Читать книгу Captives of the Desert - Zane Grey - Страница 7

The people in Curry’s party, a professor from the University of Chicago and his maiden sisters, made the girls welcome. They were glad to be of service. It all only went to show, they explained piecemeal between them, that nothing man could devise would ever conquer the desert. What good was a car? Had the girls been marooned in a more remote part of the desert, they might have starved to death!

Katharine wanted to tell them about desert magic, how the Indians who kept watch might be saviors under such a circumstance, but she always hated to repeat information just received. Unfortunately Mary seemed too preoccupied to enlighten them.

“A horse is the thing for this country,” spoke up Curry. “When a fellow’s car’s broken down on the road and Indians ride up and look on from their saddles, you know sure as life they’re figuring they have the best of the bargain. And they have. A horse can get where a car can’t. Sure, he may break a leg when he’s traveling, but if he’s your own you’d just as soon starve to death right there anyway.”

“You know how that hurts, don’t you, Mr. Curry?” said Mary softly.

“You bet I do!”

For a moment Katharine was perplexed. There was a strange import in the look that flashed between her seatmates on their exchange of words, an incident that led her to believe they shared something more than a casual acquaintance—an experience, perhaps. Her conjecture seemed trivial, but she wanted to justify their amity. It came to Katharine then that the imperturbable Wilbur had been stirred to an unusual vehemence of speech when he mentioned Curry to his wife.

Katharine fell suddenly thoughtful. She stared out into the dusk. A mellow glow pervaded. There would be no severe blackness such as she had experienced early in her visit at Taho. The desert was a pale-tinted opal in moonlight, gently tenacious of the radiance of day. Everywhere shadows were fleeing before the goddess of the night. One lone star twinkled above the blue-black rim of the world. Katharine found herself listening to silence—an intense silence that seemed to muffle the sound of the car. Was it through such a silence as this that one could hear the voice of God? She thought of the prophets of old who went to the wilderness to commune with God. How terrifying to think of one small soul alone with the Creator—not alone as in prayer, but mute, voiceless, waiting for His word! Did anyone really ever seek such an experience? She, herself, would have fled from it. She was grateful not to be alone in this silence, so alone that there would be only God. . . . She stole furtive glances at her companions. Suppose they could read her thoughts! How puerile they would seem! . . . Nothing could change the silence—it hovered heavily over the desert night. Her companions, too, had become part of it.

Finally Curry spoke, breaking a long lull. “You’ll be a little skeery crossing Canyon Diablo, Miss Winfield. We make automobiles do funny things in this country. We’ve got to.”

“Scare me if you can!” said Katharine. “Bring on your old canyon!”

Curry laughed so heartily that one of the ladies burst out with a nervous “What was that?”

“We have a young lady along who’s sure enthusiastic about that canyon I was hoping we’d make before sunset,” explained Curry. “She’s all primed for a fight.”

“For a fright, you mean,” retorted Katharine. “I don’t feel as brave as I sound.”

“Better grit your teeth then, she’s a-comin’!”

“Where? I don’t see anything.”

“You will as soon as we cover this rise.”

Katharine studied the trail. Could it be that close beyond the gentle rise of ground a canyon yawned? She leaned forward expectantly. They sped along through the silent, mysterious night—pale night, yellow night, ghostly night. Star-gleam ahead, and the canyon! They came upon it soon, a jagged black gulf, a pit of darkness over which they seemed to hang. Light caught slantwise from the moon penetrated part way down the opposite wall, and below was naked gloom. Devil’s Canyon, indeed!

“We’re going down into that—with this car!” exclaimed Katharine incredulously.

“We are, or we’ll never make Leupp till bridge builders get out here!” replied Curry stoutly. “You’ll get shaken up some.”

Katharine braced her feet, a perilous performance in itself, with the emergency brake so close, and spread her arms behind Curry and Mary to get a strong hold from the rear. Mary sat in perfect relaxation. Canyons had no terrors for her.

Strong headlights made the tortuous trail visible over a short area, but below yawned the bottomless black pit. And black walls loomed suddenly before them. From these, they turned and rode on through their shadows, only to meet others, leaning, towering. The automobile pitched and swung and shook, and brakes groaned. Katharine felt as if she were falling, slipping down into the dark abyss. They rode at a perilous angle, fretting their way between rock and boulder in perilous descent. They were subjected to about fifteen minutes of this before the car swung around with a tremendous shake and slid out on a level place where Curry shut down hard on the brakes. A gasp of relief escaped Katharine.

“And now that we’ve come this far, what are we going to do?” she asked.

“Climb out, goose,” returned Mary.

“You can get out of the car and stretch, if you like,” Curry informed her. “I’m walking up a little way to look over a piece of that trail. Sometimes it’s in a poor way. I might have to build it up some.” With what equanimity this strong desert man talked of Herculean things! Katharine smiled on him in admiration.

