks,” said Naab.
Hare saw that they had come up with the other wagons. George Naab was
leading a team down a rocky declivity to a pool of yellow water. The other
boys were unharnessing and unsaddling.
“About three,” said Naab, looking at the sun. “We're in good time. Jack,
get out and stretch yourself. We camp here. There's the Coconina Trail
where the Navajos go in after deer.”
It was not a pretty spot, this little rock-strewn glade where the white
hard trail forked with the road. The yellow water with its green scum made
Hare sick. The horses drank with loud gulps. Naab and his sons drank of
it. The women filled a pail and portioned it out in basins and washed
their faces and hands with evident pleasure. Dave Naab whistled as he
wielded an axe vigorously on a cedar. It came home to Hare that the
tension of the past night and morning had relaxed. Whether to attribute
that fact to the distance from White Sage or to the arrival at the
water-hole he could not determine. But the certainty was shown in August's
cheerful talk to the horses as he slipped bags of grain over their noses,
and in the subdued laughter of the women. Hare sent up an unspoken
thanksgiving that these good Mormons had apparently escaped from the
dangers incurred for his sake. He sat with his back to a cedar and watched
the kindling of fires, the deft manipulating of biscuit dough in a basin,
and the steaming of pots. The generous meal was spread on a canvas cloth,
around which men and women sat cross-legged, after the fashion of Indians.
Hare found it hard to adapt his long legs to the posture, and he wondered
how these men, whose legs were longer than his, could sit so easily. It
was the crown of a cheerful dinner after hours of anxiety and abstinence
to have Snap Naab speak civilly to him, and to see him bow his head meekly
as his father asked the blessing. Snap ate as though he had utterly
forgotten that he had recently killed a man; to hear the others talk to
him one would suppose that they had forgotten it also.
All had finished eating, except Snap and Dave Naab, when one of the
mustangs neighed shrilly. Hare would not have noticed it but for looks
exchanged among the men. The glances were explained a few minutes later
when a pattering of hoofs came from the cedar forest, and a stream of
mounted Indians poured into the glade.
The ugly glade became a place of color and action. The Navajos rode wiry,
wild-looking mustangs and drove ponies and burros carrying packs, most of
which consisted of deer-hides. Each Indian dismounted, and unstrapping the
blanket which had served as a saddle headed his mustang for the water-hole
and gave him a slap. Then the hides and packs were slipped from the
pack-train, and soon the pool became a kicking, splashing melee. Every
cedar-tree circling the glade and every branch served as a peg for deer
meat. Some of it was in the haunch, the bulk in dark dried strips. The
Indians laid their weapons aside. Every sagebush and low stone held a
blanket. A few of these blankets were of solid color, most of them had
bars of white and gray and red, the last color predominating. The mustangs
and burros filed out among the cedars, nipping at the sage and the
scattered tufts of spare grass. A group of fires, sending up curling
columns of blue smoke, and surrounded by a circle of lean, half-naked,
bronze-skinned Indians, cooking and eating, completed a picture which
afforded Hare the satisfying fulfilment of boyish dreams. What a contrast
to the memory of a camp-site on the Connecticut shore, with boy friends
telling tales in the glow of the fire, and the wash of the waves on the
beach!
The sun sank low in the west, sending gleams through the gnarled branches
of the cedars, and turning the green into gold. At precisely the moment of
sunset, the Mormon women broke into soft song which had the element of
prayer; and the lips of the men moved in silent harmony. Dave Naab, the
only one who smoked, removed his pipe for the moment's grace to dying day.
This simple ceremony over, one of the boys put wood on the fire, and Snap
took a jews'-harp out of his pocket and began to extract doleful discords
from it, for which George kicked at him in disgust, finally causing him to
leave the circle and repair to the cedars, where he twanged with supreme
egotism.
“Jack,” said August Naab, “our friends the Navajo chiefs, Scarbreast and
Eschtah, are coming to visit us. Take no notice of them at first. They've
great dignity, and if you entered their hogans they'd sit for some moments
before appearing to see you. Scarbreast is a war-chief. Eschtah is the
wise old chief of all the Navajos on the Painted Desert. It may interest
you to know he is Mescal's grandfather. Some day I'll tell you the story.”
Hare tried very hard to appear unconscious when two tall Indians stalked
into the circle of Mormons; he set his eyes on the white heart of the
camp-fire and waited. For several minutes no one spoke or even moved. The
Indians remained standing for a time; then seated themselves. Presently
August Naab greeted them in the Navajo language. This was a signal for
Hare to use his eyes and ears. Another interval of silence followed before
they began to talk. Hare could see only their blanketed shoulders and
black heads.
“Jack, come round here,” said Naab at length. “I've been telling them
about you. These Indians do not like the whites, except my own family. I
hope you'll make friends with them.”
