The Enchanted Canyon

by Honoré Willsie Morrow

  "What good would nerve do a guy lookin' at hell!" gasped Nucky.

  "Hell? Why the Canyon is one of the beautiful sights of the world! You're crazy, Enoch! Come out with me and look again."

  "Not on your life!" cried Nucky. "I'm going back to little old N' York."

  "It can't be done, my boy. There'll be no trains out of here for at least twelve hours, because of the storm. And listen, Enoch! No nonsense! Remember that if you wander away from the hotel, you're lost. There are no trolleys in this neck of the woods, and no telephones and no police. Wait a moment, Enoch, there's Frank Allen, the guide."

  Seaton hailed a tall, rather heavily built man in corduroys and high laced boots, who had lounged up to the cigar stand. As he approached, Nucky saw that he was middle aged, with a heavily tanned face out of which the blue of his eyes shone conspicuously.

  "Here he is, Frank!" exclaimed Seaton. "Nucky, this is the man who is going to look out for you while I'm gone."

  "Well, young New York! What're you going to do with the Canyon?" Frank slapped the boy on the shoulder.

  Nucky grinned uncertainly. "I dunno!" he said.

  "Had a look at it?" demanded the guide.

  "Yes!" Nucky spoke with sudden firmness. "And I don't like it. I want to go back to New York."

  "Come on out with Frank and me and get used to it," suggested John Seaton.

  "I'm not going near it again," returned Nucky.

  Allen looked at the boy with deliberate interest. He noted the pasty skin, the hollow chest, the strong, unformed features, the thin lips that were trembling, despite the cigarette stained fingers that pressed against them.

  "Did you ever talk to Indians?" asked Allen, suddenly.

  "No," said Nucky.

  "Well, let's forget the Canyon and go over to the hogan, yonder. Is that the best you two can do on shoes? I'm always sorry for you lady-like New Yorkers. Come over here a minute. I guess we can rent some boots to fit you."

  "I'm going to write letters, Frank," said Seaton. "You and Enoch'll find me over at one of the desks. Fit the boy out as you think best."

  Not long after, Nucky trailed the guide through the lobby. He was wearing high laced boots, with a very self-conscious air. Once outside, in the glory of the westering sun, Frank took a deep breath.

  "Great air, boy! Get all you can of it into those flabby bellows of yours. Before we go to the hogan, come over to the corral. My Tom horse has got a saddle sore. A fool tourist rode him all day with a fold in the blanket as big as your fist."

  "Is he a bronco?" asked Nucky, with sudden animation.

  "He was a bronco. You easterners have the wrong idea. A bronco is a plains pony before he's broken. After he's busted he's a horse. See?"

  "Aw, you're dead wrong, Frank!" drawled a voice.

  Nucky looked up in astonishment to see a tall man, whose skin was a rich bronze, offering a cigarette to the guide.

  "Dry up, Mike!" returned Frank with a grin. "What does a Navaho know about horses! Enoch, this is a sure enough Indian. Mike, let me introduce Mr. Enoch Huntingdon of New York City."

  The Navaho nodded and smiled. "You look as if a little Canyon climbing would do you good," said he. "I was looking at Tom horse, Frank. He's in bad shape. How much did that tender-foot weigh that rode him?"

  "I don't know. I wasn't here the day they hired him out. I know the cuss would have weighed a good deal less if I'd been here when that saddle was taken off! Going down to-morrow with Miss Planer?"

  "Not unless some one breaks trail for us. Are you going to try it?"

  "Not unless my young friend here gets his nerve up. Want to try it, Enoch?"

  "Try what?" asked Nucky.

  "The trip down Bright Angel."

  "Not on your life!" cried Nucky.

  Both men laughed, the Indian moving off through the snow in the direction of a dim building among the cedars, while Frank led on to the corral fence. Fifteen or twenty horses and mules were moving about the enclosure. Allen crossed swiftly among them, with Nucky following, apprehensively, close behind him. Frank's horse was in the stable, but while he seemed to examine the sore spot on the animal's back, Frank's real attention was riveted on Nucky. The boy was obviously ill at ease and only half interested in the horse.

  "These are the lads that take us down the trail," said Allen finally, slapping a velvety black mule on the flank.

  "We can't trust the horses. A mule knows more in a minute than a horse knows all his life."

