CHAPTER VI
A LONE HAND AGAINST HUNGER

"You will pardon an old lady," she said, "but I should not like to think of your going down there, unless you can assure me that it is really safe."

The topographer turned to her immediately, raising his cap and smiling:

"I have been over the trail before," he said, "and indeed I have been in many worse places than this part of the Canyon, so you really need feel no alarm. It is very kind of you to be solicitous of our well-being, and I shall take your expressed interest as a happy omen for the journey."

This little speech, overheard by Roger as he came up with the head packer to say that everything was ready, gave him a quick insight into the intense graceful courtesy, which was so strong a characteristic of the man who was to be his chief for a couple of months to come. A few sentences between Masseth and the chief packer were followed by the words, spoken in a sharp tone of command, markedly different from the suavity of a moment before:

"You may start, then!"

Roger waited for instructions.

"Doughty," said the leader, "you will ride in the rear with Black, and you will do well to let him teach you how to handle the animals in rough spots. I shall go ahead, of course."

"Very well, sir," answered Roger, and cantered off to the pack train, where the assistant topographer was helping the second packer to get the mules started. The head packer had gone as far as the brink of the Canyon with the chief and there waited to deploy the animals on the trail in good order and to scrutinize every pack as it passed him, to make sure that none should become loose and slip.

The boy chatted freely with Black as they paced along behind the last of the mules, and he found his companion well-informed, as Masseth had said, but except on matters of the trail, somewhat non-communicative. In brief remarks, however, he explained to the boy many of the troubles he must expect to encounter and the best manner of meeting them, and his curt references to the lie of the land struck Roger as being of immense value. He pointed out certain striking landmarks as features of the landscape which were to be ignored, because, from any point of view, they would appear entirely different; and certain other eminences, perhaps not even as noticeable as the former, which he must remember, since, by reason of their conformation they would always appear the same and thus could be taken as absolute and certain guides.

But as soon as the trail fell over the edge there was no more speaking. Fell over the edge, Roger thought, was almost the only way to describe the road, which was precipitous and winding beyond belief. There was a supposition that the way had been made smooth for mules, but it did not seem to the lad that any four-footed animal short of a goat could keep his footing. The long line of mules treading easily in front, however, was evidence that he need not fear, so warily keeping an eye on his mule lest his mount should stumble, he preceded the assistant, following immediately after the last pack mule.

For several hundred feet the trail went down in this rough fashion, then suddenly turned sharply to the left along one of the broad terraces of rock, whereof Masseth had spoken to the boy before. After a quarter of a mile of easy going, the party came to a slope of loose shale, almost filling up the terrace. The pack mules picked their way over this without any apparent demur, but Black called out:

"Guess you'd better get off!"

Roger slipped from his saddle, and going to the mule's head started to walk beside it.

"Go in front, you chump," called the other. "If the trail's none too wide for one, how do you suppose two can go abreast?"

"But I can't help him then!" protested Roger.

This speech was greeted with a hoarse chuckle.

"Any old time a mule needs a tenderfoot to teach him where to put his feet," he said, "I want to have a front seat to watch it. Don't you ever worry about that, I guess he can walk anywhere that you can, but on a shelving bank a rider makes a beast topheavy."

Down they went into the chasm, climbing over heaps of fallen rock, pitching down slopes which seemed almost perpendicular to the boy, and as they descended the sun rose higher and the air seemed to become less tenuous and almost visible. Roger had been expecting the wonderful radiance of the valley to become tenfold richer under the noonday sun, and was surprised to note all the color fade out of the rocks and the air become as it were so solid as to refract the light of the sun. The whole atmosphere seemed to be glowing with a metallic luster which was most confusing, because of the way in which it changed the whole environment. Lines of strata became distorted and even disappeared, the buttes appeared to flatten, the minor shadows to diminish and the darker shades to turn an inky black, till, when the halt was made at noon, the boy realized that he could not have made his way back one mile by reason of the chaotic look of the abyss under the direct light of the noonday sun.

After the march had been resumed and the afternoon was drawing to a close, however, the true witchery of the scene struck deep into Roger's mind. As the evening clouds began to gather and the twilight shadows deepened, the Titanic temples and cloisters seemed to awake and stretch themselves to meet the expected vesper. Little by little the atmosphere lost its density and the rocks behind began to glow, the colossal buttes assumed their due proportions; while a thousand bizarre forms, that had not been observable in the intense light of day, thrust themselves forward into an uncouth prominence. Then the sun disappeared from the view of the travelers, though still shining on the rocks above. Black cantered up beside the boy.

"Now watch," he said: "here's where you see the greatest display of color in the whole world."

"But how can it be brighter than it is now?" queried Roger, on whom the bold and striking scene was creating a profound impression.

