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