  "Will you go with me to take another look at it?" asked Nucky.

  An expression of understanding crossed Frank's weather-beaten face. "Sure I will, boy! Let's walk up the rim a little and see if you can steady your nerves."

  "I'd rather stay by the rail," replied Nucky, doggedly.

  "All right, old man! Don't take this thing too hard, you know! After all, it's only a crack in the earth."

  Nucky grinned feebly, and trudged steadily up to the rail. The sun was setting and the Canyon was like the infinite glory of God. Untiring as was his love for the view Allen preferred, this time, to watch the strange young face beside him. Nucky's pallor was still intense in spite of the stinging wind. His deep set eyes were strained like a child's, listening to a not-to-be-understood explanation of something that frightens him. For a full five minutes he gazed without speaking. Then the sun sank and the Canyon immediately was filled with gloom. Nucky's lips quivered. "I can't stand it!" he muttered again, "I can't stand it!" and once more he bolted.

  This time he went directly to his room. Neither Allen nor Seaton attempted to follow him.

  "He is some queer kid!" said Frank, taking the cigar Seaton offered him. "He may be a born crook or he may not, but believe me, there's something in him worth finding out about."

  "Just what I say!" agreed Seaton. "But don't be sure you're the one that can unlock him. Mrs. Seaton couldn't and if she failed, any woman on earth would. And I still believe that a chap that's got any good in him will open up to a good woman."

  "His woman, man! His! Not to somebody else's woman." Allen's tone was impatient.

  "His woman! Don't talk like a chump, Frank! Enoch's only fourteen."

  "Makes no difference. Your wife is an angel as I learned two years ago, but she may not have Enoch's number, just the same. If I were you, I'd mooch up to the kid's room if he doesn't come down promptly to supper. His nerves are in rotten shape and he oughtn't to be alone too long."

  Seaton nodded, and shortly after seven he knocked softly on Nucky's door. There was an inarticulate, "Come in!" Nucky was standing by the window in the dark room.

  "Supper's ready, old man. You'd better have it now and get to bed early. Jumping from sea level to a mile in the air makes a chap sleepy. Are you washed up?"

  "I'm all ready," mumbled Nucky.

  He went to bed shortly after eight. Something forlorn and childish about the boy's look as he said good night moved John Seaton to say,

  "Tell a bell boy to open the door between our rooms, will you, Enoch?" and he imagined that a relieved look flickered in Nucky's eyes.

  Seaton himself went to bed and to sleep early. He was wakened about midnight by a soft sound from Nucky's room and he lay for a few moments listening. Then he rose and turned on the light in his room, and in Nucky's. The boy hastily jerked the covers over his head. Seaton pulled the extra blanket at the bed foot over his own shoulders, then he sat down on the edge of the bed and put his hand on Nucky's heaving back.

  "Don't you think, if it's bad enough to make you cry, that it's time you told a friend about it, Enoch?" he said, his voice a little husky.

  For a moment sobs strangled the boy's utterance entirely. Finally, he pulled the covers down but still keeping his head turned away, he said,

  "I want to go home!"

  "Home, Enoch? Where's your home?"

  "N' York's my home. This joint scares me."

  "Whom do you want to see in New York, Enoch?"

  "Anybody! Nobody! Even the police station'd look
better'n that thing. I can feel it out there now, waitin' and listenin'!"

  Seaton stared blankly at the back of Nucky's head. His experiment was not turning out at all as he had planned. Jack often had puzzled him but there had always been something to grasp with Jack. His own boy had been such a good sport! A good sport! Suddenly Seaton cleared his throat.

  "Enoch, among the men you know, what is the opinion of a squealer?"

  "We hate him," replied the boy, shortly.

  "And the other night when you were arrested, you were rather proud of standing up and taking your punishment without breaking down. If one of the men arrested at that time had broken down, you'd all have despised him, I suppose?"

  "Sure thing," agreed Nucky, turning his head ever so little toward the man.

  "Enoch, why are you breaking down now?"

  "Aw, what difference does it make?" demanded the boy. "You despise me anyhow!"