"The best is yet to come," answered his companion, "and look, it begins now!"

For the first time since morning Roger was able to look upwards without being blinded by the sunlight. The sloping rays now fell full upon the upper part of the Canyon, at the crest of which a vivid yellow cut athwart the transparent blue of the sky and underneath its pallid brilliancy ran a soft belt of pale rose. The deep vibrating red of the body of the Canyon seemed to pulse with life as a faint blue haze began to gather in the dusk, changing second by second into the countless differing hues of crimson lakes and ruby violets, deepening as the hastening twilight passed. Strange and metallic gleams of burnished bronze and green gloomed from the intervening lines, all yielding place little by little to the veil of azure mist. And beneath all, the glowing red, now changed to imperial purple, as though the world were bathed in a regal radiance at the crowning of a universe's king.

It was not until the dark had really come and the stars were shining brightly that the boy awakened to the consciousness of a trail and felt that he could speak. He turned to the assistant.

"And that's been going on every day for years!" he said, struck by the wastefulness of such a sight to so few eyes.

"For thousands upon thousands of years that went on before any man saw it," replied Black, smiling slightly, "and it will go on when the present civilizations are deemed but musty antiquities."

The night was well advanced when the party reached the crest of the Canyon on the north side. The journey, as Masseth had said, was one devoid of special risk because of the numbers of the party and the known trail, though, in truth, it needed a keen eye at times to discern that such apparently impassable ground was intended for a trail. The top reached, however, a hasty camp pitched, the packs and saddles taken off, the mules and the animals hobbled to graze on the rich herbage of the Kaibab plateau, Roger sank to sleep without loss of time, and it seemed to him hardly ten minutes before the cook aroused him for the camp breakfast.

"You know something about the work of a rodman, and of the handling of the tape?" asked Masseth, after breakfast, referring to the 300-foot steel tape used in measuring distances in wooded areas.

"Yes, indeed, Mr. Masseth."

"Of course you realize that the tape is generally impracticable in such a country as this, and that all the work must be done by the computing of angles with continual astronomical verification. As topographic aid you can learn as much as you are able of the use of instruments, at such times as you are not carrying out levels." And Masseth, questioning closely, elicited the mathematical ability of the lad. The boy had always hated arithmetic and its kindred studies, not realizing the value of the higher branches, but with the incentive before him, he found his chief's teaching markedly interesting.

The next day a semi-permanent camp was pitched, and there the supplies were kept. The head packer, who became a teamster as soon as things were settled, immediately left for the village of Kanab in Utah, over a hundred miles away, where a heavy wagon was in waiting, and whence the provisions were to be drawn for the party during the two months it should be on the north side of the Canyon. As it was a three days' journey there and the same returning, the teamster was a busy man, having but one day comparatively free and camping on the trail five nights out of seven.

Roger, of course, went out with the other men every day, scaling points picked out for him by the chief as places he desired occupied, measuring from the rod elevated by the boy, who then, at a signal, was ordered to go to the next point scheduled. To a boy as fond of climbing as was Roger, for a day or two this was good fun, but the novelty soon passed by and he did his day's work with a persistent regularity, which, though it brought forth the results required, was lacking in the adventurous. In short, the continuity of risky work became monotonous.

It was due to this cause, perhaps, that one afternoon, when this sort of thing had been proceeding for several weeks, Roger, passing from one outjutting piece of rock to another, but a few feet away, jumped carelessly, twisted his ankle beneath him and fell, spraining his wrist. Despite the sprain, however, he reached the point to which he had been sent, and then, instead of going on, returned to the topographer.

"What's the matter?" called Masseth, who had seen him fall, as soon as he came in hearing. "Did you hurt yourself?"

"Sprained my wrist, I think, Mr. Masseth," answered the boy. "Beastly sorry, but I'm afraid I'll have to lay off for the rest of the afternoon."

The following morning early, after having told Roger everything he was to look after, the cook started for the side camp to take Roger's place, while the latter looked after the camp. Long and weary seemed the morning to the boy, so inactive it was after the strenuous life he had been leading for some weeks, and, though the teamster usually got in before noon, when evening came he had not arrived. Roger, who had counted on the cook's knowledge of the teamster's time, found himself almost without food for supper, and made a very light repast. He was just about to turn in for a sleep, when he heard the sound of horses' hoofs and went out to greet the teamster.

"Is that you, Jim?" he called out.

"Guess not, pardner," answered a strange voice, and a cowman loped into the circle of light. "This here a United States camp?" he queried.

"Yes," answered the boy.

"An' who's running the shebang?"

"I am just at present," Roger answered. "But I expected the teamster here to-day."

