A STORY OF NORTHERN ARIZONA.
BY KIRK MUNROE,
Author of "Rick Dale," "The Fur-Seal's Tooth," "Snow-Shoes and Sledges," "The Mate Series," etc.
CHAPTER I.
A DESERT PICTURE.
As far as the eye could see, and for leagues beyond the reach of vision, one of the most wonderful landscapes of the world was outspread in every direction. Castles of massive build with battlemented towers, Greek temples, slender spires, columns, arches, and walled cities with lofty buildings rising tier above tier met the view on every side. Not only were these structures of the most graceful modelling, but they were of such a brilliancy and variety of coloring as may only be seen in that land of wonders. While the prevailing tints were red or crimson, these were toned and contrasted with every shade of yellow from orange to buff, by greens, purples, and pinks, white, brown, and in fact every variety and combination of color known to nature. Some of the slender columns were even frosted as with silver, while others were surmounted by groups of statuary.
Broad avenues wound in and out among these gaudily tinted structures, and from them wide terraces—red, yellow, pink, or white—swept back and up smooth and regular, as though built of squared marble blocks. Apparently interspersed among these beautiful objects were shady groves, blue lakes, rippling streams, and cool, snow-capped mountains; but these were of such a curious nature that they came and went like the moving pictures of a vitascope. Even the solid objects that one might be certain were real were so sharply reflected in the heated atmosphere above them that it was impossible to discern where substance ended and its pictured counterfeit began.
In thorough keeping with these wonders was another close at hand, which was the strangest of all. It was nothing more nor less than a forest of prostrate trees lying in the wildest confusion, as though levelled by a hurricane. Although they were broken and scattered over a wide area, everything was there to prove that they had once been of vigorous growth and noble proportions. Great trunks, limbs, branches, and even twigs, many of them still retaining their covering of bark, were strewn on every side; but all, even to the tiniest sliver, were turned into stone. Not ordinary gray stone such as appears in the more common fossil forms, but stone of the most exquisite color and shading, such as red jasper, clouded agate, opalescent chalcedony, shaded carnelian, or banded onyx. These substances are deemed precious even in the palace of a Czar, but here they appeared in greatest profusion, many of them retaining so clearly the markings and general aspect of wood that they could not be mistaken for anything else. It was a fossil forest of what had been in some dimly remote geologic age stately pine-trees, with waving tops and whispering branches, perhaps filled with joyous birds, and sheltering the strange animal life of a prehistoric world.
Now all was silent and motionless, with no more sign of life among the fossil trees or their gorgeous surroundings than if the whole region lay beneath the spell of some evil magic. Not a blade of grass was to be seen, nor a living green thing of any kind. There was no sound of running waters, nor of birds, nor of human activity. A sky of pale blue arched overhead, and from it the sun poured down a parching heat that rose in glimmering waves above tower and turret, battlement and spire.
These things are not imaginary, nor are they located in some remote and unheard-of corner of the world, but they exist to-day right here in our own land, as terribly beautiful and changeless at the close of the nineteenth century as they were when first seen by a European nearly four hundred years ago. They are the same as when the long-vanished cliff-dwellers roamed amid their wonders, and gazed on them with reverent awe ages before history began, for this is the Painted Desert of Arizona. It is a region almost as little known as the deserts of the moon, and one shunned with superstitious dread by the Indian tribes who dwell on its borders as a place of departed spirits. So desolate is it, and so void of life or the means of sustaining life, that not more than a score of white men have ever gazed on its marvels and lived to tell of them. It is a place to be avoided by all men, and yet we must penetrate to its very heart, for there, with the opening of this story, shall we find our hero.
He is a boy not more than seventeen years of age, seated on a fossil tree trunk that, turned into jasper, resembles a huge stick of red sealing-wax, and he is gazing with despairing eyes at the terrors by which he is surrounded. Beside him, with drooping head, stands a clean-limbed pony, bridled and saddled. A rifle, a roll of blankets, a picket-rope, and a canteen are attached to the saddle, and one of the boy's arms is slipped through the bridle-rein. He is clad in a gray flannel shirt, a pair of blue army trousers that are protected to the knees by fringed buck-skin leggings, a broad-brimmed white sombrero, and well-worn walking-shoes. A silk handkerchief is loosely knotted about his neck, and a belt of cartridges, from which also depends a hunting-knife, is buckled about his waist.