“May Mrs. Newton and I come along?”

“Sure, anybody can come.”

The ladies and gentleman from Chicago declined; they were still breathing hard from the already too adventuresome excursion. But Mary would miss no chance to explore. She and Katharine toiled up the trail together, following the gleam of Curry’s flashlight. The sandy basin of the canyon was narrow and gorgelike and they came quickly to the precipitous trail up the far wall. Katharine looked up. Dim lavender light sifted down through the rent, and far beyond the jagged purple rim a long, narrow welt of sky gleamed like darkened steel. Yellow stars shone though the blue void, still and cold. The all-pervading silence was almost frightening.

“Isn’t it too awesome for words!” Katharine managed to murmur to her companions. “As if we’d found the gateway to Dante’s Inferno!”

“Night makes the setting more somber,” said Mary. “Day is kinder and doesn’t show the canyon in such a terrifying aspect. This is like being buried alive in a tomb.”

The place Curry was examining was not more than two hundred feet up the trail; still they felt the strain of their climb over the rock-strewn slope. Katharine could see at once how narrow the roadway was at this point. A stout log and jammed rocks built up the edge wide enough to assure the passage of the car.

“We’ve got the world by the tail!” announced Curry. “Someone’s put in a good job here. We can buck right over her!”

“I wonder how often this part of the trail has been rebuilt,” said Katharine thoughtfully.

“As often as there comes a good rain,” Curry replied.

The New York girl looked at him in amazement.

“Every break in that rim becomes a waterfall then,” Mary explained, “and a torrent of water roars through the canyon. Look straight up to that break which looks like a cross-canyon. . . . Can’t you imagine the water pouring over that ledge? All the dirt beneath that pile of rocks would be washed away, and it would be impossible to cross the trail here.”

“Well, I should say so!” declared Katharine, while deploring in her mind such destruction by the elements of the fruits of men’s labors. “The desert must be unconquerable. That might explain its charm.”

“How do you like our canyon?” queried Curry.

“Yours and the devil’s, you mean,” said Katharine before she could curb her unruly tongue. “As people in Taho would say, ‘I like it fine.’ But heaven forbid that I ever have to cross it on a dark and stormy night! I want the moon.”

“Next time you come through, I’ll see you have a moon. I’ll fix it up with the government agent at Leupp. He’s an obliging cuss.”

“You’re both incorrigible!” Mary declared, laughing as she spoke.

Immediately upon their return to the automobile, two timorous passengers questioned them about the safety in venturing farther over the terrible road.

Curry told them there would be no trouble. “We’ll eat it up. The place I was worrying about is in perfect condition.”

Thus assured, the ladies lapsed into silence, and soon the automobile was moving again, gasping and grinding up the grade. Once when the motor went dead, Katharine’s heart stopped too. Only after Curry recovered control and regained the few feet they had slid could she find breath or voice.

At last they gained the canyon rim and the car shot out upon the desert. Mary clapped her hands in approval of Curry’s masterly handling of the car. One of the ladies quavered, “Well, I never!” a sentiment which the Eastern girl heartily endorsed.

“I’ll let the old nag cool off a bit and then I’ll stick my spurs in her and make her run,” said Curry. “It’s a pretty even stretch now all the way to Leupp. We ought to make it in a half-hour.”

* * * *

Katharine’s impression of Leupp from a distance was of a treeless community of toy buildings set haphazardly on pale yellow cardboard. But the buildings, which surrounded a formal walk, took substantial proportions as they approached. Several were dark, vacant structures.

“School buildings and dormitories,” Curry informed them, indicating the largest of the group. “No youngsters here now. Vacation. Teachers gone too, I guess. Leupp’s sure a dead place in summer.”

They drove by the buildings and on toward a square brick house where a light shone. There they stopped.

“Hey!” yelled Curry. “Anybody home?”

“You betcher!” bellowed a voice from the doorway. A man of giant stature strode out to greet them. He was grizzled and desert-worn, and had a homely good-natured face.

“Howdy, everybody!” he said in thundering tones. “Want a lodging for the night?”

Mr. Curry introduced the man to his party. His name was Jenkins. He was the government agent at Leupp.

“Aw, shaw! And to think Mrs. Jenkins is in Taho when there’s ladies to entertain!” His disappointment was so genuine that Katharine could not help sharing it.

“Miss Winfield and I are from Taho,” spoke up Mary. “Sorry I haven’t met Mrs. Jenkins there. Guess she’s newly arrived.”

“Yes, she shore is. But if you ain’t away for long you’ll have lots of time to be good to her. She’s to spend a month there with the Burnhams. You know ’em, I guess. You can’t live in Taho and not know everybody.”

“Indeed I do know Mrs. Burnham. It’s certain we’ll meet your wife.”

While the ladies accepted Jenkins’ invitation to “step out and shake your skirts,” Curry explained Wilbur Newton’s plight.