“How do?” said the chief whom Naab had called Eschtah, a stately,
keen-eyed warrior, despite his age.
The next Navajo greeted him with a guttural word. This was a warrior whose
name might well have been Scarface, for the signs of conflict were there.
It was a face like a bronze mask, cast in the one expression of untamed
desert fierceness.
Hare bowed to each and felt himself searched by burning eyes, which were
doubtful, yet not unfriendly.
“Shake,” finally said Eschtah, offering his hand.
“Ugh!” exclaimed Scarbreast, extending a bare silver-braceleted arm.
This sign of friendship pleased Naab. He wished to enlist the sympathies
of the Navajo chieftains in the young man's behalf. In his ensuing speech,
which was plentifully emphasized with gestures, he lapsed often into
English, saying “weak—no strong” when he placed his hand on Hare's
legs, and “bad” when he touched the young man's chest, concluding with the
words “sick—sick.”
Scarbreast regarded Hare with great earnestness, and when Naab had
finished he said: “Chineago—ping!” and rubbed his hand over his
stomach.
“He says you need meat—lots of deer-meat,” translated Naab.
“Sick,” repeated Eschtah, whose English was intelligible. He appeared to
be casting about in his mind for additional words to express his knowledge
of the white man's tongue, and, failing, continued in Navajo: “Tohodena—moocha—malocha.”
Hare was nonplussed at the roar of laughter from the Mormons. August shook
like a mountain in an earthquake.
“Eschtah says, 'you hurry, get many squaws—many wives.'”
Other Indians, russet-skinned warriors, with black hair held close by
bands round their foreheads, joined the circle, and sitting before the
fire clasped their knees and talked. Hare listened awhile, and then, being
fatigued, he sought the cedar-tree where he had left his blankets. The dry
mat of needles made an odorous bed. He placed a sack of grain for a
pillow, and doubling up one blanket to lie upon, he pulled the others over
him. Then he watched and listened. The cedar-wood burned with a clear
flame, and occasionally snapped out a red spark. The voices of the
Navajos, scarcely audible, sounded “toa's” and “taa's”—syllables he
soon learned were characteristic and dominant—in low, deep murmurs.
It reminded Hare of something that before had been pleasant to his ear.
Then it came to mind: a remembrance of Mescal's sweet voice, and that
recalled the kinship between her and the Navajo chieftain. He looked
about, endeavoring to find her in the ring of light, for he felt in her a
fascination akin to the charm of this twilight hour. Dusky forms passed to
and fro under the trees; the tinkle of bells on hobbled mustangs rang from
the forest; coyotes had begun their night quest with wild howls; the
camp-fire burned red, and shadows flickered on the blanketed Indians; the
wind now moaned, now lulled in the cedars.
Hare lay back in his blankets and saw lustrous stars through the network
of branches. With their light in his face and the cold wind waving his
hair on his brow he thought of the strangeness of it all, of its
remoteness from anything ever known to him before, of its inexpressible
wildness. And a rush of emotion he failed wholly to stifle proved to him
that he could have loved this life if—if he had not of late come to
believe that he had not long to live. Still Naab's influence exorcised
even that one sad thought; and he flung it from him in resentment.
Sleep did not come so readily; he was not very well this night; the flush
of fever was on his cheek, and the heat of feverish blood burned his body.
He raised himself and, resolutely seeking for distraction, once more
stared at the camp-fire. Some time must have passed during his dreaming,
for only three persons were in sight. Naab's broad back was bowed and his
head nodded. Across the fire in its ruddy flicker sat Eschtah beside a
slight, dark figure. At second glance Hare recognized Mescal. Surprise
claimed him, not more for her presence there than for the white band
binding her smooth black tresses. She had not worn such an ornament
before. That slender band lent her the one touch which made her a Navajo.
Was it worn in respect to her aged grandfather? What did this mean for a
girl reared with Christian teaching? Was it desert blood? Hare had no
answers for these questions. They only increased the mystery and romance.
He fell asleep with the picture in his mind of Eschtah and Mescal, sitting
in the glow of the fire, and of August Naab, nodding silently.
“Jack, Jack, wake up.” The words broke dully into his slumbers; wearily he
opened his eyes. August Naab bent over him, shaking him gently.
“Not so well this morning, eh? Here's a cup of coffee. We're all packed
and starting. Drink now, and climb aboard. We expect to make Seeping
Springs to-night.”
Hare rose presently and, laboring into the wagon, lay down on the sacks.
He had one of his blind, sickening headaches. The familiar lumbering of
wheels began, and the clanking of the wagon-chain. Despite jar and jolt he
dozed at times, awakening to the scrape of the wheel on the leathern
brake. After a while the rapid descent of the wagon changed to a roll,
without the irritating rattle. He saw a narrow valley; on one side the
green, slow-swelling cedar slope of the mountain; on the other the
perpendicular red wall, with its pinnacles like spears against the sky.