The lad's name is Todd Chalmers, his home is in Baltimore, and on the day before our introduction to him he was a member of a well-equipped scientific expedition that was traversing the valley of the Colorado Chiquito in the interests of a great Eastern college. Mortimer Chalmers, Todd's elder and only brother, and a distinguished geologist, is in charge of the expedition. Our lad, who is an honest, well-meaning fellow, but of an adventurous disposition and extremely impatient of control, had never been West until now, and only by persistent effort had he induced his brother to allow him to accompany his exploring party and remain with it during the long summer vacation. Three-fourths of the journey to their point of destination had been made by rail, and only ten days have elapsed since the party left the cars at Holbrook, where they purchased an equipment of pack and saddle animals. From there they set forth on their independent progress into the wild regions of the Colorado Chiquito, whose valley bounds the Painted Desert on the south.
For a few days, or until the first novelty of this new life wore off, all went well with Todd, who proved obedient to orders and attentive to the duties devolving upon him. Then came trouble. One of the party left camp on a private hunting expedition, became lost, and was only found after a long delay and much organized searching. To provide against further accidents of a similar nature, Mortimer Chalmers ordered that thereafter no member of the party should stroll alone more than one hundred yards from camp, or from the pack-train when it was in motion, without receiving permission from him.
Now Todd was passionately fond of hunting, and, as already stated, was impatient of restraint. He had anticipated unrestricted opportunities for indulging in his favorite sport on this expedition. At the same time not being a paid member of the party he did not feel bound in quite the same way as the others to obey the orders of one whom he regarded with the familiarity of a brother rather than with the respect due one in authority. Therefore the order regarding hunting had hardly been issued before he disobeyed it by galloping half a mile from the pack-train in pursuit of a jack-rabbit, which he finally got, and with which he returned in triumph.
In answer to his brother's query why he had thus disobeyed orders, the boy replied that he did not suppose that particular order applied to him, and that at any rate he was perfectly well able to take care of himself.
"Do you mean, Todd, that you intend to continue in your disobedience of orders?" asked the chief of party, sternly.
"Certainly not, when they are reasonable," answered the lad, flushing at the other's tone. "But you know, Mort, I came out here especially for the hunting, and it does seem rather hard—"
"No matter how it seems," interrupted the other. "I asked you if you intended to continue in your disobedience of my orders."
"And I gave you my answer," replied Todd.
"Which means that you propose to pass your own judgment on them, and then obey them or not, as seems to you best?"
"You can think as you please about it," retorted the other, angrily. "I know, though, that I am not going to submit to being treated like a child by my own brother just because he happens to be a few years older than I am."
"Very well," replied the chief of party, calmly; "unless you will promise implicit obedience to any order I may see fit to issue for the welfare of the party, I shall disarm you, at the same time forbidding you to borrow any other rifle or go upon any sort of a hunting expedition until you do promise what I ask."
"I certainly sha'n't promise to obey any order so foolish as the one in question, and if you choose to play the tyrant, why, you can, that's all. Only remember, if anything unpleasant happens in consequence, the fault will be wholly yours." Thus saying, the lad flung himself out of the tent in which this unhappy interview had taken place, and strode angrily away.
So the boy's cherished rifle was taken from him, and, filled with mingled rage, mortification, and repentance, he passed a very unhappy night. Although impatient and quick-tempered, he was not of a sullen disposition, nor one who could long cherish anger. He was manly enough to acknowledge to himself that he was wholly in the wrong, but was too proud, or rather too cowardly—which is what so-called pride generally means—to confess his fault to his brother and ask his forgiveness.
In vain did Mortimer Chalmers gaze wistfully at his younger brother on the following morning, and long for a reconciliation. As for himself, he could not weaken his authority by showing partiality toward any one member of his party, and must be even more strict with Todd than with the others because of the relationship between them. Thus his position forbade his making the first friendly advances, and when the younger brother, assuming a careless cheerfulness that he did not feel, pointedly avoided him, the other turned to his own duties with a heavy heart.
