The Enchanted Canyon

by Honoré Morrow

CHAPTER XI

THE PERFECT ADVENTURE

"Who cares whether or not my hands are clean? Does God? Wouldn't God expect me to punish evil? God is mercilessly just, is He not? Else why disease and grief in the world? If you could only tell me!"—Enoch's Diary.

It was nipping cold in the morning. Ice encrusted the edges of the little brook. But by the time breakfast was finished, the sun had appeared over the distant mountain peaks and the long warm rays soon brought the thermometer up to summer heat. Milton expounded his program at breakfast. Jonas was to keep the camp. Enoch and Milton were to climb to the rim for topographical information. Harden was to look for fossils. Agnew and Forrester were to make a geological report on the strata of the section.

Jonas was extraordinarily well pleased with his assignment.

"I'm going to finish painting the Na-che," he said. "Mr. Milton, have you got anything I can mend the tarpaulins with that go over the decks?"

"Needles and twine in the bag labeled Repairs," replied Milton. "How about giving the Ida the once over, too, Jonas."

"All right! If I get around to it!" Jonas' manner was vague.

"Can't love but one boat at a time, eh, Jonas?" asked Enoch.

"I always wanted to have a boat to fix up," said Jonas. "When I was a kid my folks had an old flat-bottom tub, but I never earned enough for a can of paint. Will you folks be home by twelve for dinner?"

There was a chorus of assent as the crew scattered to its several tasks. Milton and Enoch started at once up the edge of the brook, hoping that the ascent might be made more easily thus. But the crevice, out of which the little stream found its way to the Colorado, narrowed rapidly to the point where it became impossible for the two men to work their way into it. They were obliged, after a half hour's struggle, to return to the camp and start again.

A very steep slope of bright orange sand led from the shore to a scarcely less oblique terrace of sharp broken rock. There were several hundred feet of the sand and, as it was dry and loose, it caused a constant slipping and falling that consumed both time and strength. The rocky terrace was far easier to manage, and they covered that rapidly, although Enoch had a nasty fall, cutting his knee. They were brought to pause, however, when the broken rock gave way to a sheer hard wall, which offered neither crack nor projection for hand or foot hold.

Milton led the way carefully along its foot for a quarter of a mile until they reached a fissure wide enough for them to enter. The walls of this were crossed by transverse cracks. By utilizing these, now pulling, now boosting each other, they finally emerged on a flat, smooth tableland, of which fissures had made a complete island. At the southern end of the island rose an abrupt black peak.

"If we can get to the top of that," said Milton, "it ought to bring us to the general desert level. Is your knee bothering you, Judge?"

"Not enough to stop the parade," replied Enoch. "How high do you think that peak is, Milton?"

"Not less than a thousand feet, I would guess. I bet it's as easy to climb as a greased pole, too."

The pinnacle, when they reached it, appeared very little less difficult than Milton had guessed it would be. The north side offered no hope whatever. It rose smooth and perpendicular toward the heavens. But the south side was rough and though a yawning fissure at its base added five hundred feet to its southern height they determined to try their fortunes here. Ledges and jutting rocks, cracks and depressions finally made the ascent possible. The top, when they achieved it, was not twenty feet in diameter. They dropped on it, panting.

The view which met their eyes was superb. To the south lay the desert, rainbow colored. Rising abruptly from its level were isolated peaks of bright purple, all of them snow capped, many of them with crevices marked by the brilliant white of snow. Miles to the south of the isolated peaks lay a long range of mountains, dull black against the blue sky, but with the white of snow caps showing even at this distance. To the north, the river gorge wound like a snake; the gorge and one huge mountain dominating the entire northern landscape. Satiated by wonders as Milton was, he exclaimed over the beauty of this giant, sleeping in the desert sun.

A sprawling cone in outline, there was nothing extraordinary about it in contour, but its size and color surpassed anything that Enoch had as yet seen. From base to apex it was a perfect rose tint, deepening where its great shoulders bent, to crimson. As if still not satisfied with her work, nature had sent a recent snow storm to embellish the verdureless rock, and the mountain was lightly powdered with white which here was of a gauze-like texture permitting pale rose to glimmer through, there lay in drifts, white defined against crimson.

Enoch sat gazing about him while Milton worked rapidly with his note book and instruments. Finally he slipped his pencil into his pocket with a sigh.

"And that's done! What do you say to a return for lunch, Judge?"