“Shore. I’ll pull him out,” agreed Jenkins. “Likely he’s diggin’ a pair of spurs into a rock somewheres. Ain’t he the dandy? Arizona couldn’t support two of him.”

Curry’s effort to stop the man before he had his full say was futile. Half-whispered words passed between them; then Katharine caught, “Well I’ll be damned! I didn’t get it that she was the missus. Now, ain’t some men lucky, and some women fools!”

Mary was serene through it all, as if she had not heard.

Their arrival had interrupted a card game in which sat a professor from Harvard University and two students, all of archeological bent. This information came unsolicited with the introductions. Jenkins was proud of his guests.

After professor had met professor, no one could separate them, and much to the consternation of the students it became their lot to decide who should accompany Jenkins on his relief expedition. It was obvious that they preferred the company of the ladies. Katharine did not wonder at it, marooned as they were in this remote place where they likely had not seen a girl for many weeks. Finally, in heroic brothers-in-arms fashion they agreed that they both would go.

Jenkins turned the house over to the ladies. They were to do with it what they pleased. There was a kitchen stocked with any amount of canned food. They could cook, play the victrola—at this the students exchanged despairing glances—look through his albums and guest book, or anything else that took their fancy. When it came to sleeping time they could send the men folks to the dormitories where they would find a dozen beds apiece. There were three bedrooms for which the ladies could draw. He wanted them to be sure to “make themselves to home.”

Guided by their host’s suggestion, Mary and Katharine explored the rooms as soon as he left. No small home could have been more complete than the Jenkins’ desert place. And it was spotlessly neat. In the kitchen the girls found Curry, sleeves rolled above his elbow, laying out food supplies he had brought in from the car.

“You’ve had no supper,” said Mary. “You and your party must be starved!”

“Just watch me rustle some grub!” Curry grinned happily.

“Let us do it!” Katharine begged.

“Not while I’ve got legs to stand on.”

“Then let us help,” chimed in Mary. “It will hurry things.”

Curry swung one arm high in surrender. “That’s putting it too straight for me. Dip in if you want to.”

If it had been a competition, Katharine would have had difficulty in deciding whether Curry or Mary were the better cook. While she herself awkwardly carried out the tasks they directed her to do, Mary and Curry were talking as they worked and yet accomplished twice as much. Between the three the work was dispatched quickly.

Mary and Katharine waited table against the protest of the others. Attention of this kind, they declared, would spoil them forever.

Never had Katharine felt such joy in service; never had people seemed so necessary to each other, their interdependence been more clearly established, than here, far from the civilized world. The desert had a power over men, linking their destinies or pulling them far asunder. People met as friends or enemies. There was no intermediate bond.

After supper the maiden ladies retired to their room. They much preferred the room with a double bed to the separate rooms and single beds. The desert seemed to have made them conscious of their impotence, and they clung to each other for strength. Youth had greater vigor and less fear.

Katharine stepped out into the pale yellow night. The droning voices of the two professors came to her. She wanted to hear their interesting conversation on the subject of archeology. But even more than this she wanted the moonlight of the desert and its strange impelling silence; so she walked down the barren path that led to the trail.

This desert solitude was the storehouse of unlived years, the hush of the world at the hour of its creation. It was solemn, grand, incorruptible. It did something to one, something inexplicable; it drew one’s narrow soul from out oneself, and poured in something big, so big it was almost too great to bear. It set one’s heart beating faster. Tears came too, and a strange yearning. Was it the desire to be in tune with the Infinite? Was it self trying to meet God? Was it God trying to storm her soul? Had Mary surrendered to this force, this power, this unnamable magic, that she could find in the desert infinite peace? . . . “Come unto me all ye who are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” . . . It must be that Mary meant that God had received her in the desert, that she too could find Him there. But Katharine was too unsure. This vast, solemn, ageless sepulcher was voiceless and fearsome, and too merciless in aspect. The stars looked down coldly, and the moon. The Eastern girl found companionship in her shadow; and watching it before her, she returned slowly to the house.

Curry and Mary were alone on the porch; he sat against a pillar; she, at the far end of the steps, seemingly unconscious of his presence, was wrapped in deep meditation. Neither was aware of Katharine’s approach until her voice brought them to their feet.

“I didn’t mean to run off. I simply couldn’t resist it.”

“The desert has a way of wooing all its own,” said Mary. “However, I knew you weren’t far.”

“It’s wonderful and so terrifying! Do you ever feel that way about it, Mr. Curry?” Katharine asked.

“I’ve lived on it for years, and I don’t savvy it yet,” Curry returned.

“Someday you will,” put in Mary, turning to him.

“Do you? You sound like you meant that you do.”

“I think so. And I want to continue to think so, because it means peace—it makes me brave enough to meet life. . . . It’s something a person has to find out for himself.”

