hostler take charge of this little matter for you—the return of the
burros by freight, or whichever way the owner decides,” offered Mr.
Walters.
After another short conference it was decided to act as the manager of
the hotel had advised; then Mr. Gilroy sent a telegram to Trinidad to be
delivered at the horse-ranch of the man who had rented him the animals.
Everything in connection with facilitating the departure of the
scout-party for the Navajo Desert moved along without a hitch. Tally
came in on the freight which was due just after midnight, and Mr. Gilroy
met him to assist in getting the horses over to the stables.
“Boss, dey so fresh dey mek plenty kick on the car from Laguna. Mebbe I
not glad it no so far to Gallop, or dey kick off side of train,”
explained Tally.
“They will have a jaunt to-morrow, my boy, that’ll take out all that
pep!” laughed Mr. Gilroy. Then he outlined the plan as Mr. Walters had
proposed it, and which every one, but Tally, heartily approved of.
“I go ’long all ’lone wid dem fresh horses?” inquired Tally, dubiously.
“You won’t have the three burros to bother with, and the horses will
have the outfit to carry,” explained Mr. Gilroy.
“Mebbe we ’rive at the Mission an’ mebbe we don’. Tally’s money goes on
the gamble dat we never see Mission, so!”
“What then—what would you say?” demanded Mr. Gilroy.
“Boss, you not live wid dem hosses lek me, and now I tell you troof when
I say dey run away on me sure es shootin’. One guide no good holdin’ in
bunch ’a ’leben galavantin’ hosses. No!”
“Think I could help you?”
“Mebbe Boss an’ Meesr Verny do. Mebbe need good extra hand to help,”
said the guide.
“All right, Tally. Mr. Vernon and I will send scouts in automobile and
we will help you drive the animals to St. Michael’s Mission,” agreed Mr.
Gilroy.
This quieted the Indian’s doubts and Mr. Gilroy left him to finish the
last bed for his horses, and went to the hotel to bed.
The only change in the program, therefore, was that both men, instead of
motoring with the scouts over the road which ran to the edge of the
Navajo Land, were to ride with Tally and lead the extra horses to the
Mission. Mr. Walters had secured two cars, one of which was equipped
with a large rack at the back. This suggested a good idea to Julie.
“Verny, why not strap the tents and kitchen stove on that rack?”
“Yes, Captain; gasoline ‘ain’t got no feelin’s,’ but horse-flesh has. By
making the motor do the work we spare our horses,” said Joan.
“Just what we’ll do!” declared the Captain. “Maybe we can pack away the
utensils in Gilly’s and Verny’s places in the car.”
Thus they started: the Captain and four girls with their suit-cases in
one car, three girls and as much of the camp outfit as would go
comfortably into the spare room in the second car.
The road was good, the day was fine, the two automobiles roomy and
comfortable, and the drivers experienced; hence the trip from Gallup to
the Mission was delightful. The scouts kept up a rapidfire of calls to
Mrs. Vernon to look.
“Oh, Verny! Look at that Indian riding across the mesa going like the
West Wind!” called Judith,
“Captain! Do look at that little Navajo babe riding that broncho
_bareback_! How does he manage to stick on?” shouted Joan,
“Quick! Turn around and see that cute little thing minding the flock of
sheep!” gurgled Amy.
“Oh, dear! Just _look_ at that coloring of the mesa! Was ever such
wonderful tones made for us to use in Art?” sighed Betty.
Many more similar demands were made upon Mrs. Vernon’s attention until
she wondered that her head was not twisted off with its continual
turning.
After leaving Gallup the trail ran up to the high northern mesa, higher
and higher, where the air was as exhilarating as the atmosphere at
Acoma. Here the scouts saw as gorgeous flowers as those at the Enchanted
Mesa, and twice they stopped the cars in order to add strange specimens
to their collections at home. One of these odd blossoms was a sort of
snake-plant, said the chauffeur. It had a long seedpod instead of a
flower, and this pod was colored and marked like a diamond-backed
rattler of the Rockies. The other queer plant was the pricklypear cactus
with its great exotic blooms.
The cars resumed their running, and the trail resumed its upward grade.
“I wonder where the jumping-off place might be?” laughed Julie, as they
gazed up and up and still up the mesa.
The machines topped the grade after a time, and suddenly, quite as
unexpectedly as the mountain had vanished and left the valley revealed
before the amazed scouts the day of the trip to the Acoma pueblo, now
the trail seemed to end on top of the world and there——!
“Well! is this another mirage where the lights and shadows play hide and
seek in those ever-changing clouds of blue, lilac, rose and gold
colors?” wondered Mrs. Vernon aloud.
“Look down there! That simply can’t be earth, but an ocean of purple and
green waves constantly rolling over and over each other to break
up—where?” exclaimed Julie.
