General Crook and the Fighting Apaches / Treating Also of the Part Borne by Jimmie Dunn in the days, 1871-1886, When With Soldiers and Pack-trains and Indian Scouts, but Employing the Stronger Weapons of Kindness, Firmness and Honesty, the Gray Fox Worked Hard to the End That the White Men and the Red Men in the Southwest as in the Northwest Might Better Understand One Another

by Edwin L. Sabin

Next, Lieutenant Ross continued, with Archie and Joe and Nan-ta-je, a dozen cavalrymen and the packers Jack Long, Jim O’Neill, Long Jim Cook, Frank Monach, Slim Shorty—dead shots all, and fine Indian fighters. Nan-ta-je led.

Captain Burns and Lieutenant Thomas, with their cavalrymen and most of the Pimas, branched off on the back trail of the pony herd, to the southeast. More Yavapai might be coming, from that direction, with other booty.

The remainder of the column followed Lieutenant Ross. The White Mountains had dropped their blankets about their waists, as if clearing for action. Their faces were set alert, their nostrils flared, they were straining every sense, to detect more “sign.” Micky pointed downward; underfoot was a regular trail, disclosed in the gray light.

Their carbines and rifles at a trail, the Lieutenant Ross detachment, led by Nan-ta-je, with Archie and Joe at his heels, had dipped out of sight, as if over an edge. The last one of them disappeared. The faint roar of rapid waters sounded.

“Canyon of Salt River there,” whispered Micky. “Yavapai cave, too.”

The crack of the canyon began to open—across were the opposite walls. Cold mist was floating up. The trail conducted to the canyon, and down. Major Brown and Captain Taylor and Lieutenant Bourke, with Tony Besias the interpreter, Chief Big Mouth and others went forward to peer in. As the column bunched, everybody tried to peer in. Micky craned forward, with the scouts—he and Alchisé and Bobby Do-klinny; Jimmie edged on; they all might look over the rim, for the officers were as curious as the rest.

The roar of the waters rose louder. The river was far down, hundreds of feet, at the bottom of a long crooked gorge with precipice walls. Icicles hung from the crags. The trail entered, here, and clinging to the niches and wearing away the sod of the few flat spots snaked at a diagonal until, descending, it rounded a shoulder one hundred yards below the rim, where the mists were wreathing.

It was as steep as the trail down which those Tontos had scampered, into the Tonto Basin! Nobody was on it. The Ross party had gone.

“Mescal,” whispered Micky, sniffing. All the scouts were sniffing. A sweetish scent was in the air, as if welling from below.