"I'm very much with you," replied Enoch. "Here! Hold up, old man!
What's the matter?" For Milton was swaying and would have fallen if
Enoch had not caught him.

Milton clung to Enoch's broad shoulder for a moment, then straightened himself with a jerk.

"Sorry, Judge. It's that infernal vertigo again!"

"What's the cause of it?" asked Enoch. "Might be rather serious, might it not, on a trip such as yours?"

"I think the water we have to drink must be affecting my kidneys," replied Milton. "I never had anything of the sort before this trip, but I've been troubled this way a dozen times lately. It only lasts for a minute."

"But in that minute," Enoch's voice was grave, "you might fall down a mountain or out of the boat."

"Oh, I don't get it that bad! And anyhow, I haven't gone off alone since these things began. When we get to El Tovar I'll try to locate a doctor."

Enoch looked admiringly at the grim young freckled face beneath the faded hat. "I see I shall have to appoint myself bodyguard," he said. "I'd suggest Jonas, only he's deserted me for the Na-che, and I doubt if you could win him from her."

Milton laughed. "Nothing on earth can equal the joy of puddling about in boats, to the right kind of a chap, as the Wind in the Willows has it. And Jonas certainly is the right kind of a chap!"

"Jonas is a man, every inch of him," agreed Enoch. "Shall we try the descent now, Milton?"

"I'm ready," replied the young man, and the slow and arduous task was begun.

Jonas was just lifting the frying pan from the fire when they slid down the orange sand bank. The rest of the crew was ready and waiting around the flat rock that served as dining table.

"What's the matter with your knee, boss?" cried Jonas, standing with the coffee pot in his hand.

Enoch laughed as he glanced down at his torn and blood-stained overalls. "Of course, if you were giving me half the care you give your boat, Jonas, these things wouldn't happen to me!"

"You better let me fix you up, before you eat, boss," said Jonas.

"Not on your life, old man! Food will do this knee more good than a bandage."

"It's a wonder you wouldn't offer to help the rest of us out once in a while, Jonas!" Harden looked up from his plate of fish. "Look at this scratch on my cheek! I might get blood poisoning, but lots you care if my fatal beauty was destroyed! As it is, I look as much like an inmate of a menagerie as old goat Forrester here."

"Too bad the scratch didn't injure your tongue, Harden," returned
Forrester, sarcastically.

"Nothing seems able to stop your chin, though, Forr! Why do you have to get sore every time I speak to you?"

"Because you're always going out of your way to say something insulting to me."

"Don't make a mountain out of a mole hill, Forr," said Milton. "If you fellows aren't careful you'll have a real quarrel, and that's the last thing I'm going to stand for, I warn you."

"Very well, Milt," replied Forrester, "if you don't want trouble make
Harden keep his tongue off me."

"The fault is primarily yours, Hard," Milton went on. "You know Forrester is foolishly sensitive and you can't control your love of teasing. Now, once for all, I ask you not to speak to Forrester except on the business of the survey."

Harden shrugged his shoulders and Forrester scowled a little sheepishly. Agnew, a serene, kindly fellow, began one of his endless Irish stories, and the incident appeared to be closed. The work assigned for the day was accomplished in shorter order than Milton had anticipated. By two o'clock all hands were back in camp and Milton decided to embark and move on as far as possible before nightfall. But scarcely had they finished loading the boats and tied on the tarpaulins when a heavy rain began to fall, accompanied by lightning and tremendous peals of thunder that echoed through the Canyon deafeningly.

Milton, in his anxiety to get on with his task, would have continued in spite of the rain, but the others protested so vigorously that he gave in and the whole party crawled under a sheltering ledge beside the brook. For an hour the storm raged. A few flakes of snow mingled with the descending rain drops. Then with a superb flash of lightning and crash of thunder the storm passed as suddenly as it had come, though for hours after they heard it reverberate among the distant peaks.

At last they embarked and proceeded along a smooth, swift-flowing river for a short time. Then, however, the familiar roar of falls was heard, the current increased rapidly in velocity and Milton made a landing for observation.

They were at the head of the wildest falls that Enoch had yet seen. The Canyon walls were smooth and perpendicular. There was no possibility of a portage. The river was full of rocks against which dashed waves ten to twelve feet high.