"You are? No offense, but you don't look more'n a yearling. Well, it's not so worse to brand 'em young."

The lad explained the circumstances of his being alone, pointing out that the rest of the party were only three or four hours' ride away, and the stranger nodded.

"Which I was a plumb forgettin' to explain is that the gent what you was a-greetin' with the airy name of Jim, won't come none this week to camp, but he allowed as you-all had a-plenty."

"What's the matter with him?"

"Which I ain't a sharp as a doc. Took a spell or somethin'. I opine he's a goin' to continue cavortin' around this Vale of Tears some more, though he has been figurin' on procurin' a brace of wings."

"He's getting better, though?" asked the boy.

"Which he holds a good hand for a long life."

"But I haven't got any extra supply of grub," continued Roger in some dismay.

"Shore!" The stranger, who was just gathering up his reins, half turned in the saddle. "I wouldn't bet a small white chip for any gent's success in a dooel with hunger. Which it is some uncomfortable to ignore the chuck-wagon. But this here Jim he relates that he toted a big jag last time, and it must be cached."

"It must be here somewhere, then," said Roger dubiously, "and I'll look. But it doesn't sound good to me."

"Which if you don't locate, saunter over to the Bar X Double N and we will supply the existin' demand a whole lot," and with a wave of his hand the rider cantered away into the darkness, without giving Roger a chance even to ask where the ranch might be.

But youth is little accustomed to troubled dreams, and Roger slept soundly enough, awakening the next morning, not to a hot and well-cooked breakfast, but to having to prepare his own. Laying hands on everything that he could find, the boy made out a breakfast and then started on a search for other provision. He doubted its existence for the cook had told him that it was nearly all gone. At last, in his rummaging he found a little notebook, marked on the outside, "Record of Supplies," and thinking that this might give a clew, he opened it.

There, under a date of a few days before, was an entry to the effect that the cook had sold to a passing party a large supply of surplus provision, thinking that the teamster would make his regular trip. It was small wonder, Roger thought, that the teamster was not at all anxious, because he made sure that the provision was still in the camp, and of course the cook was not disturbed because he supposed that the teamster would come the next day.

The situation was gloomy enough so far as Roger was concerned, for he was practically without food, but what rendered the matter doubly serious was that the rest of the party would come in from the side camp two days hence with their supply of provision exhausted, only to find the camp barren, and leaving five men a long way from getting food instead of one. The more Roger thought over the matter, the more determined he was that he must procure supplies. The question was, where?

If the lad had known the country at all, there were undoubtedly ranches somewhat near at hand to which he could appeal at a pinch, but he had wisdom enough to know that it would be the height of folly to ride out upon the north Arizona plateau without the faintest idea of a destination. There was the ranch to which he had been told to come, and he had heard of it often enough to know that it was one of the largest ranches in the country, but who would direct him there? He feared that a blind try in the plain might put him out of touch of water as well as food, a condition insupportable.

There was only one bright spot in the position, and that was the presence of Jack. Jack was a burro, apparently of extreme age, who had been found one morning near the camp, and who had attached himself to the party. Of course all the rest of the animals were away, the cook having ridden back to the side camp the horse on which Roger had come from there. True, there was this burro, but what could he do with it, where could he go?

As he asked himself this question, an answer shot into the boy's mind which turned him hot and cold. He looked over the plateau to the plains and shook his head, then quietly went into the tent to think over the best course for him to pursue. Five, ten, fifteen minutes passed, then with jaw hard-set and lips compressed Roger walked to where the burro was grazing, and slipped a halter over his head. Obediently the patient animal followed him to the edge of the rift of the Canyon, and there Roger looked down and across. Nine miles away, across those fearful chasms and lurid cliffs lay food and necessaries not only for himself, but for the party.

Roger was conscious that prudent judgment would counsel his return to the side camp for the purpose of informing the party of the situation, so that they could cross by the old trail to renew supplies, but the boy knew that Masseth was working against time. Beside this, it would be a great achievement and the lad was burning with a desire to shine before the Survey. The old trail was the better way, but it had been night when they debouched on the plateau and Roger could not have told where the trail entered. He feared he might lose time by hunting for that faint trail, and decided to direct his whole strength into an attempt to force his way straight across the cleft in defiance of the decree that it had never been done and could never be done.

About a mile away along the bank there was a deep fault which could be entered a few hundred yards back on the plateau. The lad knew about this, for the spring whence the camp got its water was close by. Into this Roger turned with his burro, casting one long glance at the camp just visible in the distance, before he took his courage in both hands and plunged into the almost inaccessible ravine.

"They call this Bright Angel Canyon, Jack," he said aloud. "I'd like to have a pair of their wings right now."