Mary rose with a quick smile. “The moon is so lovely,” she continued. “I’d like to stay with it forever, but I’d only fall asleep and miss it all. I’m not a desert owl like you, Katharine. I’m a very domestic bird, and go to my roost early. Will you say good night to Wilbur for me and explain that the men are to sleep in the dormitories?”

Katharine understood Mary’s message. For her sake she stayed and talked with Curry until Wilbur had come, and she had told him, and he had seen.

* * * *

The next morning Curry and Jenkins were moving about before the sun came up. Katharine, from her room in the rear, heard them enter the kitchen by the back way, and then whispers and the opening of cupboards and an occasional clatter followed by an exclamation of disgust. She identified the voices. The two were stealing a march—preparing breakfast while everyone else still slept. Katharine was amused and delighted at the idea of two men cooking breakfast for four capable women, and such truly masculine men, too! The whole social order seemed reversed. She rose hurriedly.

Mary appeared before Katharine was fully dressed. She was an early riser, accustomed daily to greet the sun. And presently Mr. Jenkins gave a tremendous bellow which ended in the summons, “Time to get up!”

The girls set the table, though Mr. Jenkins at first objected, claiming they had no right to have risen so soon and to spoil half his fun.

How different this man was from Wilbur, who came in when breakfast was half over, expressing mild surprise that he was the last to arrive. It pleased Katharine that the young students, not wholly without guile, had seated themselves one on each side of Mary. Katharine sat next, with Curry on her right. They were well barricaded. Wilbur, frowningly, took the vacant chair opposite.

The offending carburetor having been repaired by Curry the minute it was hauled to the shed at Leupp, everything was in readiness for both parties to move on. A silent rage evidently was burning within Wilbur that he must continue to accept Curry’s favors. Katharine could tell by the two red spots that showed in his usually pale face. Curry offered to ride at the pace Wilbur set all the way to Oraibi, so he could be of assistance if necessary, and Wilbur received the courteous offer boorishly.

Mr. Jenkins, driving the government truck, went with them as far as the Little Colorado, whither at his request several Navaho Indians had come with a team and a high-bodied wagon. The wagon fascinated Katharine. It was a tremendous wooden box set on wheels and without protective covering.

Ford the Little Colorado! She was beginning to understand what such a thrilling experience would mean. Mary explained that although the river seemed wide it was low and shallow, a fact easily conceivable, after studying the topography of the land. For compared to the great, wide sandy wash through which it moved so sluggishly, the river had indeed but a narrow span, and the long slopes from the bank of the wash showed how far from its flood height the river had receded.

“It’s the quicksand that’s worrisome,” said Mary. “These Navahos know the river well, but that doesn’t eliminate the risk.”

The Indians awaited orders with stolid indifference. They were exceptionally picturesque in their bright velvet tunics and the careless twist of gay bands that encircled their foreheads. One wore elaborate silver ornaments and another a string of turquoise. Prosperous Navahos these obviously were.

Jenkins told them to ride on across the wash to the place they had picked as a crossing while the cars followed. The horses and wagon traveled easily over the trail, but at times the wheels of the automobiles, buried deep in the sand, spun ineffectually. When at last the two cars reached the river their engines had to be cooled before attempting the ford.

“Now folks,” dictated Jenkins, “the cars must be cleared of everything and everybody except the drivers. We’ll get them over first, and then cart you and the baggage in the wagon. I reckon we’d better make two trips of that, too.”

The New York girl understood the process as soon as she saw Jenkins and the Indians hitching the team to Curry’s car. The automobiles could not make the crossing under their own power. They must be towed.

Viewed from the river bank, the country was barren. The only visible breaks in the monotonous stretch of terrain were a few clumps of greasewood on the rim of the wash which made lacy prints against the sky. Katharine thought of the majestic view she had had yesterday from the top of the red butte, that now they had left far behind them in the desert. How remote they were from civilization!

Curry and the professor unloaded the cars. Wilbur meanwhile kept busy giving unnecessary advice to Jenkins and the Indians. Katharine, with Mary and the older women, looked about for a shady secluded place, and finding none took refuge in the shadow of the wagon. From there they watched the activities of the men.

As soon as the horses were securely hitched, each was mounted by an Indian, and Curry took his place behind the wheel of the first car. With shouts and kicks the Indians got their horses started. The car progressed ever so slowly under its own power until the front wheels slid into the water; then Curry turned off the ignition. The rest was up to the horses. They strained and pulled and panted, and breasted the lazy current stoutly. The advance was scarcely perceptible; but slowly the water rose around the wheels of the machine, reached the hubs, and crept up to submerge the four wheels.

“Won’t that water flood the body and engine and everything?” Katharine asked. She was really more worried about the Indians and Curry, but pretended that it was the car about which she was concerned.

“Indeed it will flood the body,” returned Mary. “The cover Mr. Curry put over the hood and radiator will protect the engine some. He’ll open everything up the minute he makes the other side. The sun will dry things in no time.”

