"Fay, he means he killed the Mormon," said Shefford. "He must have, for _I_ did not!"
"Ah!" murmured Fay, and she leaned to him with pa.s.sionate, quivering gladness. It was the woman--the human--the soul born in her that came uppermost then; now, when there was no direct call to the wild and elemental in her nature, she showed a heart above revenge, the instinct of a saving right, of truth as Shefford knew them. He took her into his arms and never had he loved her so well.
"Nas Ta Bega, you killed the Mormon," declared Shefford, with a voice that had gained strength. No silent Indian suggestion of a deed would suffice in that moment. Shefford needed to hear the Navajo speak--to have Fay hear him speak. "Nas Ta Bega, I know I understand. But tell her. Speak so she will know. Tell it as a white man would!"
"I heard her cry out," replied the Indian, in his slow English. "I waited. When he came I killed him."
A poignant why was wrenched from Shefford. Nas Ta Bega stood silent.
"BI NAI!" And when that sonorous Indian name rolled in dignity from his lips he silently stalked away into the gloom. That was his answer to the white man.
Shefford bent over Fay, and as the strain on him broke he held her closer and closer and his tears streamed down and his voice broke in exclamations of tenderness and thanksgiving. It did not matter what she had thought, but she must never know what he had thought. He clasped her as something precious he had lost and regained. He was shaken with a pa.s.sion of remorse. How could he have believed Fay Larkin guilty of murder? Women less wild and less justified than she had been driven to such a deed, yet how could he have believed it of her, when for two days he had been with her, had seen her face, and deep into her eyes? There was mystery in his very blindness. He cast the whole thought from him for ever. There was no shadow between Fay and him. He had found her.
He had saved her. She was free. She was innocent. And suddenly, as he seemed delivered from contending tumults within, he became aware that it was no unresponsive creature he had folded to his breast.
He became suddenly alive to the warm, throbbing contact of her bosom, to her strong arms clinging round his neck, to her closed eyes, to the rapt whiteness of her face. And he bent to cold lips that seemed to receive his first kisses as new and strange; but tremulously changed, at last to meet his own, and then to burn with sweet and thrilling fire.
"My darling, my dream"s come true," he said. "You are my treasure. I found you here at the foot of the rainbow!... What if it is a stone rainbow--if all is not as I had dreamed? I followed a gleam. And it"s led me to love and faith!"
Hours afterward Shefford walked alone to and fro under the bridge. His trouble had given place to serenity. But this night of nights he must live out wide-eyed to its end.
The moon had long since crossed the streak of star-fired blue above and the canon was black in shadow. At times a current of wind, with all the strangeness of that strange country in its hollow moan, rushed through the great stone arch. At other times there was silence such as Shefford imagined dwelt deep under this rocky world. At still other times an owl hooted, and the sound was nameless. But it had a mocking echo that never ended. An echo of night, silence, gloom, melancholy death, age, eternity!
The Indian lay asleep with his dark face upturned, and the other sleepers lay calm and white in the starlight.
Shefford saw in them the meaning of life and the past--the illimitable train of faces that had shone the stars. There was a spirit in the canon, and whether or not it was what the Navajo embodied in the great Nonnezoshe, or the life of this present, or the death of the ages, or the nature so magnificently manifested in those silent, dreaming waiting walls--the truth for Shefford was that this spirit was G.o.d.
Life was eternal. Man"s immortality lay in himself. Love of a woman was hope--happiness. Brotherhood--that mystic and grand "Bi Nai!" of the Navajo--that was religion.
XIX. THE GRAND CANYON OF THE COLORADO
The night pa.s.sed, the gloom turned gray, the dawn stole cool and pale into the canon. When Nas Ta Bega drove the mustangs into camp the lofty ramparts of the walls were rimmed with gold and the dark arch of Nonnezoshe began to lose its steely gray.
The women had rested well and were in better condition to travel. Jane was cheerful and Fay radiant one moment and in a dream the next. She was beginning to live in that wonderful future. They talked more than usual at breakfast, and La.s.siter made droll remarks. Shefford, with his great and haunting trouble ended for ever, with now only danger to face ahead, was a different man, but thoughtful and quiet.
This morning the Indian leisurely made preparations for the start. For all the concern he showed he might have known every foot of the canon below Nonnezoshe. But, for Shefford, with the dawn had returned anxiety, a restless feeling of the need of hurry. What obstacles, what impa.s.sable gorges, might lie between this bridge and the river! The Indian"s inscrutable serenity and Fay"s trust, her radiance, the exquisite glow upon her face, sustained Shefford and gave him patience to endure and conceal his dread.