"We'll have to run it!" shouted Milton above the din of the waters.
"Powell did it and so can we. Give the Ida five minutes' start, Hard.
Then profit by the mistakes you see us make. All ready, Judge and
Forr!"

Under Milton's directions, they rowed back upstream far enough to gain complete control of the boat before entering the falls. Then they shot forward. Instantly the oars became useless. They were carried upward on the crest of a wave that seemed about to drop them down an unbelievable depth to a jagged rock. But at this point, another wave seized them and hurled them sidewise, half rolled them over, then uptilted them until the Ida's nose was deep in the water.

They bailed like mad but to little avail for the waves broke over the sides constantly. They could see little for the air was full of blinding spray. Suddenly, after what had seemed an eternity but was really five minutes of time, there was a rending crash and the Ida slid into quieter water, turning completely over as she did so.

Enoch, as the sucking current seized him, was convinced that his hour had come, and a quick relief was his first sensation. Then Diana's wistful eyes flashed before him and he began to fight the Colorado. As his head emerged from the water, he saw the Na-che land on all fours from the top of a wave upon the overturned Ida, then whirl away. He began to swim with all his strength. The mud forever suspended in the Colorado weighed down his clothing. But little by little he drew near the Ida, to which he could see two dark bodies clinging. The Na-che, struggling to cross a whirlpool toward him, made slow progress. He had, indeed, dizzily grasped the Ida, before the other boat came up.

"We can hang on, Hard!" gasped Milton. "Give us a tow to that sand spit yonder."

They reached the sand spit and staggered to land, while Harden and his crew turned the Ida over and beached her. She had a six-inch gap in her side.

"Well," panted Enoch, "I'm glad we managed to keep dry during the rainstorm!"

"My Lord, Judge!" exclaimed Milton, "your own mother wouldn't own you now! I don't see how one human being could carry so much mud on his face!"

"I'll bet it's not as bad as yours at that," returned Enoch. "Jonas, as long as it's not the Na-che that's hurt—"

"Coming, boss, coming!" cried Jonas. "Here's your moccasins and here's your suit. Sure you aren't hurt any?"

"Jonas," replied Enoch in a low voice that the others might not hear,
"Jonas, I'm having the greatest time of my life!"

"So am I, Mr. Secretary! Honest, I'm so paralyzed afraid that I enjoy it!" And Jonas hurried away to inspect the Ida.

It was so biting cold, now that the afternoon was late, that all the wrecked crew changed clothing before attempting to make camp or unload the Ida.

"How many miles have we made by this venture, Milton?" called Enoch, as he pulled on his moccasins.

"One and a half!"

Enoch grinned, then he began to laugh. The others looked at him, then joined him, and Homeric laughter echoed for a long minute above the snarl of the water. Fortunately the hole in the Ida did not open into one of the compartments, so there was no damage done to the baggage. It was too dark by the time this had been ascertained to attempt repairs that night, so Milton agreed to call it a day, and after supper was over every one but Enoch and Milton went to bed. These two sat long in silence before the fire, smoking and enjoying the sense of companionship that was developing between them. Finally Enoch spoke in a low voice:

"You're going to have trouble between Forrester and Harden."

"It certainly looks like it, I've tried every sort of appeal to each of them, but trouble keeps on smoldering." Milton shook his head. "That's one of the trivial things that can wreck an expedition like this; just incompatibility among the men. What would you do about it, Judge?"

"I'd put it to them that they could either keep the peace or draw lots to see which of them should leave the expedition at the Ferry. In fact, I don't believe I'd temporize even that much. I'd certainly set one of them ashore. My experience with men leads me to believe that with a certain type of men, there is no appeal. As you say, they're both nice chaps but they have a childish streak in them. The majority of men have. A leader must not be too patient."

"You're right," agreed Milton. "Judge, couldn't you complete the trip with us?"

"How long will you be out?" asked Enoch.

"Another six months!"

Enoch laughed, then said slowly: "There's nothing I'd like to do better, but I must go home, from the Ferry."

Milton gazed at Enoch for a time without speaking. Then he said, a little wistfully, "I suppose that while this is the most important experience so far in my life, to you it is the merest episode, that you'll forget the moment you get into the Pullman for the East."

"Why should you think that?" asked Enoch.

"I can't quite tell you why. But there's something about you that makes me believe that in your own section of the country, you're a power. Perhaps it's merely your facial expression. I don't know—you look like some one whom I can't recall. Perhaps that some one has the power and I confuse the two of you, but—I beg your pardon, Judge!" as Enoch's eyebrows went up.