“Talked it all over with Curry, I suppose,” drawled Wilbur. “Oh, he’s shore smart, and he’d waste no time telling you about it.”

Jenkins, who was standing near, wheeled quickly. “Look-a-here, Newton, what that hombre is talks so loud in all the fine things he does that he don’t have to go round shootin’ his mouth off about himself to folks.”

One of the maiden ladies peered at them, and Katharine wished devoutly that she had not asked her stupid question.

“Look! They’re stuck, aren’t they?” Mary exclaimed.

Katharine followed Mary’s intent gaze past Wilbur, whose suddenly compressed lips and narrowed eyes expressed malevolent pleasure, out to the middle of the river where the horses tossed heads and strained without advancing. The car might have been a boat anchored in midstream. Only part of the body was visible. The Indians yelled and beat the horses frantically. Behind them Curry held fast to the wheel.

“Quicksand! I’ll be blowed!” muttered Jenkins.

“Head ’em with the current, you fools!” he shouted. And when the Indians turned, he gesticulated wildly, pointing downstream.

There were more high staccato yells and frantic blows. The bewildered beasts staggered and swayed. Each time they jerked their heads forward they met the water. Curry was straining at the steering wheel to turn the front wheels of the car. His action seemed to frighten the horses, a lucky circumstance, because they pawed and reared so violently that the car moved with them and they were on their way again, making surer progress on to firmer bottom. A few rods, and the horses and the car began slowly to emerge from the muddied stream.

Katharine gasped her relief and turned to find a similar expression of relief registered in Mary’s eyes. The professor and his sisters too were showing their concern.

“That’s a terribly dangerous crossing, Mr. Jenkins,” one of the women declared. “I’m not so sure that I want to try it.”

“Don’t you be worryin’, Miss. It’s them cars that play the devil. They’re so heavy. You’ll mostly float over in the wagon. . . . Funny for them Indians to make straight for that quicksand! Usual they test a place first, and pick out a landmark to put ’em right. You see that big clump of greasewood yonder? Likely they was workin’ one or t’other side of that and got to operatin’ on the wrong side. They won’t be forgettin’ next time.”

“Well, I hope not,” returned the woman severely.

Soon the automobile was safe on the dry sand of the wash. The Indians dismounted to help Curry take down the top and lay the engine open to the sun. Then they waded their horses across the river.

The second car was lighter, and under better piloting made the trip without difficulty.

By the time the Indians had returned, the professor’s sisters had recovered somewhat from their anxiety, but unblushingly requested that Mr. and Mrs. Newton and Katharine precede them across the river. The New York girl caught a twinkle in Mr. Jenkins’ eye.

“Shore, you folks came a year too soon,” he said dryly. “There’s talk of a bridge going up here, mebbe next summer.”

“This will be interesting to talk about afterward,” returned the heretofore uncommunicative sister, “having to ford a river and do such terribly primitive things. But I don’t know that an airplane wouldn’t suit me any better.”

Katharine bade good-by to Mr. Jenkins, and followed by Mary and Wilbur climbed into the high hearselike box of the wagon. The side boards were almost five feet high, and to these they had to cling. There were no seats provided. A narrow shelf across the back supported their baggage, but so insecurely that Wilbur had to stand against it to hold the things in place.

“You look exactly as if you were on the way to be hanged,” came an unemotional comment from below. And Katharine laughed out loud.

This time the Indian riders rested, and one of their companions mounted the wagon, took the reins over the high board and gave a shrill cry to the horses. The wagon rolled easily on its way. The horses started to wade in the shallow water and the wheels of the wagon scattered spray. The farther they advanced, the higher the water rose and the more swiftly it swirled and eddied about them. The river was swifter than it had appeared from the bank. Suddenly the wagon pitched and everyone was jerked violently about. There was a sudden drop in midstream they had not figured on. The water rose above the level of the wagon bottom, and a little seeped in, wetting their shoes. Wilbur swore. Katharine, on the contrary, would have been pleased to find herself ankle deep in water. It was all so thrilling, yet she would have it even more so. She almost envied Curry his misadventure. The water continued to rise, but not for long. The horses were moving quickly in their eagerness to make the bank again, and the river fell away below them. In a short time they were straining and tugging the heavy vehicle up the last few yards to the place where the cars were standing. Curry was alongside the minute the panting horses came to a stop. He helped the girls to descend. Newton swore again, but this time it was just a breath between closed teeth.

* * * *

As Curry had predicted, it was late afternoon when the cars reached the foot of Oraibi Mesa. For miles Katharine had seen the great promontory take form and color, growing higher, bolder, more sweeping in length, coming out of its lavender haze, warmly red and shimmering. A jagged cliff lifted itself high above the desert, and atop it, on a perch lofty as an eagle’s, rose the red walls of the old Indian village of Oraibi.