  "Oh!" ejaculated Seaton as a sudden light came to his groping mind. "Oh, I see! What a chump you are, old man! Of course, I despise the kind of life you've led, but I blame Minetta Lane for that, not you. And I believe there is so much solid fine stuff in you that I'm giving you this trip to show you that there are people and things outside of Minetta Lane that are more worth a promising boy's time than gambling. But, you won't play the game. You are so vain and ignorant, you refuse to see over your nose."

  "I told you, you despised me," said Nucky, sullenly.

  The man smiled to himself. Suddenly he took the boy's hand in both his own.

  "I suppose if Jack had been reared in Minetta Lane, he'd have been just as wrong in his ideas as you are. Look here, Enoch, I'll make a bargain with you. I want you to try the Canyon for a week or so, until I get back from the Coast. If, at the end of that time, you still want Minetta Lane, I'll land you back there with fifty dollars in your pocket, and you can go your own gait."

  Nucky for the first time turned and looked Seaton in the face. "Honest?" he gasped.

  Seaton nodded.

  "Do I have to go down the Canyon?" asked Nucky.

  "You don't have to do anything except play straight, till I get back."

  "I--I guess I could stand it,"--the boy's eyes were a little pitiful in their fear.

  "That isn't enough. I want your promise, Enoch!"

  Nucky stared into Seaton's steady eyes. "All right, I'll promise. And--and, Mr. Seaton, would you sit with me till I get to sleep?"

  Seaton nodded. Nucky had made no attempt to free his hand from the kindly grasp that imprisoned it. He lay staring at the ceiling for a long moment, then his eyelids fluttered, dropped, and he slept. He did not stir when Seaton rose and went back to his own bed.

  It did not snow during the night and the train that had brought Nucky and Mr. Seaton up announced itself as ready for the return trip to Williams, immediately after breakfast. Nucky slept late and only opened his eyes when Frank Allen clumped into the room about nine o'clock.

  "Hello, New York! Haven't died, have you? Come on, we're going to break trail down the Canyon, you and I."

  "Not on your life!" Nucky roused at once and sat up in bed, his face very pale under its thatch of dark red hair.

  "John Seaton turned you over to me. Said to tell you he thought you needed the sleep more than you did to say good-by to him."

  "He told me last night," exclaimed Nucky; "that I didn't have to go down the Canyon."

  "And you don't, you poor sissy! You aren't afraid to get up and dress, are you?" Allen's grin took away part of the sting of his speech. "Meet me in the lobby in twenty minutes, Enoch," and he turned on his heel.

  Nucky was down in less than the time allotted. As he leaned against the office desk, waiting for the guide, the room clerk said, "So you're the kid that's afraid to go down the trail. Usually it's the old ladies that kick up about that. Most boys your age are crazy for the trip."

  Nucky muttered something and moved away. In front of the fire the woman who had smiled at him the day before, smiled again.

  "Afraid too, aren't you! They can't get me onto that trail, either."

  Nucky smiled feebly then looked about a little wildly for Frank Allen. When he espied the guide at the cigar-stand, he crossed to him hurriedly.

  "Say now, Mr. Allen, listen!"

  "I'm all ears, son!"

  "Now don't tell everybody I'm afraid of the trail!"

  "Oh, you're the kid!" exclaimed a bell boy. "Say, there was an old lady here once that used to go out every morning and pray to the Lord to close the earth's gap, it made her so nervous! Why don't you try that, kid? Maybe the Lord would take a suggestion from a New Yorker."

  Nucky rushed to the dining room. He was too angry and resentful to eat much. He drank two cups of coffee, however, and swallowed some toast.

  "Ain't you going to eat your eggs?" demanded the waitress. "What's the matter with you? Folks always stuff themselves, here. Say, don't let the trail scare you. I was that way at first, but finally I got my nerve up and there's nothing to it. Say, let me give you some advice. There's only a few folks here now, so the guides and the hotel people have got plenty of time on their hands. They're awful jokers and they'll tease the life out of you, till you take the trip. You just get on a mule, this morning, and start. Every day you wait, you'll hate it more."

  Nucky's vanity had been deeply wounded. Greater than his fear, which was very great indeed, was Nucky's vanity. He gulped the second cup of coffee, then with the air of bravado which belonged to Marty the Dude, he sauntered up to the cigar stand where the guide still lounged.

  "All right, Frank," said Nucky. "I'm ready for Bright Angel when you are."