"You have nothing to beg it for, Milton. But you're wrong when you think this trip is merely an episode to me. All my life I have longed for just such an experience in the Canyon. It's like enchantment to really find myself here."

Milton smiled. "Well, we all have our Carcasonnes."

"What's yours?" demanded Enoch.

The younger man hesitated. "It's so absurd—but—well, I've always wanted to be Chief of the Geological Survey."

"Why?"

"Why did you dream of a wild trip down the Colorado as the realization of your greatest desire?" asked Milton.

"I couldn't put it into words," answered Enoch. "But I suppose it's the pioneer in me or something elemental that never quite dies in any of us, of Anglo-Saxon blood."

Milton nodded. "The Chief of the Geological Survey's job is to administer nature in the raw. I'd like to have a chance at it."

"I believe you'd get away with it, too, Milton," Enoch replied thoughtfully.

Milton laughed. "Too bad you aren't Secretary of the Interior! Well,
I'm all in! Let's go to bed."

"You go ahead. I'll sit here with my pipe a bit longer."

But, after all, Enoch did not write in his diary that night. Before
Milton had established himself in his blankets, Harden rose and went to
a canteen for a drink of water. On his return he stumbled over
Forrester's feet. Instantly Forrester sat erect.

"What're you doing, you clumsy dub foot?" he shouted.

"Oh, dry up, Forr; I didn't mean to hurt you, you great boob!"

"We'll settle this right now!" Forrester was on his feet and his fist had landed on Harden's cheek before Enoch could cross the camp. And before he or Milton could separate the combatants, Harden had returned the blow with interest, and with a muttered:

"Take that, you sore-headed dog, you!"

Forrester tried to twist away from Enoch, but could not do so. Harden freed himself from Milton's grasp, but did not attempt to go on with the fight.

"One or the other of you," said Milton briefly, "leaves the expedition at the Ferry. I'll tell you later which it will be. I'm ashamed of both of you."

"I'd like to know what's made a tin god of you, Jim Milton!" shouted Forrester. "You don't own us, body and soul. I've been in the Survey longer than you! I joined this expedition before you did. And I'll leave it when I get ready!"

"You'll leave it at the Ferry, Forrester!" Milton's voice was quiet, but his nostrils dilated.

"And I'm telling you, I'll leave it when I please, which will be at
Needles! If any one goes, it'll be that skunk of a Harden."

Harden laughed, turned on his heel and deliberately rolled himself in his blankets. Forrester stood for a moment, muttering to himself, then he took his blankets off to an obscure corner of the sand. And Enoch forgot his diary and went to bed, to ponder until shortly sleep overtook him, on the perversity of the male animal.

In the morning Jonas constituted himself ship's carpenter and mended the Ida very creditably. Forrester was surly and avoided every one. Harden was cheerful, as usual, but did not speak to his adversary. The sun was just entering the Canyon when the two boats were launched and once more faced the hazards of the river.

During the morning the going was easy. The river was swift and led through a long series of broken buttes, between which one caught wild views of a tortured country; twisted strata, strange distorted cedar and cactus, uncanny shapes of rock pinnacles, in colors somber and strange. They stopped at noon in the shadow of a weathered overhanging rock, with the profile of a witch. The atmosphere of dissension had by this time permeated the crew and this meal, usually so jovial, was eaten with no general conversation and all were glad to take to the boats as soon as the dishes were washed.

The character of the river now changed again. It grew broader and once more smooth canyon walls closed it in. As the river broadened, however, it became more shallow and rocks began to appear above the surface at more and more frequent intervals. At last the Na-che went aground amid-stream on a sharp rock. The Ida turned back to her assistance but Enoch and Milton had to go overboard, along with the crew of the Na-che, in order to drag and lift her into clear water. Then for nearly two hours, all thought of rowing must be given up. Both crews remained in the water, pushing the boats over the rough bottom.

It was heartbreaking work. For a few moments the boats would float, plunging the men beyond their depths. They would swim and flounder perhaps a boat's length, clinging to the gunwale, before the boat would once more run aground. Again they would drag their clumsy burden a hundred yards over sand that sucked hungrily at their sodden boots. This passed, came many yards of smooth rock a few inches below the surface of the water, which was so muddy that it was impossible to see the pot holes into which some one of the crew plunged constantly.