While Wilbur dozed, Mary told Katharine the traditions of the place toward which they were climbing. In the ancient village, life was going on much as it had a hundred years ago; old Indians, and the young who adhered to the faith of their fathers, frowned upon the automobiles of the white man, on the encroachment of a modern civilization, hating the recently erected Hopi dwellings at the foot of their noble mesa. The Indians who lived in the despised places had a smattering of education and enough knowledge of the white man’s trade and traffic to copy his commercialism. It was they who encouraged the white man to appear at the Snake Dance ceremonies, so they might rent their houses and horses and sell their handiwork.

The houses at the foot of the mesa were boxlike, one-story structures, some square, some rectangular, all built of adobe pink-red in color. The dwellings were few and widely scattered. Some of the surrounding terrain was under cultivation.

The driver, looking back to see that Curry was close behind, picked a house with a central location and stopped. Curry drew up alongside. Other cars were parked near by on the open desert. A dozen white people were in evidence. Several, not ten yards away, were bargaining with an Indian for a gay-looking basket. A party of six, gathered round a campfire preparing their evening meal, shouted a cheerful welcome to Curry.

“That’s Mr. and Mrs. Weston and guests from the trading post at Black Mesa. Fine people, the Westons,” said Mary.

“Mebbe it would be better to rustle right now, and take stock of folks later,” Wilbur suggested.

Mary opened the car door for him, then she and Katharine stepped out.

Curry, busy with his own party, called over, “See you later, friends! Mosey over to the Westons’ fire for a while this evening.”

“Like hell we will,” muttered Wilbur to himself.

Meanwhile two young women and a man appeared from the doorway of the adobe house. The girls were dressed in riding habits of the latest cut. Their faces beneath small tailored hats were comely. The man was brutish in build, tall, thick-bodied, shoulders heavy and broad, and his legs were bowed, a condition that intensified his likeness to a bulldog. Under a large sombrero which might have been twin to Wilbur’s bulged a wide-jowled, square-cut face. The man was laughing at something one of the girls said, and Katharine beheld a perfect though unconscious imitation of a ventriloquist’s yapping doll.

“There’s Hanley now,” said Wilbur. “Hello, pard,” he called.

That name struck association in Katharine’s mind—Hanley! The man Mary spoke of yesterday!

He looked up and saluted. “Be right over, Newton.”

After a word to the girls he doffed his sombrero and came to join Wilbur. Katharine and Mary forthwith retreated a few yards to where the baggage lay.

“There go two thoroughbred fillies!” Hanley greeted Wilbur, indicating the girls he had just left. His gaze swept down the trim figures of the women, audaciously, speculatively.

Katharine shrank from the prospect of meeting this man, but it could not be avoided for at once Hanley abandoned Wilbur for them, and Mary was forced to perform the amenities.

“Folks come a long way to see them Indians cut up,” he said. “An’ it sure is interestin’. Never seen it before, either of you, I reckon.”

Mary said they had not.

“Don’t miss none of it,” Hanley continued. “Make the old man take you up to the race tomorrow mornin’.” He turned to Wilbur. “You’re takin’ ’em, ain’t you?”

“Race? I haven’t heard anything about a race.”

“Sure! Most everybody goes. You got to get up about four-thirty to make it. It’s on top of the mesy, at sunrise. The Indians will bring your horses in time if you tell ’em.”

“That lets us out. We’re not getting up at four-thirty to see a fool Indian race!” declared Wilbur.

As far as he was concerned, the matter was settled. Mary looked before her, not daring to express an opinion.

“You lazy son-of-a-gun,” Hanley exclaimed, his small eyes snapping. “You might ask the ladies what they’d like to do.”

Katharine felt indebted to him for his remark. She would have said as much to Wilbur, though not quite so forcibly. Hanley was not wholly abominable.

Wilbur scowled, but made no comment.

“I’ll take the ladies, if they’d like to go,” Hanley went on. “I’m goin’ up with the Weston outfit, and likely some other folks’ll join us.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Katharine hurried to say. “I’d love to go, and I’m sure Mrs. Newton would too.”

She had not the slightest desire to encourage companionship with Hanley. She knew what Wilbur’s reaction would be, so she purposely compromised him, enjoying her duplicity.

“If Mrs. Newton goes, I go!” declared Wilbur, a thin cutting edge to his words.

Katharine smiled inwardly.

“Of course, we’ll all go, and gladly,” said Mary quietly. “I appreciate your suggestion, Mr. Hanley. Mr. Newton never did have much zest in anticipation, but he is always glad afterward that someone has dragged him into a thing.”

Hanley declared he could arrange quarters for them easily. The girls he had just left—the Blakely girls, he called them—would share with Miss Winfield and Mrs. Newton the adobe house across the road which they had just bargained for. Wilbur could make camp with him, and the driver would shift for himself.