At length the flight was resumed, with Nas Ta Bega leading on foot, and Shefford walking in the rear. A quarter of a mile below camp the Indian led down a declivity into the bottom of the narrow gorge, where the stream ran. He did not gaze backward for a last glance at Nonnezoshe; nor did Jane or La.s.siter. Fay, however, checked Nack-yal at the rim of the descent and turned to look behind. Shefford contrasted her tremulous smile, her half-happy good-by to this place, with the white stillness of her face when she had bade farewell to Surprise Valley. Then she rode Nack-yal down into the gorge.
Shefford knew that this would be his last look at the rainbow bridge. As he gazed the tip of the great arch lost its cold, dark stone color and began to shine. The sun had just arisen high enough over some low break in the wall to reach the bridge. Shefford watched. Slowly, in wondrous transformation, the gold and blue and rose and pink and purple blended their hues, softly, mistily, cloudily, until once again the arch was a rainbow.
Ages before life had evolved upon the earth it had spread its grand arch from wall to wall, black and mystic at night, transparent and rosy in the sunrise, at sunset a flaming curve limned against the heavens. When the race of man had pa.s.sed it would, perhaps, stand there still. It was not for many eyes to see. Only by toil, sweat, endurance, blood, could any man ever look at Nonnezoshe. So it would always be alone, grand, silent, beautiful, unintelligible.
Shefford bade Nonnezoshe a mute, reverent farewell. Then plunging down the weathered slope of the gorge to the stream below, he hurried forward to join the others. They had progressed much farther than he imagined they would have, and this was owing to the fact that the floor of the gorge afforded easy travel. It was gravel on rock bottom, tortuous, but open, with infrequent and shallow downward steps. The stream did not now rush and boil along and tumble over rock-enc.u.mbered ledges. In corners the water collected in round, green, eddying pools. There were patches of gra.s.s and willows and mounds of moss. Shefford"s surprise equaled his relief, for he believed that the violent descent of Nonnezoshe Boco had been pa.s.sed. Any turn now, he imagined, might bring the party out upon the river. When he caught up with them he imparted this conviction, which was received with cheer. The hopes of all, except the Indian, seemed mounting; and if he ever hoped or despaired it was never manifest.
Shefford"s antic.i.p.ation, however, was not soon realized. The fugitives traveled miles farther down Nonnezoshe Boco, and the only changes were that the walls of the lower gorge heightened and merged into those above and that these upper ones towered ever loftier. Shefford had to throw his head straight back to look up at the rims, and the narrow strip of sky was now indeed a flowing stream of blue.
Difficult steps were met, too, yet nothing compared to those of the upper canon. Shefford calculated that this day"s travel had advanced several hours; and more than ever now he was antic.i.p.ating the mouth of Nonnezoshe Boco. Still another hour went by. And then came striking changes. The canon narrowed till the walls were scarcely twenty paces apart; the color of stone grew dark red above and black down low; the light of day became shadowed, and the floor was a level, gravelly, winding lane, with the stream meandering slowly and silently.
Suddenly the Indian halted. He turned his ear down the canon lane. He had heard something. The others grouped round him, but did not hear a sound except the soft flow of water and the heave of the mustangs. Then the Indian went on. Presently he halted again. And again he listened.
This time he threw up his head and upon his dark face shone a light which might have been pride.
"Tse ko-n-tsa-igi," he said.
The others could not understand, but they were impressed.
"Sh.o.r.e he means somethin" big," drawled La.s.siter.
"Oh, what did he say?" queried Fay in eagerness.
"Nas Ta Bega, tell us," said Shefford. "We are full of hope."
"Grand Canon," replied the Indian.
"How do you know?" asked Shefford.
"I hear the roar of the river."
But Shefford, listen as he might, could not hear it. They traveled on, winding down the wonderful lane. Every once in a while Shefford lagged behind, let the others pa.s.s out of hearing, and then he listened. At last he was rewarded. Low and deep, dull and strange, with some quality to incite dread, came a roar. Thereafter, at intervals, usually at turns in the canon, and when a faint stir of warm air fanned his cheeks, he heard the sound, growing clearer and louder.
He rounded an abrupt corner to have the roar suddenly fill his ears, to see the lane extend straight to a ragged vent, and beyond that, at some distance, a dark, ragged, bulging wall, like iron. As he hurried forward he was surprised to find that the noise did not increase. Here it kept a strange uniformity of tone and volume. The others of the party pa.s.sed out of the mouth of Nonnezoshe Boco in advance of Shefford, and when he reached it they were grouped upon a bank of sand. A dark-red canon yawned before them, and through it slid the strangest river Shefford had ever seen. At first glance he imagined the strangeness consisted of the dark-red color of the water, but at the second he was not so sure. All the others, except Nas Ta Bega, eyed the river blankly, as if they did not know what to think. The roar came from round a huge bulging wall downstream. Up the canon, half a mile, at another turn, there was a leaping rapid of dirty red-white waves and the sound of this, probably, was drowned in the unseen but nearer rapid.