The little gray burro looked at him for a moment, then went on picking his steps carefully. It was rough but not perilous for a few hundred yards and the boy's spirits rose until in an hour or so he came to an obstruction about ten feet high, but this puny ten feet, which had looked simply like a little ridge of dirt, baffled him for hours. He traveled up and down, but found the terrace continuous, and it seemed as though his quest would fail almost before it had well begun.

Suddenly there flashed into the boy's mind one of the old fables, and, as before, he took his rough-haired friend into his confidence.

"We can't jump it or knock it down, Jack, old boy," he said. "It's up to us to climb it some way."

With immense toil and labor he carried stone and rock and bits of boulders, and though hours were spent on the task he built up a kind of shaky and insecure pile up which the burro, following him patiently, reached the top. There luck was with him, for, by picking his steps carefully for twenty yards or so, he was enabled to reach a newly fallen piece of cliff, by which he got to firm ground on the other side. Stopping to rest, this obstacle over, the boy's ears were greeted by the musical and grateful sound of falling water, and hurrying to the place, he found a little stream fed by springs and gurgling merrily in tiny cascades to the river.

Although he knew but little of geology, Roger's sense speedily showed him that, by following this little tributary, he probably would have a fair path down to the river, or at least, while he would probably find many drops downward, there would be no walls across his path unless it were one through which the little creek had tunneled. So, ankle deep in the grooved bed, they started down the streamlet on its way to the bottom of the valley.

It was perhaps fortunate for the lad that he was not too well-informed in the customary ways of the burro, and was entirely unaware of the animal's intense objection to running water. Had he known this, in all probability he would have left the burro behind, which would have resulted grievously. But this old burro, as it fortunately chanced, must have belonged to some prospector working in a mountain country, for he evinced no fear of or dislike to the stream. One hundred and seven times did Roger and the burro cross Bright Angel Creek, each crossing growing swifter and deeper than the last. Dusk was falling as they reached the bank of the Colorado River at the base of the Canyon.

Before it became entirely dark, the boy climbed up a peak of rock to make sure of the direction of his objective point, a matter hard to be determined because of the windings of the river, and on descending laid several stones in a row pointing to the direction sought. Then, supperless and almost spent, he resolutely refrained from eating the few last morsels he had brought with him, and flinging himself down beneath an overhanging ledge he fell asleep.

In spite of the strangeness of his position it was bright daylight when he awoke and the burro was standing patiently near by. Taking from his wallet the solitary crust of bread and the few biscuits that remained, and noting that Jack had found some grass just at the water's edge, Roger put on his shoes and walked gravely to the edge of the river. There is only one Colorado River in the world, and it is perhaps the most violent stream in the two hemispheres. It was not at its height at this time, but it ran like a mill race with a vicious swirl and spume, and was ugly to look at. Roger was no mean swimmer, but his heart sank at the thought of plunging into it.

"Jack," he said, "I'd as soon try to swim the Niagara gorge," and the burro looked wonderingly at his master.

So up and down the bank for several hundred yards he went, striving to find some rapids that might be forded, but only at one place did it even appear possible and that, the boy thought, had large odds against it. Still, it was all he saw, and he put the burro at it. But Jack refused, point-blank, and as the obstinacy of a burro needs some considerable persuasion to overcome, things looked black for the boy.

There was just the river between him and safety, for Roger had heard the men speak of an Indian trail which paralleled the river on the southern side and whence he could reach one of the three trails that ascended the plateau, and not only safety, but the welfare of the party, which he felt was intrusted to his care. The burro would not try the ford. Very well, then, he would cross himself. On this side of that torrent, hunger, defeat, and death, on the other food, success, and reputation. Come what might, he would cross!

CHAPTER VII
SAVED BY HIS NERVE

The longer he looked at it, however, the worse it got, and so, in order to test the feasibility of it, the boy sprang lightly upon the nearest boulder about four feet from the bank. Water to the depth of six inches was pouring over the stone, but he had paid no heed to this, feeling that it was easy to brace against a current of that shallowness. But if his feet ever touched that stone he did not know it, for the rush of water took his footing from him, throwing him headlong as though his feet had been jerked from under him by a rope.

As he fell, the boy threw out a hand to save himself and grasped a projecting corner of the boulder on which he had expected to land, and found himself hanging on for dear life with the current pouring over the rock into his face and almost strangling him. Very few seconds were enough to show that he had not strength enough to draw himself up on the rock against the force of the stream, but the bank was scarcely more than an arm's length away, and making a desperate lunge the boy reached it and clambered on shore, his breath gone and his nerve somewhat shaken by the suddenness of the peril.