“Those mountain peaks prove that this is no mirage, Verny, it is the
real thing! However, it doesn’t seem natural, but heavenly,” added Amy
in a whisper.
“That’s the beginning of the Painted Desert,” said the man at the wheel,
then he started the automobile again.
“Why!” gasped Joan, “that isn’t a desert, at all!”
“It looks more like Egypt to me,” said Mrs. Vernon.
“Visitors do say that it reminds them more of the Holy Land than any
place in the world,” explained the driver.
“It’s perfectly marvelous,” breathed Betty, who had been silent
heretofore.
After several hours of further driving through this unusual country, the
car came to a stop at St. Michael’s Mission. Mr. Walters had given Mrs.
Vernon a splendid letter of introduction to the father in charge of the
Mission, and the father, being a staunch friend of the manager’s,
welcomed the guests warmly.
After the drivers had been refreshed with lunch they bid the scouts
good-day and started on their homeward trip. The packs had been left at
the shed of the Mission House, and then the girls, with their Captain,
were shown about the quaint little town. What surprised them most was
the cleanliness and perfect manners of the natives they met.
The three riders with their string of horses rode in at St. Michael’s
long after sundown, without having had any mishaps or delays. Tally was
sent to a low shed with the animals, and the two dusty men were escorted
to a small room where they might brush off and clean up. Water was
scarce in this section of the land; therefore the dry and dusty riders
were warned about wasting a drop of it.
When all were convened again in the Mission’s front room, the father
said he wished them to visit the Navajo School, where the boys and girls
were educated. This, he explained, would interest them all, as the
building would compete with any public school in the East, and the
deportment of the pupils caused visiting teachers to marvel.
“The ladies may remain over-night at the school-convent, and I shall be
delighted to entertain you men as my guests,” added the father, thus
relieving the minds of the scouts as to a possible sleeping place that
night.
The entire party went with the father to see the children and to partake
of supper in the refectory, but it looked as if the sisters had been
warned of the expected guests: the swarthy little Navajos were out in
the playgrounds having a fine time. Some were enjoying true American
games, and some were walking or reading in secluded corners of the
grounds.
Vespers were attended with deep reverence by the little ones who so
shortly before had been racing about like mad. Then, after the evening
prayers, they were taken to supper. Meantime, the Mother Superior came
and welcomed the scout-party with a wonderful smile that glowed in their
hearts because it was genuine hospitality that gave it birth.
“We will now sup in the refectory, my friends,” said the Superior,
leading the way to a room where the table was set for her and the
visitors. And such delicious viands as the girls were given for supper
that night! Julie could not help whispering to Joan, who sat next to
her: “Where do they get the things to cook such wonderful goodies?”
“S-sh!” whispered Joan in reply. “Say nothing, but keep busy at it,
Jule! We shall never have another chance like this.”
“Now, my friends, if you have supped, we will go out and please the
children by watching them at their native games. They particularly
wished to show the girl scouts of the East some new and entertaining
pastimes,” said Superior, rising, and then bending her head in
thanksgiving for the food. Every one in the party did likewise, for each
one felt the joy of giving thanks to the Power that gave others such
love as was being shown in this Navajo Mission by helping those less
fortunate in education and ways of the civilized world.
“Not but that the Indians had their own civilization long before
Americus Vespucius ever discovered the land!” said Julie to Mrs. Vernon.
“Yes, but it isn’t the same kind of civilization, and so it does not
count with the world and its stereotyped laws of society,” whispered the
Captain in reply.
They followed the Superior out to the play-ground where a circle of
sconces made of pitch and a form of cactus fiber lighted the place as
well as any one could expect for an outdoor entertainment. After the
guests were seated upon rude benches the games began.
One of the sweet-faced convent teachers came forward and said: “John
Sweetwater wishes to entertain the visitors by doing a problem play for
them to guess. John, come forward.”
Thereupon a slender, graceful lad came smilingly forward and, without
self-consciousness or egotism, began his story. In the words Julie
wrote for the _Elmertown Record_ it was as follows:
“White Feather was fine scout who know much of wild-wood life, but
some time he little know how to apply his lesson to his wants. One
day he alone in camp. Him friends go on long walk-path, but White
Feather lazy and no like walk on warm day. He say he get sleep for
hour when camp quiet.
“We-e-ll—White Feather find sun very hot as shine on tee pee, and
it make air too hot for sleep inside. Now he ’member a cool shade
under pine trees, so he move tee pee over, but now he no find how
to raise tee pee once again. He work and work and now he pitch so
it stand alright, but it very difrent like before. And so he make
it stand: He take the nine pegs and drive ’em in ground like
this:”
Then John demonstrated the trick. He took nine sticks and pushed them
into the soft earth, then he took a small rope that represented the tent
line, and this he wound back and forth about the sticks till he had
_ten_ straight rows formed of the line. Each row was complete and each
line was part of an angle. Then he looked over at the scouts and smiled
as he said: “How White Feather do?”