All day this backward outlook was the same, except that each time he
opened aching eyes the valley had lengthened, the red wall and green slope
had come closer together in the distance. By and by there came a halt, the
din of stamping horses and sharp commands, the bustle and confusion of
camp. Naab spoke kindly to him, but he refused any food, lay still and
went to sleep.
Daylight brought him the relief of a clear head and cooled blood. The camp
had been pitched close under the red wall. A lichen-covered cliff, wet
with dripping water, overhung a round pool. A ditch led the water down the
ridge to a pond. Cattle stood up to their knees drinking; others lay on
the yellow clay, which was packed as hard as stone; still others were
climbing the ridge and passing down on both sides.
“You look as if you enjoyed that water,” remarked Naab, when Hare
presented himself at the fire. “Well, it's good, only a little salty.
Seeping Springs this is, and it's mine. This ridge we call The Saddle; you
see it dips between wall and mountain and separates two valleys. This
valley we go through to-day is where my cattle range. At the other end is
Silver Cup Spring, also mine. Keep your eyes open now, my lad.”
How different was the beginning of this day! The sky was as blue as the
sea; the valley snuggled deep in the embrace of wall and mountain. Hare
took a place on the seat beside Naab and faced the descent. The line of
Navajos, a graceful straggling curve of color on the trail, led the way
for the white-domed wagons.
Naab pointed to a little calf lying half hidden under a bunch of sage.
“That's what I hate to see. There's a calf, just born; its mother has gone
in for water. Wolves and lions range this valley. We lose hundreds of
calves that way.”
As far as Hare could see red and white and black cattle speckled the
valley.
“If not overstocked, this range is the best in Utah,” said Naab. “I say
Utah, but it's really Arizona. The Grand Canyon seems to us Mormons to
mark the line. There's enough browse here to feed a hundred thousand
cattle. But water's the thing. In some seasons the springs go almost dry,
though Silver Cup holds her own well enough for my cattle.”
Hare marked the tufts of grass lying far apart on the yellow earth;
evidently there was sustenance enough in every two feet of ground to
support only one tuft.
“What's that?” he asked, noting a rolling cloud of dust with black bobbing
borders.
“Wild mustangs,” replied Naab. “There are perhaps five thousand on the
mountain, and they are getting to be a nuisance. They're almost as bad as
sheep on the browse; and I should tell you that if sheep pass over a range
once the cattle will starve. The mustangs are getting too plentiful. There
are also several bands of wild horses.”
“What's the difference between wild horses and mustangs?”
“I haven't figured that out yet. Some say the Spaniards left horses in
here three hundred years ago. Wild? They are wilder than any naturally
wild animal that ever ran on four legs. Wait till you get a look at
Silvermane or Whitefoot.”
“What are they?”
“Wild stallions. Silvermane is an iron gray, with a silver mane, the most
beautiful horse I ever saw. Whitefoot's an old black shaggy demon, with
one white foot. Both stallions ought to be killed. They fight my horses
and lead off the mares. I had a chance to shoot Silvermane on the way over
this trip, but he looked so splendid that I just laid down my rifle.”
“Can they run?” asked Hare eagerly, with the eyes of a man who loved a
horse.
“Run? Whew! Just you wait till you see Silvermane cover ground! He can
look over his shoulder at you and beat any horse in this country. The
Navajos have given up catching him as a bad job. Why—here! Jack!
quick, get out your rifle—coyotes!”
Naab pulled on the reins, and pointed to one side. Hare discerned three
grayish sharp-nosed beasts sneaking off in the sage, and he reached back
for the rifle. Naab whistled, stopping the coyotes; then Hare shot. The
ball cut a wisp of dust above and beyond them. They loped away into the
sage.
“How that rifle spangs!” exclaimed Naab. “It's good to hear it. Jack, you
shot high. That's the trouble with men who have never shot at game. They
can't hold low enough. Aim low, lower than you want. Ha! There's another—this
side—hold ahead of him and low, quick!—too high again.”
It was in this way that August and Hare fell far behind the other wagons.
The nearer Naab got to his home the more genial he became. When he was not
answering Hare's queries he was giving information of his own accord,
telling about the cattle and the range, the mustangs, the Navajos, and the
desert. Naab liked to talk; he had said he had not the gift of revelation,
but he certainly had the gift of tongues.
The sun was in the west when they began to climb a ridge. A short ascent,
and a long turn to the right brought them under a bold spur of the
mountain which shut out the northwest. Camp had been pitched in a grove of
trees of a species new to Hare. From under a bowlder gushed the sparkling
spring, a grateful sight and sound to desert travellers. In a niche of the
rock hung a silver cup.