The hope of a ford must be given up therefore; no boat or raft was procurable, and indeed could hardly live in such a torrent, bridging was out of the question, so nothing remained but to swim for it. Roger figured that, while of course he could not swim directly across, if he could manage to make any resistance to the current at all and would point up stream at a slight angle, the onrush of the stream would carry him across. A little distance below the ford he had attempted, the river flowed deeper with less apparent turmoil, and there, perhaps, was a chance to get through alive.

But the question of the wearing or the not wearing of boots was quite a quandary. If he kept them on, they would impede his swimming greatly, while if he took them off and did manage to get across, his feet would be cut to pieces in ascending the Canyon on the other side. But he decided to do one thing first, and if he crossed the river safely, then it would be time to consider ways of going up the chasm. Taking off his shoes he tied them to the burro's neck, feeling sure that even if the little animal failed to cross alive, he might be washed ashore on the further bank and the boots could be recovered.

Then, unexpectedly to the burro, while the latter was standing at the edge of the bank, he gave him a shove and toppled him in and sprang into the water after him.

But, despite his previous little experience of the force of the current, Roger had altogether underestimated its power. He could not even face it, the impetus stunned, blinded, and deafened him. The river took him like a chip, and though in an aimless sort of way, he tried to swim so as to keep his head above water, he knew that he was being swept down the reach with incredible speed. As for the burro, he had not time to think about the faithful little beast, who was being swept down the river even more rapidly than the boy.

But, about two hundred yards down the river, there stuck out above the water a large projecting snag, which had been carried down the stream from the forests hundreds of miles above, and which had been partly buried in silt and thereby held firm. The snag being on the further side of the river, just as it took a sharp curve, had made a tiny shoal and the burro was slung by the current against the snag and held there by the force of the water. The donkey had hardly struck the snag before Roger, gasping and exhausted, came whirling down upon him, but his smooth wet sides afforded no handhold and Roger was slipping away from him when his hands unconsciously touched and grasped the animal's tail.

A violent jerk followed, and for a moment it seemed doubtful whether the wrench would not tear the burro from the crotch of the limb in which he was imprisoned, but the anchored tree held fast, and Roger, though his arms were nearly pulled from their sockets, fought inch by inch his way to the lee of the burro, grasped the snag, and finally got footing on a part of it below the water, where the current was not so swift. But there was no time to lose, so Roger, rapidly unfastening his shoes from around the burro's neck, threw them to the shore, which was about sixteen feet distant; then to get a start for a jump he balanced himself on the topmost branch of the snag and gave a wild leap for safety.

He could jump six feet, and with arms outstretched reach five, leaving scarcely two yards to cover. This the impetus of his leap should give him, Roger figured, but even those few feet were almost too much, and had not the shore curved a trifle at that point he might have been carried out toward the center of the stream again. But the initial velocity of his spring was just enough, and a moment later, with his heart beating like a trip-hammer and trembling with the exertion, Roger flung himself upon the other shore. The Colorado was crossed!

Roger's first thought, after a sense of gratitude and relief, was for the burro, but for whose providential capture in the snag and whose most convenient tail, he would probably have been dashed upon the rapids below. He got nimbly to his feet, though considerably bruised and sore, and hurried up stream the thirty or forty feet to where he had left the animal. As he reached there, he saw that the burro had found shoal water under his feet and was pawing away for a foothold, thus loosening the hold of the snag upon the bottom, and the boy saw the tree begin to shift.

"Don't, Jack," he called, as though he believed the burro could understand, "keep still till I help you out!"

But the companion of the boy's perilous trip took the shouting for encouragement and kicked all the harder, till a few seconds later, amid a swirl of mud and sand, the huge wreck of a tree rolled over and whirled down in the river in a confusion of branches amid which the poor burro seemed to have no chance. The very size of the tree evinced to Roger how furious must be the torrent of the Colorado in the spring floods, for the snag showed that it must have come from a pine not less than thirty inches at the base. The forking, broken and splintered limbs, however, projecting on all sides, caught in the bed of the river now that the stream was low, and this prevented the burro from being swept into the middle of the current, and suddenly, to the surprise and delight of the boy, a swift back eddy caught the animal and threw him up upon the shore.

Roger ran to him, but there was no sign of motion, the poor burro lay quiet as though dead. Heaving a sigh, for their twin peril had made Roger quite fond of the little animal, he turned to go, half-thinking that, if there were any future state for the four-footed part of the world, he would have a candidate to present. Then, sitting on a fallen rock, he put on his boots, his feeling of pride at the great achievement of having crossed the Colorado River only dimmed by his sorrow for his faithful comrade. Before leaving, however, he went back to where the burro lay.

"It's a shame to leave you lying there, Jack," he said, "but there's nothing I can do for you. Of course, I know you're only just a burro, but I do hate to say 'Good-by.'"