From Katharine’s point of view, any place was perfect that gave Mary to her for a while without Wilbur’s presence added.

“The Blakelys are kind of society,” said Hanley. “Don’t like campin’ much an’ don’t want to be alone. I promised I’d look ’em up some nice companions.”

Hanley transferred their baggage and bed-rolls at once. That done, he and Wilbur left the girls and went to search for some Indians from whom they could rent horses.

The adobe house was a barren place, just the four pink-red walls and roof, and a doorway with no door—not a stick of furniture, not a single decoration. Whoever lived there must have taken his few possessions with him before he vacated it. Hard clay hut, clean and cool, was the way Katharine described it to herself. It was at most a shelter, if shelter were necessary, though why, Katharine could not imagine, she herself preferring the stars.

“There’s nothing to do here but sit on our bed-rolls and talk,” said Mary. “Wilbur didn’t specify whether we were to wait here or not. Let’s go out to the car. He can’t be provoked at that.”

Once outside, they discovered a short, slight man in riding outfit foraging through their car, dipping into the pockets on the doors in a most dogged fashion and without stealth.

“What does he think he’s doing?” exclaimed Mary, hurrying forward.

Katharine, too surprised to answer, quickened her steps to keep pace with Mary.

As they approached, the man straightened to meet them, jerking into position much like a soldier about to salute. He was very solemn and very important for a man of such a negative type, and appeared offended rather than the offender.

“So this is your car!” he said. “I was wondering. I was looking for liquor.”

“Dreadfully sorry we can’t accommodate you,” said Mary with gentle irony.

The man’s look of injury deepened. “You misunderstand me, Madam! I am the government agent. I am trying to locate liquor. Some has already been passed on to the Indians. Liquor on the reservation is absolutely against the law, and I’m out to make a few arrests.”

Katharine, reflecting on the size of the only lawmen she knew—husky New York policemen—smiled.

“It’s no smiling matter, Madam!” the government agent continued. “It’s really very grave. You’ll pardon me if I make absolutely sure there is nothing in this car?”

He investigated again as thoroughly as before, and came up red in the face.

“We wear no coats and have no hip pockets,” said Katharine demurely.

But he ignored her with perfect dignity.

Then came a volley of questions: “Who drives this car? How many in the party? What are the names? Any hand baggage? How long do you intend to stay? Have you any cameras? If so you’ll have to turn them over until tomorrow evening. No photographing allowed on Oraibi Mesa at the Snake Dance!”

From them he stalked impressively to Curry’s car. The girls watched him, amused beyond words. How shocked the professor and the maiden ladies would have been to discover themselves looked upon as liquor suspects!

Katharine turned to see Wilbur and Hanley returning. Hanley was carrying a burlap bag from which protruded an ear of corn.

“Didn’t happen to see the government agent around, did you?” asked Wilbur.

“Yes, very much in evidence,” Mary returned. “He searched the car for liquor.”

“Been by, has he? Went right on down the line, I suppose,” supplemented Wilbur. “He’s a sketch, isn’t he?”

Hanley sidled over to Curry’s car. “Guess he’ll want some of this corn,” he said, as if to himself, and hoisted the bag over onto the floor of the car.

A minute later, as if from nowhere, Curry himself strode up. He had eyes only for the car, and to Katharine they seemed ablaze. He flung open the door, dragged out the burlap bag, and stalked over to the men.

“Hanley! That’s a skunk trick. I came ’round that adobe house in time to see you. You’ll risk my reputation instead of yours, will you? Take your dirty liquor!”

“Liquor?—why—why, it’s corn!” declared Mary, her eyes wide with astonishment.

“John Barley Corn, Mrs. Newton, the inseparable companion of Mr. Hanley and his friends.”

“That’s a lie! It’s not liquor,” stormed Hanley, reaching for the bag.

Curry drew it away. “No, not yet, Hanley. I’d better drop the bag and demonstrate to the ladies.”

“For God’s sake, don’t!” Hanley muttered. “Think of what might happen. Think of it sensibly—the ladies and everythin’.”

“You and Newton have given them a heap of consideration, haven’t you?” retorted Curry. He thrust the bag toward the heavy-set man. “I’m sorry they are forced into such company.”

With that he strode off.

Katharine glanced covertly at Mary. She sensed the humiliation her friend was suffering, saw color rise and recede in her still face. Wilbur was white with the paleness of wrath. But Hanley seemed untouched, now that he possessed the bag.

“Can you imagine anyone messin’ up such a row about another feller’s private stock?” he asked. “Everybody knows he don’t drink, and in an emergency he could have helped a feller out.”

To a man of Hanley’s intelligence quotient, that was all the defense his action required.

Mary, head high, walked past Hanley. “You better come with me, Katharine,” she said.

Wilbur grasped Mary’s wrist as she stepped past him. “Where are you going?”