"This is the Grand Canon of the Colorado," said Shefford. "We"ve come out at the mouth of Nonnezoshe Boco.... And now to wait for Joe Lake!"
They made camp on a dry, level sand-bar under a shelving wall. Nas Ta Bega collected a pile of driftwood to be used for fire, and then he took the mustangs back up the side canon to find gra.s.s for them. La.s.siter appeared unusually quiet, and soon pa.s.sed from weary rest on the sand to deep slumber. Fay and Jane succ.u.mbed to an exhaustion that manifested itself the moment relaxation set in, and they, too, fell asleep.
Shefford patrolled the long strip of sand under the wall, and watched up the river for Joe Lake. The Indian returned and went along the river, climbed over the jutting, sharp slopes that reached into the water, and pa.s.sed out of sight up-stream toward the rapid.
Shefford had a sense that the river and the canon were too magnificent to be compared with others. Still, all his emotions and sensations had been so wrought upon, he seemed not to have any left by which he might judge of what const.i.tuted the difference. He would wait. He had a grim conviction that before he was safely out of this earth-riven crack he would know. One thing, however, struck him, and it was that up the canon, high over the lower walls, hazy and blue, stood other walls, and beyond and above them, dim in purple distance, upreared still other walls. The haze and the blue and the purple meant great distance, and, likewise, the height seemed incomparable.
The red river attracted him most. Since this was the medium by which he must escape with his party, it was natural that it absorbed him, to the neglect of the gigantic cliffs. And the more he watched the river, studied it, listened to it, imagined its nature, its power, its restlessness, the more he dreaded it. As the hours of the afternoon wore away, and he strolled along and rested on the banks, his first impressions, and what he realized might be his truest ones, were gradually lost. He could not bring them back. The river was changing, deceitful. It worked upon his mind. The low, hollow roar filled his ears and seemed to mock him. Then he endeavored to stop thinking about it, to confine his attention to the gap up-stream where sooner or later he prayed that Joe Lake and his boat would appear. But, though he controlled his gaze, he could not his thought, and his strange, impondering dread of the river augmented.
The afternoon waned. Nas Ta Bega came back to camp and said any likelihood of Joe"s arrival was past for that day. Shefford could not get over an impression of strangeness--of the impossibility of the reality presented to his naked eyes. These lonely fugitives in the huge-walled canon waiting for a boatman to come down that river!
Strange and wild--those were the words which, inadequately at best, suited this country and the situations it produced.
After supper he and Fay walked along the bars of smooth, red sand. There were a few moments when the distant peaks and domes and turrets were glorified in changing sunset hues. But the beauty was fleeting. Fay still showed la.s.situde. She was quiet, yet cheerful, and the sweetness of her smile, her absolute trust in him, stirred and strengthened anew his spirit. Yet he suffered torture when he thought of trusting Fay"s life, her soul, and her beauty to this strange red river.
Night brought him relief. He could not see the river; only the low roar made its presence known out there in the shadows. And, there being no need to stay awake, he dropped at once into heavy slumber. He was roused by hands dragging at him. Nas Ta Bega bent over him. It was broad daylight. The yellow wall high above was glistening. A fire was crackling and pleasant odors were wafted to him. Fay and Jane and La.s.siter sat around the tarpaulin at breakfast. After the meal suspense and strain were manifested in all the fugitives, even the imperturbable Indian being more than usually watchful. His eyes scarcely ever left the black gap where the river slid round the turn above. Soon, as on the preceding day, he disappeared up the ragged, iron-bound sh.o.r.e. There was scarcely an attempt at conversation. A controlling thought bound that group into silence--if Joe Lake was ever going to come he would come to-day.
Shefford asked himself a hundred times if it were possible, and his answer seemed to be in the low, sullen, m.u.f.fled roar of the river. And as the morning wore on toward noon his dread deepened until all chance appeared hopeless. Already he had begun to have vague and unformed and disquieting ideas of the only avenue of escape left--to return up Nonnezoshe Boco--and that would be to enter a trap.
Suddenly a piercing cry pealed down the canon. It was followed by echoes, weird and strange, that clapped from wall to wall in mocking concatenation. Nas Ta Bega appeared high on the ragged slope. The cry had been the Indian"s. He swept an arm out, pointing up-stream, and stood like a statue on the iron rocks.
Shefford"s keen gaze sighted a moving something in the bend of the river. It was long, low, dark, and flat, with a lighter object upright in the middle. A boat and a man!