In the early afternoon of that day, when the leader was riding at some distance in advance of his party, a small herd of black-tailed deer, alarmed by the echoes behind them, suddenly sprang from a small side cañon or ravine, halted abruptly on the edge of the bottom-land, gazed for a moment in startled terror at the strange beings not fifty yards from them, and then dashed madly back into the place whence they had come.
"Give me a shot—quick!" cried Todd to his nearest neighbor, and snatching the other's rifle as he spoke, he fired wildly at the retreating animals. Then clapping spars to his pony, he bounded after them in hot pursuit.
CHAPTER II.
TODD'S PONY BRINGS BACK THE NEWS.
Carried away by the enthusiasm and excitement of the moment, Todd did not in the least realize what he was doing, or remember that he was disobeying his brother's clearly expressed orders. He only knew that the first deer he had ever seen alive and in their native haunts were scampering away from him, and that it seemed just then as though nothing in the world could compare in importance with getting one of them.
So, bending low in the saddle and firing as he rode, he spurred his broncho pony to frantic exertions, and dashed away up the ravine after the flying animals. Several others of the party spurred after the boy as though to join in the exciting chase; but after a short run, either because they remembered their chief's orders or because they found themselves hopelessly left behind, they returned to the train, and its slow line of march was resumed.
More than five minutes elapsed after Todd was lost to view behind a sharp bend of the ravine before Mortimer Chalmers, attracted by the sound of firing, hastened back to learn the cause of disturbance. When it was explained his face darkened, though more with anxiety than anger, and he ordered the party to go into camp where they were, there to await his return. Then calling to one of the best mounted of his assistants to see that his canteen was full of water and to follow him, the chief of the party clapped spurs to his own horse, and set off up the ravine in the direction taken by his impetuous young brother.
Until nearly sunset of the following day did the party in camp await, with ever-increasing anxiety, the return of those who had thus left them. Then their leader and his companion rode wearily back into the valley. They were haggard, covered almost beyond recognition with the dust of desert sands, and utterly exhausted, while their steeds were ready to drop with thirst and fatigue.
Mortimer Chalmers's first words announced the failure of his search, for as he entered camp he asked, "Has the boy come back?" Upon being answered in the negative, a look of utter despair settled over the man's face, though he turned away to hide it from the pitying gaze of his men.
From his companion it was learned that when, on the preceding day, they had emerged from the ravine, they found themselves on a vast plain of shifting sands, void of vegetation and dotted with great fortresslike mesas or lofty bluffs of the most vivid and varied coloring. In the distance they had descried a rider whom they believed to be Todd, but though they fired their rifles and waved sombreros to attract his attention, he failed either to see them or took no notice of their signals, and a few seconds later disappeared behind a distant butte. Hastening to that point, they found and followed his trail until it was lost in the wind-blown sands. Even then they kept on in the same general direction, firing their rifles at short intervals, until darkness compelled a halt. During the long cheerless night, without fire or food, and comforted by only a few mouthfuls of water from their canteens, they still fired occasional shots, but without receiving any answer.
At daybreak they were again in the saddle and moving in a great sweeping arc that embraced many miles of the terrible desert, back toward the river. Until reaching it they had hoped against hope that the missing lad might in some way have been led back to the point from which he had started. Now, however, there was no doubt that he was indeed lost in that fearful wilderness of sand and towering rocks.
This was the opinion of the whole party; but though it was fully shared by Mortimer Chalmers, he was off again before daylight of the following morning, accompanied by five of his most experienced men. These were to explore the desert by twos in different directions, as far as their strength and that of their animals would allow them to penetrate, though on no account were they to remain from camp longer than two days.
This expedition was as fruitless as the first, and when on the second evening the six searchers returned to camp empty-handed there was no longer a doubt but that poor Todd, lost and bewildered, had wandered beyond recovery, and met his death amid the horrors of the Painted Desert.
Although there was no longer any hope that he would ever again be seen alive, the party remained encamped at that place another day before moving on, and scouts were kept constantly posted along the edge of the plateau, whence they could command a great sweep of the interior country in case any tidings of the lost one should be miraculously wafted in that direction.
Even when the sad little camp was finally broken and the expedition resumed its melancholy march down the valley of the muddy river, these same scouts followed the edge of the bluffs, though often being obliged to make long and fatiguing detours to head precipitous cañons.