Jonas suffered agonies during this period; not for himself, though he took his full share of falls. His agony was for the Na-che, whose freshly painted bottom was abraded, scraped, gorged and otherwise defaced almost beyond Jonas's power of endurance.

"Look out! Don't drag her! Lift her! Lift her!" he would shout. "Oh, my Lord, see that sharp rock you drag her onto, Mr. Hard! Ain't you got any heart?"

Once, when all three of the Na-che's crew had taken a bad plunge, and Jonas had come up with an audible crack of his black head against the gunwale, he began to scold while the others were still fighting for breath.

"You shouldn't ship her full of water like that! All that good paint I put on her insides is gone! Hey, Mr. Agnew, don't drip that blood off your hand on her!"

"Shut up, Jonas," coughed Agnew good-naturedly.

"Let him alone, Ag!" exclaimed Harden, between a strangling cough and a sneeze. "What do you want to divulge your cold-heartedness for? Go to it, Jonas! You're some lover, all right!"

The shallows ended in a rapid which they shot without more than the usual difficulties. They then had an hour of quiet rowing through gorges that grew more narrow and more dusky as they proceeded. About four o'clock snow began to fall. It was a light enough powder, at first, but shortly it thickened until it was impossible to guide the boats. They edged in shore where a ledge overhanging a heap of broken rock offered a meager shelter. Here they planned to spend the night. The shore was too precipitous to beach the boats. Much to Jonas' sorrow, they could only anchor them before the ledge. There was plenty of driftwood, and a brisk fire dispelled some of the discomfort of the snow, while a change to dry clothing did the rest.

To Enoch it was a strange evening. The foolish quarrel between Harden and Forrester was sufficient to upset the equanimity of the whole group which before had seemed so harmonious. The situation was keenly irritating to Enoch. He wanted nothing to intrude on the wild beauty of the trip, save his own inward struggle. The snow continued to fall long after the others had gone to sleep. Enoch, with his diary on his knees, wrote slowly, pausing long between sentences to watch the snow and to listen to the solemn rush of waters so close to his feet.

"I've been sitting before the fire, Diana, thinking of our various conversations. How few they have been, after all! And I've concluded that in your heart you must look on me as presumptuous and stupid. You never have given me the slightest indication that you cared for me. You have been, even in the short time we have known each other, a gallant and tender friend. A wonderful friend! And you are as unconscious of my passion for you, of the rending agony of my giving you up as the Canyon is of the travail of Milton and his little group. And I'm glad that this is so. If I can go on through life feeling that you are serene and happy it will help me to keep my secret. Strange that with every natural inclination within me to be otherwise, I should be the custodian of ugly secrets; secrets that are only the uglier because they are my own. It seems a sacrilegious thing to add my beautiful love for you to the sinister collection. But it must be so.

"I am so glad that I am going to see you so soon after I emerge from the Canyon. There will be much to tell you. I thought I knew men. But I am learning them anew. And I thought I had a fair conception of the wonders of the Colorado. Diana, it is beyond human imagination to conceive or human tongue to describe."

Enoch had looked forward with eager pleasure to seeing the Canyon snowbound. But he was doomed to disappointment. During the night the snow turned to rain. The rain, in turn, ceased before dawn and the camp woke to winding mists that whirled with the wind up and out of the Canyon top. The going, during the morning, offered no great difficulties. But toward noon, as the boats rounded a curve, a reef presented itself with the water of the river boiling threateningly on either side. As the Canyon walls offered no landing it was necessary to make one here and Forrester volunteered to jump with a rope to a flat rock which projected from the near end of the reef.

"Leap just before we are opposite the rock, Forr," directed Milton. "When that rough water catches us, we're going to rip through at top speed."

Forrester nodded and, after shipping his oars, he clambered up onto the forward compartment.

"Now," shouted Milton.

Forrester leaped, jumped a little short, and splashed into the boiling river. The Ida, in spite of Enoch madly backing water, shot forward, dragging Forrester, who had not let go the rope, with her. Milton relinquished the steering oar, dropped on his stomach on the compartment deck, his arms over the stern, and began to haul with might and main on the rope. Now and again Forrester, red and fighting for breath, showed a distorted face above the waves. The Na-che shot by at uncontrollable speed, her crew shouting directions as she passed. Milton at last, just as the Ida entered a roaring fall, brought Forrester to the gunwale, but having achieved this, the end of the rope dropped from his fingers and he lay inert, his eyes closed. Forrester clung to the edge of the boat and roared to Enoch:

"Milt's fainted!"