There was a great big lump in the boy's throat.

"I'd like to dig a grave, or—or—something," he added, "but I can't. It seems playing it low down on you, Jack, when I couldn't have got across but for you, but there's no help for it. It's got to be good-by!"

He turned away sadly, when, just as he did so, he thought he saw the little burro's side heave. With a shout of delight, he stooped down, though he had not the faintest idea whereabouts to locate the animal's heart, and was feeling for a throb, when, with two or three deep breaths, the burro opened his eyes and staggered to his feet; looking with a mild surprise on Roger, who was dancing the wildest kind of a war-dance round him and whooping enough to make it sound as though the Apaches were on the scalping trail once again.

But while the difficulties of the trip were by no means over, the dangers were now few. Roger knew that he was bound to strike the Indian trail which paralleled the river on the southern side, and that, if he desired still easier going, though probably longer, he had only to follow any of the terraces and he would strike one of the trails. He decided on the latter course, and with Jack following him with absolute docility, he commenced his long trip up the other side of the Canyon. On and on he went, hour after hour passed, when, just as the boy had given up all hope of ever reaching the trail, the burro turned sharply and stood still. The afternoon was drawing on, and between hunger and exhaustion Roger was very nearly played out. Looking up, however, he found he could just discern the edge of the Canyon near the hotel, and he knew that the little black specks upon the brink were people, probably looking down at him, and all unaware of the desperateness of his condition.

His handkerchief had been lost somewhere, so Roger tore off the sleeve of his shirt to wave at the people, and a following glint of white told him that they were waving back. But it was help that he wanted, not greeting, and the boy puzzled his brains to think how he could signal at that distance. Then an idea struck him, and looking up to see that the people were there, he stumbled and fell as though to make them think that he had been hurt or wounded in some way. A rapid increase in the numbers on the edge of the chasm told him that his ruse had succeeded, and in a few minutes he saw several people debouch on the trail, which was only visible for a few yards from the summit.

He pulled himself together and started up the trail, but it was not until it was almost dark that the rescue party found him, the leader being a long, gaunt frontiersman.

"What's your name?" demanded the latter.

"Got anything to eat?" promptly countered Roger, to whom this was the chief need.

The frontiersman signed to one of the party who had brought some provisions along, and after the boy had been somewhat refreshed, the old man said:

"Now tell us whar you've been."

"I've come from the other side, down Bright Angel Canyon," replied Roger tersely, "and I came to get grub for the Survey camp."

Numerous inquiries brought from the boy enough of the story to give the members of the search party a fair idea of what had happened. He was too tired to talk, however, and contented himself with an appeal that Jack should be well looked after, and thereafter satisfied himself with sticking to the saddle of the mule which had been brought down for him to ride. When they reached the hotel the frontiersman walked into the rotunda with the boy, and as they stood before the desk, he turned to the crowd assembled and said:

"Ladies and gents, I'm no speechmaker, but I reckon we hadn't ought to let this young feller hit the bunk before we tell him what we think of a chap who is plucky enough to blaze a new trail across the Grand Canyon, and the first time in its history to cross it alone with one burro. This is Roger Doughty, ladies and gents, the first white man to cross the Grand Canyon alone."

Immediately all the curiosity-hunters that hang about those sight-seeing hotels crowded around the boy, but he would have nothing to say, and was far too wearied to undertake to tell his story. Bidding the clerk have all the supplies ordered for him early in the morning he turned to go, when his new friend, the frontiersman, said:

"Did you reckon to go back yourself with the grub?"

"Sure. To-morrow," said the boy. "That is, if I can get a little sleep to-night," he added pettishly.

"Then I'll go with you, boy. You've done a thing that will be talked about in Arizona, I guess, as long as the Colorado River flows. It isn't right for you to tackle the trip back alone, and anyway, I know the trail better than you do. An' what's more, you sleep till I call you myself to-morrow, and I'll see that all the supplies are ready and packed for the start. I'm an old hand at the game, bub, and you can leave it all to me."

Roger thanked him and once more turned to go to bed when he was intercepted by another group. The frontiersman stepped forward.

"The kid's going to hit the pillow," he announced, "an' I reckon that he's earned it. Any one that tries to stop him can talk a while to me. Go on up, bub," which Roger, portentously yawning, proceeded to do.

So, laughing at the mixture of friendliness and bravado exhibited by the boy's lanky champion, the people stood aside while Roger stumbled upstairs and fell on a bed asleep. A few minutes later the big frontiersman followed him, and seeing him dead to the world with all his clothes on, even his hat being still crushed over his eyebrows; picked him up on his knee, took off his clothes and tucked him in as tenderly as his mother might have done, the boy never even growing restless in his sleep the while. That done, the burly Westerner, whose touch had been throughout as light as that of a woman, looked down on the sleeping boy.