In this manner the party had proceeded but a few miles when Mortimer Chalmers, who, alone with his grief and self-accusing reflections, rode in advance, was seen to suddenly clap spurs to his horse and dash off down the valley. He had discovered a riderless pony grazing on the coarse herbage of the bottom, and was filled with a momentary hope that by some means his dearly loved brother might after all have found his way back to the river.
When the others overtook him they at once recognized the animal which was cropping the tough grasses with starving avidity as the broncho that had borne Todd Chalmers from their sight six days before. Its belly was bloated with water, of which it had evidently drunk a prodigious quantity, but it was otherwise gaunt from hunger. It still wore a broken bridle, and the saddle was found at no great distance away. To this were still attached the rifle, now broken, the roll of blankets, soiled and torn, and the empty canteen, that had belonged to the poor lad, of whose fate they brought melancholy tidings. A fragment of picket-rope still remained attached to the pony's neck, but its frayed end, worn with long dragging through sand and over rocks, showed that the animal must have traversed many miles of desert since the time when last he bore his young master.
The broncho's trail was discovered and followed to the distant brow of the bluffs, but beyond that it had been obliterated by wind-swept sands, and offered no further clew.
As no one of the party would ever care to use that broken saddle, and as it was all that was left to them of the merry lad who was lost, they buried it where they found it, with all its accoutrements. When they turned silently from the little mound of earth that covered it, all felt with Mortimer Chalmers as though they were leaving the grave of his light-hearted, hot-headed, affectionate, and impetuous young brother.
And now let us see what had really become of the lad whom his recent comrades mourned so sincerely, and who we left sometime since gazing anxiously at the gaudily decked monuments of the Painted Desert.
When in his thoughtless race after the coveted prize of a black-tailed deer, Todd emerged from the ravine that led to the plateau, and gained a wide range of vision, he was sorely disappointed to see the animals he was pursuing skimming across the sands more than a mile away and approaching a tall mesa, behind which he knew they would in another moment disappear. He was about to give over the chase with a sigh of disappointment, when, to his surprise, one of the fleeing deer seemed to fall, though it almost immediately regained its feet and followed after its companions.
"Hurrah!" shouted Todd, again urging his pony to the chase. "One of them is wounded, and I'll have it yet. Mort will forgive me when I bring fresh venison into camp."
Just before reaching a rocky buttress of the mesa the lad heard shots behind him and, with a backward glance, saw two horsemen in hot pursuit. One of them he knew to be his brother, and both of them were waving to him to come back.
"I won't go without something to show for my hunt if I can help it," muttered the boy to himself, as he dashed around a corner of the rocky wall, and also disappeared from view. He had hoped to find his wounded deer there, but neither it nor the others were in sight, though he could still distinguish their tracks. Following these, he was led through a narrow and crooked valley that finally divided into several branches. The deer had taken one of these that led sharply to the right amid a confused mass of rocks.
"They are making a circuit back toward the river," thought the young hunter, "and that suits me exactly, for I shall be able to reach it and regain camp without being caught by Mort like a naughty child. That I couldn't stand, and I would rather stay out all night than submit to anything so humiliating."
Thus thinking, the lad continued to ride in the direction he thought the deer had taken, though he could no longer distinguish their tracks. Nor did he discover any sign of the wounded one, which for more than an hour he expected to do with each moment. By this time he was beginning to feel a little uneasy at not coming to the river toward which he was confident he was circling. The speed of his pony was now reduced to a walk, and Todd was greatly bewildered by the labyrinth of walls, columns, and fantastic rock forms into which he had wandered.
With the waning day the sky became overcast, and a strong wind, blowing in gusts, so shifted the desert sands, piling them into ridges and whirling their eddies, that when the boy finally determined to retrace his own trail he found, to his dismay, that even a few paces behind him it had wholly disappeared. At this discovery the terrible knowledge that he was lost came into his mind like a flash, and for a full minute he sat stunned and motionless.
Then he pulled himself together, laughed huskily, and said aloud: "Don't lose your head, old man. Keep cool. Camp right where you are until daylight, and then climb the highest point you can find. From it you will surely be able to get your bearings, for the river can't be more than a mile away."