But Enoch, fighting to guide the Ida, dared not stop rowing. The falls were short, with a vicious whirlpool at the foot. One glance showed the Na-che broken and inverted, dancing in this. Enoch bent to his right oar and by a miracle of luck this, with a wave from a pot hole, threw them clear of the sucking whirlpool, but dashed them so violently against the rocky shore that the Ida's stern was stove in and Milton rolled off into the water. Enoch dropped his oars, seized the stern rope, jumped for the rocks and sprawled upon one. He made a quick turn of the rope, then leaped back for Milton, whose head showed a boat's length downstream.

Forrester staggered ashore, then with a life preserver on the end of a rope, he started along the river's edge. Half a dozen strokes brought Enoch to Milton. He lifted the unconscious man's mouth out of water and caught the life preserver that Forrester threw him. It seemed for a moment as if poor Forrester had reached the limit of his strength, but Enoch, after a violent effort, brought Milton into a quiet eddy and here Forrester was able to give help and Milton was dragged up on the rocks.

At this moment, Jonas, his eyes rolling, clothes torn and dripping, clambered round a rocky projection, just beyond where they were placing Milton.

"Got 'em ashore!" he panted, "but they can't walk yet."

"Anybody hurt?" asked Enoch.

"Nobody but the Na-che. I gotta take the Ida out after her."

"She's beyond help, Jonas," said Enoch. "Go up to the Ida and bring me the medicine chest."

He was unbuttoning Milton's shirt as he spoke, and feeling for his heart.

"He's alive!" exclaimed Forrester, who was holding Milton's wrist.

"Yes, thank God! But I don't like that!" pointing to Milton's left leg.

"It's broken!" cried Forrester. "Poor old Milt!"

Poor old Milt, indeed! When he finally opened his eyes, he was lying on his blankets on a flat rock, and Jonas and Harden, still dripping, were finishing the fastenings of a rude splint around his left leg. Enoch was kindling a fire. Forrester and Agnew were unloading the Ida. He tried to sit up.

"What the deuce happened?" he demanded.

"That's what we want to know!" exclaimed Harden cheerfully.

"You had a dizzy attack after you pulled Forr in," said Enoch, "and rolled off the boat. Just how you broke your leg, we don't know."

"Broke my leg!" Dismay and disbelief struggled in Milton's face.
"Broke my leg! Why, but I can't break my leg!"

"That's good news," said Agnew unsmilingly, "and it would be important if it were only true."

"But I can't!" insisted Milton. "What becomes of the work?"

"The work stops till you get well." Harden stood up to survey his and Jonas's surgical job with considerable satisfaction. "We'll hurry on down to the Ferry and get you to a doctor."

Milton sank back with a groan, then hoisted himself to his elbow to say:

"You fellows change your clothes quick, now."

The men looked at each other, half guilty.

"What is it!" cried Milton. "What are you keeping from me."

"The Na-che's gone!" Jonas spoke huskily.

"How'd she go?" demanded Milton.

"A sucking whirlpool up there took her, after we struck a rock at the bottom of the falls," answered Harden. "We struck at such speed that it stove in her bottom and threw us clear of the whirlpool. But she's gone and everything in her."

"How about the Ida?" Milton's face was white and his lips were compressed.

"She'll do, with some patching," replied Enoch.

"Some leader, I am, eh?" Milton lay back on his blanket.

"I think I've heard of a number of other leaders losing boats on this trip," said Enoch. "Now, you fellows can dry off piecemeal. This fire would dry anything. We've got to shift Milton's clothes somehow. Lucky for you your clothes were in the Ida, Milt. Mine were in the Na-che."

"And two thirds of the grub in the Na-che, too!" exclaimed Agnew.

Jonas had rooted out Milton's change of clothing and very tenderly, if awkwardly, Agnew and Harden helping, he was made dry and propped up where he could direct proceedings.

"Forrester, I wish you'd bring the whole grub supply here," Milton said, when his nurses had finished.

It was a pitifully small collection that was placed on the edge of the blanket.