“Jack, no man knows how old this cup is, or anything about it. We named
the spring after it—Silver Cup. The strange thing is that the cup
has never been lost nor stolen. But—could any desert man, or outlaw,
or Indian, take it away, after drinking here?”
The cup was nicked and battered, bright on the sides, moss-green on the
bottom. When Hare drank from it he understood.
That evening there was rude merriment around the campfire. Snap Naab
buzzed on his jews'-harp and sang. He stirred some of the younger braves
to dancing, and they stamped and swung their arms, singing,
“hoya-heeya-howya,” as they moved in and out of the firelight.
Several of the braves showed great interest in Snap's jews'-harp and
repeatedly asked him for it. Finally the Mormon grudgingly lent it to a
curious Indian, who in trying to play it went through such awkward motions
and made such queer sounds that his companions set upon him and fought for
possession of the instrument. Then Snap, becoming solicitous for its
welfare, jumped into the fray. They tussled for it amid the clamor of a
delighted circle. Snap, passing from jest to earnest, grew so strenuous in
his efforts to regain the harp that he tossed the Navajos about like
shuttle-cocks. He got the harp and, concealing it, sought to break away.
But the braves laid hold upon him, threw him to the ground, and calmly sat
astride him while they went through his pockets. August Naab roared his
merriment and Hare laughed till he cried. The incident was as surprising
to him as it was amusing. These serious Mormons and silent Navajos were
capable of mirth.
Hare would have stayed up as late as any of them, but August's saying to
him, “Get to bed: to-morrow will be bad!” sent him off to his blankets,
where he was soon fast asleep. Morning found him well, hungry, eager to
know what the day would bring.
“Wait,” said August, soberly.
They rode out of the gray pocket in the ridge and began to climb. Hare had
not noticed the rise till they were started, and then, as the horses
climbed steadily he grew impatient at the monotonous ascent. There was
nothing to see; frequently it seemed that they were soon to reach the
summit, but still it rose above them. Hare went back to his comfortable
place on the sacks.
“Now, Jack,” said August.
Hare gasped. He saw a red world. His eyes seemed bathed in blood. Red
scaly ground, bare of vegetation, sloped down, down, far down to a vast
irregular rent in the earth, which zigzagged through the plain beneath. To
the right it bent its crooked way under the brow of a black-timbered
plateau; to the left it straightened its angles to find a V-shaped vent in
the wall, now uplifted to a mountain range. Beyond this earth-riven line
lay something vast and illimitable, a far-reaching vision of white wastes,
of purple plains, of low mesas lost in distance. It was the shimmering
dust-veiled desert.
“Here we come to the real thing,” explained Naab. “This is Windy Slope;
that black line is the Grand Canyon of Arizona; on the other side is the
Painted Desert where the Navajos live; Coconina Mountain shows his flat
head there to the right, and the wall on our left rises to the Vermillion
Cliffs. Now, look while you can, for presently you'll not be able to see.”
“Why?”
“Wind, sand, dust, gravel, pebbles—watch out for your eyes!”
Naab had not ceased speaking when Hare saw that the train of Indians
trailing down the slope was enveloped in red clouds. Then the white wagons
disappeared. Soon he was struck in the back by a gust which justified
Naab's warning. It swept by; the air grew clear again; once more he could
see. But presently a puff, taking him unawares, filled his eyes with dust
difficult of removal. Whereupon he turned his back to the wind.
The afternoon grew apace; the sun glistened on the white patches of
Coconina Mountain; it set; and the wind died.
“Five miles of red sand,” said Naab. “Here's what kills the horses.
Getup.”
There was no trail. All before was red sand, hollows, slopes, levels,
dunes, in which the horses sank above their fetlocks. The wheels ploughed
deep, and little red streams trailed down from the tires. Naab trudged on
foot with the reins in his hands. Hare essayed to walk also, soon tired,
and floundered behind till Naab ordered him to ride again. Twilight came
with the horses still toiling.
“There! thankful I am when we get off that strip! But, Jack, that
trailless waste prevents a night raid on my home. Even the Navajos shun it
after dark. We'll be home soon. There's my sign. See? Night or day we call
it the Blue Star.”
High in the black cliff a star-shaped, wind-worn hole let the blue sky
through.
There was cheer in Naab's “Getup,” now, and the horses quickened with it.
Their iron-shod hoofs struck fire from the rosy road. “Easy, easy—soho!”
cried Naab to his steeds. In the pitchy blackness under the shelving cliff
they picked their way cautiously, and turned a corner. Lights twinkled in
Hare's sight, a fresh breeze, coming from water, dampened his cheek, and a
hollow rumble, a long roll as of distant thunder, filled his ears.
“What's that?” he asked.
“That, my lad, is what I always love to hear. It means I'm home. It's the
roar of the Colorado as she takes her first plunge into the Canyon.”