"If that's the kind the government breeds," he said, "no wonder we can whip the earth!" and he went down to arrange about the next day's trip.

In the meanwhile the Survey party had progressed rapidly with its work, and on the afternoon following Roger's arrival at the hotel, they returned to the main camp. They thought it strange, as they rode in, that Roger should not have heard the horses' hoofs and come out to greet them, and Masseth felt a slight alarm lest the hurt to Roger's wrist should have proved more serious than was at first thought. On reaching the main tent, however, he saw a large piece of paper, held down by a stone. He picked it up. It was written, boy-like, as an official report, and read as follows:

"By the eternal jumping crickets!" was Masseth's first astonished exclamation. Then, calling to the cook, "George," he said, "come here a moment!"

The cook came over and the chief handed him the letter. George read it through carefully twice, then handed it back.

"I got a chance to get a long price for some pretty stale grub, and it looked to me like a good stunt. How was I goin' to know that bally chump of a teamster was plannin' to get sick?"

"But the boy!"

"It's sure tough on the boy. It's a beast of a trip, even if he's sure of the trail."

"But he's only been over it once, and he could never remember that confusion of canyons." He turned sharply on the cook. "It's your fault," he said; "you ought to know better than to let yourself run out. It's never safe to go without some on hand for contingencies."

The cook thought it wiser not to increase his superior's anger by replying, so went to the cooking tent to try to devise some sort of a meal from the remnants that had been brought from the side camp. As for Masseth, the more he thought of the situation the less likely did it seem that the boy could have found his way, but he could have struck water somewhere, so that perhaps search parties organized on the other side might have a chance of finding him, but every hour counted. He talked it over with the assistant.

"Well," answered Black, "of course the dark's confusing, but with both of us watching the trail and knowing the landmarks, we can't get far astray. And we might drop across the lad. I'm ready to start any minute you say."

Masseth thought for a moment, then pointed with his finger to the chasm.

"I don't believe any of us would be comfortable to-night," he said, "knowing that the lad was down there, when for all we know he may be dying of starvation and the loneliness of desolation, just within our reach. A bite to eat, whatever there is, and then an immediate start."

Gathered to the hasty and scanty supper, the cook found himself in a position of extreme discomfort, though no blame was attached to him. He had acted for the best and this result could not have been foreseen. Perhaps it was because his nerves were unusually upon the strain that he was the first to hear a sound along the chasm. He held up his hand to enjoin silence, and in a moment or two horses' hoofs and voices were heard. Then, looming unnaturally large in the last flush of twilight before the darkness fell, came two figures, one on a tall iron-gray horse, one on a mule, with a burro plodding along patiently behind.

A stentorian voice hailed them from the distance.

"Hey, there!" it said.

"Well?" called back Masseth.

The second of the oncomers answered, this time in a boy's voice.

"Oh, Mr. Masseth, have you been back long?"

"It's the boy," said the topographer solemnly, but with a note of joy in his voice, "and his life won't be laid at my door;" the soberness of words and tone revealing how keenly the fear of Roger's peril had been pressing on him.

When the two rode up the boy introduced his frontiersman friend to the chief of the party, the while he was being untied from the saddle, to which, in his still exhausted and stiffened state, he had been fastened. But introductions, however informal, did not stop the big Westerner from speaking his mind.

"I'm thinkin' there's some thunderin' big fools in this here party," he announced in his abrupt way, "that can get matters into such a hole that a youngster has to start off on a crazy trip like that, but I want to state that the boy is pay dirt all through. He's not only crossed the Canyon alone, but he's found a new trail!"

"Where?" asked Masseth eagerly, thinking it wiser to ignore the stranger's criticism rather than debate the point.

"Down Bright Angel Canyon, Mr. Masseth," answered the boy. "It wasn't so awfully bad, except in a few places."

"But how did you get through?"

"I went down by the spring," answered Roger, "keeping to the right, until I got wedged in between two cliffs, pink in color with a broad band of slate blue about two-thirds of the way up."

"That's usually a bad wall!" interjected Masseth. "How did you cross it?"

Roger described the device he had used, and received the encomiums of all his comrades for the work, and then, as briefly as he could, gave an outline of the various points of interest on the way.

He was especially gratified, when, after telling how he had got out of the pocket of rock, Masseth turned to his assistant.

"We'll chart that as Doughty Point," he said, "for the boy's sake."

The boy flushed with delight at having his name given to a part of the country, just like a real explorer, and cast a grateful look at his chief.