  The guide looked at the boy carefully. Two bright red spots were burning in Nucky's cheeks. He was biting his lips, nervously. But his blue eyes were hard and steady.

  "I'll be ready in half an hour, Enoch. Meet me at the corral. We'll camp down below for a night or two if you hold out and I'll have to have the grub put up. You go over to the store room yonder and get a flannel shirt and a pair of denim pants to pull on over those you're wearing. Mr. Seaton left his camera for you. I put it on your bureau. Bring that along. Skip now!"

  Nucky's cheeks were still burning when he met Allen at the corral. Three mules, one a well loaded pack mule, the others saddled, were waiting. Frank leaned against the bars.

  "Enoch," said the man, "there's no danger at all, if you let your mule alone. Don't try to guide him. He knows the trail perfectly. All you have to do is to sit in the saddle and look up, not down! Remember, up, not down! I shall lead. You follow, on Spoons. Old Foolish Face brings up the rear with the pack. Did you ever ride, before?"

  "I never touched a horse in my life," replied Nucky, trying to curb the chattering of his teeth.

  "You had better mount and ride round the road here, for a bit. Take the reins, so. Stand facing the saddle, so. Now put this foot in the stirrup, seize the pommel, and swing the other leg over as you spring. That's the idea!"

  Nucky was awkward, but he landed in the saddle and found the other stirrup, the mule standing fast as a mountain while he did so. Spoons moved off at Allen's bidding, and Nucky grasped at the pommel. But only for a moment.

  "Don't he shake any worse than this?" he cried.

  "No, but it's not so easy to stay in the saddle when the grade's steep. Pull on your right rein, Enoch, and bring old Spoons in behind me. Well done! We're off! See the bunch on the hotel steps! Guess you fooled 'em this time, New York!"

  Half a dozen people, including the clerk were standing on the steps, watching the little cavalcade. As the mules filed by, somebody began to clap.

  "What's the excitement, Frank?" demanded Nucky.

  Frank turned in his saddle to smile at the boy. "Out in this country we admire physical nerve because we need a lot of it. And you're showing a good quality, old chap. Just sit easy now and when you want me to stop, yell."

  Nucky was sitting very straight with his thin chest up, and he managed to maintain this posture as the trail
turned down over the rim. Then he grasped the pommel in both hands.

  It was a wonderful trail, carved with infinite patience and ingenuity out of the canyon wall. To Allen it was as safe and easy as a flight of stairs. Nucky, trembling in the saddle would have felt quite as comfortable standing on the topmost window ledge of the Flat Iron building, in New York. And, to Nucky, there was no trail! Only a narrow, corkscrew shelf, deep banked with snow into which the mules set their small feet gingerly. For many minutes, the boy saw only this trackless ledge, and the sickening blue depths below.

  "I can never stand it!" he muttered. "I can never stand it! If this mule makes just one mis-step, I'm dead." He felt a little nauseated. "I can never stand it! 'Twould have been better if I'd just let 'em tease me. Hey, Frank!"

  The guide looked back. The red spots were gone from Nucky's cheeks now.

  "We got to go back! I can't get away with it!" cried the boy.

  "It's impossible to turn here, Enoch! Look up, man! Look up! And just trust old Spoons! Are you cold? It was only eight above zero, when we left the top. But the snow'll disappear as we go down and when we reach the river it'll be summer. See that lone pine up on the rim to your right? They say an Indian girl jumped from the top of that because she bore a cross-eyed baby. Look up, Enoch, as we round this curve and see that streak of red in the wall. An Indian giant bled to death on the rim and his blood seeped through the solid rock to this point. Watch how the sky gets a deeper blue, the farther down we go. And now, Enoch look out, not down. You may come down Bright Angel a thousand times and never see the colors you see to-day. The snowfall has turned the world into a rainbow, by heck!"

  Slowly, very slowly, Nucky turned his head and clinging to the pommel, he stared across the canyon. White of snow; sapphire of sky; black of sharp cut shadow. Mountains rising from the canyon floor thrust scarlet and yellow heads across his line of vision. Close to his left, as the trail curved, a wall of purest rose color lifted from a bank of snow that was as blue as Allen's eyes. Beyond and beyond and ever beyond, the vast orderliness of the multi-colored canyon strata melted into delicate white clouds that now revealed, now concealed the mountain tops.