Captives of the Desert. Zane Grey
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saddles, you know sure as life they’re figuring they have the best of the bargain. And they have. A horse can get where a car can’t. Sure, he may break a leg when he’s traveling, but if he’s your own you’d just as soon starve to death right there anyway.”
“You know how that hurts, don’t you, Mr. Curry?” said Mary softly.
“You bet I do!”
For a moment Katharine was perplexed. There was a strange import in the look that flashed between her seatmates on their exchange of words, an incident that led her to believe they shared something more than a casual acquaintance—an experience, perhaps. Her conjecture seemed trivial, but she wanted to justify their amity. It came to Katharine then that the imperturbable Wilbur had been stirred to an unusual vehemence of speech when he mentioned Curry to his wife.
Katharine fell suddenly thoughtful. She stared out into the dusk. A mellow glow pervaded. There would be no severe blackness such as she had experienced early in her visit at Taho. The desert was a pale-tinted opal in moonlight, gently tenacious of the radiance of day. Everywhere shadows were fleeing before the goddess of the night. One lone star twinkled above the blue-black rim of the world. Katharine found herself listening to silence—an intense silence that seemed to muffle the sound of the car. Was it through such a silence as this that one could hear the voice of God? She thought of the prophets of old who went to the wilderness to commune with God. How terrifying to think of one small soul alone with the Creator—not alone as in prayer, but mute, voiceless, waiting for His word! Did anyone really ever seek such an experience? She, herself, would have fled from it. She was grateful not to be alone in this silence, so alone that there would be only God. . . . She stole furtive glances at her companions. Suppose they could read her thoughts! How puerile they would seem! . . . Nothing could change the silence—it hovered heavily over the desert night. Her companions, too, had become part of it.
Finally Curry spoke, breaking a long lull. “You’ll be a little skeery crossing Canyon Diablo, Miss Winfield. We make automobiles do funny things in this country. We’ve got to.”
“Scare me if you can!” said Katharine. “Bring on your old canyon!”
Curry laughed so heartily that one of the ladies burst out with a nervous “What was that?”
“We have a young lady along who’s sure enthusiastic about that canyon I was hoping we’d make before sunset,” explained Curry. “She’s all primed for a fight.”
“For a fright, you mean,” retorted Katharine. “I don’t feel as brave as I sound.”
“Better grit your teeth then, she’s a-comin’!”
“Where? I don’t see anything.”
“You will as soon as we cover this rise.”
Katharine studied the trail. Could it be that close beyond the gentle rise of ground a canyon yawned? She leaned forward expectantly. They sped along through the silent, mysterious night—pale night, yellow night, ghostly night. Star-gleam ahead, and the canyon! They came upon it soon, a jagged black gulf, a pit of darkness over which they seemed to hang. Light caught slantwise from the moon penetrated part way down the opposite wall, and below was naked gloom. Devil’s Canyon, indeed!
“We’re going down into that—with this car!” exclaimed Katharine incredulously.
“We are, or we’ll never make Leupp till bridge builders get out here!” replied Curry stoutly. “You’ll get shaken up some.”
Katharine braced her feet, a perilous performance in itself, with the emergency brake so close, and spread her arms behind Curry and Mary to get a strong hold from the rear. Mary sat in perfect relaxation. Canyons had no terrors for her.
Strong headlights made the tortuous trail visible over a short area, but below yawned the bottomless black pit. And black walls loomed suddenly before them. From these, they turned and rode on through their shadows, only to meet others, leaning, towering. The automobile pitched and swung and shook, and brakes groaned. Katharine felt as if she were falling, slipping down into the dark abyss. They rode at a perilous angle, fretting their way between rock and boulder in perilous descent. They were subjected to about fifteen minutes of this before the car swung around with a tremendous shake and slid out on a level place where Curry shut down hard on the brakes. A gasp of relief escaped Katharine.
“And now that we’ve come this far, what are we going to do?” she asked.
“Climb out, goose,” returned Mary.
“You can get out of the car and stretch, if you like,” Curry informed her. “I’m walking up a little way to look over a piece of that trail. Sometimes 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.”