The sullen note returned to Nucky's voice. "I wouldn't harm 'em!"
"No, I'll bet you wouldn't!" returned Allen succinctly.
Nucky turned to stare into the Canyon. It seemed to the guide that it was a full five minutes that the boy gazed into the drifting depths before he turned with a smile that was as ingenuous as it was wistful.
"Frank, I guess I made an awful dirty fool of myself! I—I can't like 'em, but I'll take your word that lots of 'em are good. And nobody will ever hear me sling mud at 'em again, so help me God—and the Canyon!"
Frank silently held out his hand and Nucky grasped it. Then the guide said, "You'd better go to bed again as soon as you've eaten your supper. By to-morrow you'll be feeling like a short trip down Bright Angel. Good-night, old top!"
When Nucky came out of the hotel door the next morning, Frank, with a cavalcade of mules, was waiting for him. But he was not alone. Seated on a small mule was a little girl of five or six.
"Enoch," said Frank, "this is my daughter, Diana. She is going down the trail with us."
Nucky gravely doffed his hat, and the little girl laughed, showing two front teeth missing and a charming dimple.
"You've got red hair!" she cried.
Nucky grunted, and mounted his mule.