"I wonder how many times," said Milton, "I've told you chaps to load the grub half and half between the boats? Somebody blundered. I'm not going to ask who because I'm the chief blunderer myself, for neglecting to check you over, at every loading. With care, we've about two days' very scanty rations here, and only beans and coffee, at that. With the best of luck and no stops for Survey work we're five days from the Ferry."

"Guess I'd better get busy with my fishing tackle!" exclaimed Forrester.

"Ain't any fishing tackle," said Jonas succinctly. "She must 'a' washed out of the hole in the Ida. I was just looking for it myself."

"Suppose you put us on half rations," suggested Enoch, "and one of us will try to get to the top, with the gun."

Milton nodded. "Judge, are you any good with a gun?"

"Yes, I've hunted a good deal," replied Enoch.

"Very well, we'll make you the camp hunter. The rest understand the river work better than you. Forrester, you and Agnew and Jonas, patch up the Ida; and Harden, you stay with me and let's see what the maps say about the chances of our getting out before we reach the Ferry. When the rest have finished the patch, you and Agnew row downstream and see if you can pick up any wreckage from the Na-che."

Jonas made some coffee and Enoch, after resting for a half hour, took the gun and started slowly along the river's edge.

His course was necessarily downstream for, above the heap of stones where he had tied the Ida, the river washed against a wall on which a fly could scarcely have found foothold. There was a depression in the wall, where the camp was set. Enoch worked out of this depression and found a foothold on the bottom-most of the deep weathered, narrow strata that here formed a fifty-foot terrace. These terraced strata gave back for half a mile in uneven and brittle striations that were not unlike rude steps. Above them rose a sheer orange wall, straight to the sky. Far below a great shale bank sloped from the river's edge up to a gigantic black butte, whose terraced front seemed to Enoch to offer some hope of his reaching the top.

He slung the gun across his back and began gingerly to clamber along the stratified terrace. He found the rock extremely brittle and he was a long hour reaching the green shale. He was panting and weary and his hands were bleeding when he finally flung himself down to rest at the foot of the black butte.

A near view of this massive structure was not encouraging; terraces, turrets, fortifications, castles and above Enoch's head a deep cavern, out of which the wind rushed with a mighty blast of sound that drowned the sullen roar of the falls. Beyond a glance in at the black void, Enoch did not attempt to investigate the cave. He crept past the opening on a narrow shelf of rock, into a crevice up which he climbed to the top of the terrace above the cavern. Here a stratum of dull purple projected horizontally from the black face of the butte. With his face inward, his breast hard pressed against the rock, hands and feet feeling carefully for each shift forward, Enoch passed on this slowly around the sharp western edge of the butte.

Here he nearly lost his balance, for there was a rush of wings close to the back of his head. He started, then looked up carefully. Far above him an eagle's nest clung to the lonely rock. The purple stratum continued its way to a depression wide enough to give Enoch sitting room. Here he rested for a short moment. The back of the depression offered an easy assent for two or three hundred feet, to the top of another terrace along whose broad top Enoch walked comfortably for a quarter of a mile to the point where the butte projected from the main canyon wall. The slope here was not too steep to climb and Enoch made fair speed to the top.

The view here was superb but Enoch gave small heed to this. To his deep disappointment, there was no sign of life, either animal or vegetable, as far as his eye could reach. He stood, gun in hand, the wind tossing his ruddy hair, his great shoulders drooping with weariness, his keen eyes sweeping the landscape until he became conscious that the sun was low in the west. With a start, he realized that dusk must already be peering into the bottom of the Canyon.

Then he bethought himself of the eagle's nest. It was a terrible climb, before he lay on a ledge peering ever into the guano-stained structure of sticks from which the eagle soared again at his approach. As he looked, he laughed. The forequarters of a mountain goat lay in the nest. Hanging perilously by one hand, Enoch grasped the long, bloody hair and then, rolling back on to the ledge, he stuffed his loot into his game bag and started campward.

The way back was swifter but more nerve wracking than the upward climb had been. By the time he reached the green shale, Enoch was trembling from muscle and nerve strain. It was purple dusk now, by the river, with the castellated tops of butte and mountain molten gold in the evening sun. When he reached the brittle strata, the water reflected firelight from the still unseen camp blaze. Enoch, clinging perilously to the breaking rock, half faint with hunger, his fingers numb with the cold, laughed again, to himself, and said aloud:

"'. . . . . . . . . . . . . And yet
Dauntless the slug horn to my lips I set
And blew, Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came.'"