"It was just beyond that that I struck water. The ravine sloped abruptly for about one hundred feet, then struck an upcurving rock and gave a little jump like a fellow does on skis and fell like a long silver ribbon for about two hundred feet. I suppose that is Bright Angel Creek?"

"And rightly named," put in the assistant topographer, nodding his head affirmatively, "any stream that doesn't run dry in this sort of country is angelic, all right."

Roger continued his story of the trip, describing points which he had noted, Masseth naming them, "Deva Temple," "Brahma Temple," "Zoroaster Temple," etc., and at last he fixed the route by its relation to "Cheops Pyramid," one of the well-known configurations of the Canyon.

"But on which side of the creek were you, when you saw the pyramid?" asked the chief.

"On the other side from it," answered Roger.

"If you had only crossed once more, or once less, it would have brought you to the main trail where the boat is," said Masseth regretfully. "But how in the world did you cross?"

So Roger told the story of the burro, and the manner in which he had been caught in the crotch of a snag; and the party, though old hands at the business, hung on his tale as though they had been so many greenhorns. He told, moreover, as well as he could, his route up the other side, until the frontiersman took up the story from the point where the lad had been seen by the spectators on the edge of the Canyon, near the hotel.

The last few sentences of the boy's story had been somewhat incoherent, for the long trip of that day, following his arduous experiences alone had been too much for him, and he could not keep his eyes open. He was promptly taken to his tent and bidden to sleep, the while the frontiersman described enthusiastically the boy's pluck and nerve.

"And I thought, by thunder," he concluded, "that the overschooled kids of this generation were a pack of milksops, but I see there's grit in an American boy yet!"

CHAPTER VIII
THE LAND WHERE IT NEVER RAINS

A couple of lazy weeks passed by rapidly, lazy because the Westerner insisted on doing all the work that needed to be done, and before they were over Roger found that he had nearly regained his full strength, his wiry frame recuperating without loss of vitality. Masseth, on his return, was much gratified to find how well the boy had got along, and the following week he took him alone to one of the most prominent stations on the northern side.

"Now, Roger," Masseth said to him, "I've just about finished what I want to do on this side, so I'm going across to run a level on the other side. But I'm very anxious to get a clear sight of this peak, where we're standing, for an extensive triangulation, in order to correct or rather verify some results. The only way in which this can be done is to flash a heliograph message to me, at a certain time on a certain day, in the way I showed you last week."

"Across seven miles?" asked the boy in amazement.

"More than that," said his chief, smiling. "Now here is the way you had better get at it. In this box, which you see has been securely fastened to the rock, are two pieces of tin, one with a quarter of an inch hole in it, the other with a hole an inch square. They point, with mathematical correctness, to a peak on the other side, which is an old station, and easily seen. If you look through, you can see the place."

Roger bent down, and looking through the aperture was able to determine a slight projection on the far distant bank, which he described and which was in verity the point sought.

"Now," continued Masseth, "two months hence, or to be more exact, sixty days from now, at eight o'clock in the morning, I will be waiting at that point on the other side, and I shall expect you to be here. Over the further piece of tin, as you see, I have hung a cloth, which you can drop while you are testing the glass. In this movable frame, so devised that it can be screwed up or down, or shifted slightly sideways, arrange the glass so that the reflection of it, shining through the larger hole, appears at an equal distance on all sides of the smaller opening. You understand me?"

"Quite, Mr. Masseth," answered the boy, who had been listening with all his ears.

"Very well," the older man continued. "At eight o'clock sharp, then, you will raise quickly the curtain in front of the smaller hole, and drop it again, doing this three times, allowing the hole to remain open for ten seconds each time. Do that every five minutes for half an hour, or six times in all, to allow for any possible variation of time in your watch. By the way, you had better have two watches in the event of one of them stopping or the hands catching, or something of that sort, because a month's work will depend on getting that signal. But I think I can trust you."

"You can, indeed, Mr. Masseth," said Roger. "But what shall I be doing during those two months? Am I to remain alone in camp?"

"Hardly," said his chief, smiling. "The Survey does not waste men that way. Mr. Mitchon has written me that Mr. Herold desires you should have an insight into the varied work of the department, and I have arranged for another topographic aid to meet me on the other side, so that, except for this heliograph signal, which I must remind you is excessively important, you will have finished with the work here."

"Then what?"

"Death Valley and the Mohave Desert," replied his chief. "It is perhaps a little hard to send you into a hot section of the country at this time of year, but, you see, you cannot go too far away because of your engagement with the sun on a morning two months hence—by the way, if it is cloudy, which is so rare a contingency as scarcely to be reckoned on, signal the next morning at the same hour—so you must stay near by, and the most interesting work at hand is that being done in the waterless country."