“To the house,” Mary replied quietly. “I’ve quite lost my appetite. I’ll not eat anything this evening. Perhaps Katharine will join you. Call her when you’re ready.”

“But Mary, nothing’s happened,” protested Katharine. “Don’t be so upset.”

Mary sat on a bed-roll, her head tilted back against the wall, the lovely curve of her lips lost in a tight line.

“You’ve told me that Wilbur isn’t a drinking man,” said Katharine. “That’s one of the good things about him. Mr. Curry apparently doesn’t know Wilbur very well.”

“It’s the duplicity,” moaned Mary. “It’s Hanley—his influence. I’m afraid of it. Wilbur is selfish, egotistical, weak in many ways, but there used to be a sweetness, and at times even a bigness, in things sacred just to him and me. At least I thought so. But Hanley isn’t good for him. Hanley has no real regard for women. It’s superficial—play-acting. He’s the kind who thinks all women fundamentally weak because he could brutally ruin a few. He’s poisoned Wilbur’s mind to such an extent that my husband distrusts me.”

“Why does Wilbur hate Curry so?” Katharine asked bluntly. “He’s the kind of man, it seems to me, that one would choose for a friend.”

“Because of the way I first met Curry.” Mary was lost in thought a minute, then she went on, “I went riding alone one day out to a place called Cliff Rocks. I had wanted to go for a year. I knew that I would never get there if I didn’t try it alone. It was twelve miles, but I had a good horse. I wasn’t afraid. The Indians, seen and unseen, are a protection to anyone among them. And Wilbur didn’t care much that I went. . . . I made it beautifully. Then something drew me to ride farther, just a mile to investigate a curious boulder. I thought a deep wash lay beyond. As I came near the boulder, I thought I smelled blood. Suddenly my horse reared and snorted, and then, Katharine—oh, I’ll never forget it—I saw a horse, recently shot, not fifty feet away down in the wash, and just beyond, a man, stretched full length, and face down in the sand. He was groaning. He hadn’t heard me. I was petrified. I thought a thousand harrowing things. I think I cried out, ‘Oh, what’s the matter?’ or something like that—some childish, thoughtless words. Anyway, the man looked up. He seemed dazed. I didn’t know at first whether he saw me or not. It was Curry, though I didn’t know him then. I had never seen him before. It seems he’d been on a mad race from Castle Mesa to get the doctor at Taho to save some poor Indian youngster’s life. His horse tried to clear the wash and missed, and broke two legs in the fall, and pitched Curry against the rocks. Curry was bruised and cut, and his ankle was sprained. He had to shoot his horse and that broke his heart. He had ridden him for years.

“There we were, two people alone on the desert, with one horse. He wouldn’t take my horse and let me walk, and he couldn’t walk, I knew, though he pretended he could. I mounted and told him I was going for help. I’d seen a hogan about a mile from the trail four miles back, and I figured the Navahos would have horses. I met them, a young boy and an older man, mounted and about to leave the place. I had an awful time making them understand that I wanted only one to go along with me, but that I needed an extra horse. The boy luckily understood a little English. He explained and the older man agreed he should go. I told the boy about the sick youngster at Castle Mesa, and when we had reached the trail I managed to coax him to give the extra horse to me, and go on alone, riding fast to Taho to get the doctor. I was so excited that I never thought about sending a message back to Wilbur.”

Mary paused. Her eyes were soft, dark and eloquent. Her mouth had lost its hard set look. Never had Katharine seen her look so beautiful.

“I rode back to Curry,” she continued presently, “and he managed to mount somehow, and we rode to Taho together. Katharine, that night the sun set perfectly. I will never forget the desert as it looked to me then. And poor Curry, after he explained who he was, that he was a guide and packer for Mr. Weston and lived at Black Mesa half of the year, was silent all the rest of the way. I knew he was in pain. I don’t mean pain from his injuries—the pain of bereavement. It was dark when we got in. Wilbur, lantern in hand, watched us ride up to the post. He was in an ugly mood—wretchedly ugly—but Curry didn’t know because men who had collected to search for me, surrounded him and rode him off to the government hospital. Two weeks later Curry called, and Wilbur deliberately walked out the back way when he saw him come in. Curry brought his bridle to present to me. He said he could never use it on another horse—wanted me to have it as a token of appreciation for what I had done. Later Wilbur hacked it to pieces with a knife. That is all there was to it.”

“That is all!” Long after Mary’s recital, Katharine repeated these words to the night. Mary had retired, and the Eastern girl was alone in her restlessness. The Blakely girls had not come in yet. They were still at the remote red dot of fire that marked the Westons’ camp. Gay voices carried through the night from the spot. Mary should have been there with them, happy and giving happiness. Curry, perhaps, would be there, too. Mary and Curry! Why could not it have been such a man as he that Mary had loved and married? How ghastly to have to live one’s life out with a man like Wilbur, and how difficult to keep one’s soul from dry rot under such a bondage!