With a bow he retired and the sister smiled as she said: “John wants to
know if the girl scouts will try and do his trick?”
The girl scouts, in duty bound, tried to accomplish the trick which had
looked so simple, but they found it was not so easy as it had seemed.
Finally, while the young Navajos smiled delightedly, they had to give it
up. Then the young lad explained how it was done.
“We now will hear a class game which the pupils like very much,”
announced the teacher, glancing at a memorandum she held. She then
called upon certain pupils and they got up with alacrity to take their
places as designated.
“This game, I must explain to the visitors, is called our Nature Game.
Each player chooses a profession for himself, such as canoeman,
forester, birdman, star-gazer, hunter, swimmer and so on. Each one who
chooses his work must be well acquainted with all the lines of that
choice. For instance, the fisherman must know twenty different kinds of
fish and describe them; the birdman must know twenty kinds of birds; the
forester, twenty kinds of trees; and so on through the game.”
The teacher next proceeded to place the players in such a manner that no
one of them could whisper and help another, though the Superior
explained that there was more honor in class studies with these young
Indians than one finds in white schools.
“Now, friends, I begin to tell a story, and during the course of my
telling I find I am at a loss for the information I need, so I have to
call upon my aids to assist me. Are you all ready, aids?” The Navajos
laughingly nodded and waited eagerly for the sister to begin. Then
followed a lively contest between the pupils.
The young Navajos proved to be splendid entertainers in this Nature
Game, as well as in other ways the teachers suggested, and the Girl
Scouts spoke as they felt when it was time to retire: “We wish all our
friends might have been here to-night and have enjoyed this hour as we
have.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE PAINTED DESERT
Julie had spoken to Mrs. Vernon about writing to Ranger Sanderson and
the Captain wisely advised: “No harm in writing, Jule, as long as you
stick to general topics of interest. Eliminate personalities and _any_
form of endearing terms.”
Julie had laughed as she answered: “No fear of any swain being able to
produce a letter from me in which I have called him anything more
intimate than the ‘dear sir.’ I’m not wasting any emotions on them,
because I need to conserve my soul-power in accomplishing my main
ambition in life. When I am a successful writer, Verny, then I may
dabble in human emotions in order to be better able to transfer them to
paper.”
This was the first time Julie had actually spoken of her choice of a
profession in life, and Mrs. Vernon smiled as she patted her on the
head. But she was not aware that Julie was sensitive over her choice of
writing and feared the ridicule or amused smiles of her friends, in
case of failure, or partial success.
Consequently, Julie wrote friendly letters to the Ranger, but used
discretion in her manner of addressing him, as well as in her signature.
Before leaving St. Michael’s, therefore, Julie left a long letter
addressed to Sanderson, in which she told of the visit in Gallup and the
subsequent trip and visit to the Mission.
The cavalcade of scouts left their hosts filled with gratitude for the
donation of a check to advance the splendid work in the Mission.
Tally had secured three fine pack-horses, and a Navajo guide as well,
for the Desert trip, and now all rode forward with eager spirits.
“It doesn’t seem a bit like the Desert as I pictured it,” remarked
Hester, glancing at the park-like vista of yellow pine and patches of
wild flowers through which the trail ran.
“If you consider how high we are up on these mesas, you’ll not wonder at
the springs we feel inside us—springs that make us want to jump up and
down in very lightness,” said Joan, comically.
“Talking of springs—I notice there aren’t many to be seen along the
trail,” remarked Mr. Vernon.
“And the lack of water accounts for the absence of birds and beasts, the
guide just told me,” added the Captain.
“I’m glad we followed Lorenzo’s advice and filled our thermos bottles,
as well as the water-bags, before we left the Mission,” said Mr. Gilroy.
That noon they all were glad for that water. After many miles had been
reeled off by the horses’ hoofs on the trail, the Navajo guide, whose
name was Lorenzo shortened to Lo, led the way down from the high mesa.
Down, down, they rode, until, finally, the trail came to an arroyo bed,
where, a short distance ahead, the scouts saw a typical village.
“This call Ganado trading-post. We mek good camp there for night,” said
Lo, riding up to the adobe settlement.
“What a picturesque hamlet,” said Mr. Gilroy, gazing at the graceful
natives—the women in their gay blankets, the children in Mother Nature’s
garb.
“A hamlet without Hamlet,” giggled Joan.
“Hamlet without the ham, you mean,” retorted Julie, laughing. “I see
only goats and sheep.”
It now became apparent why their Navajo guide had chosen the name of
Lorenzo in place of a Navajo name—it was because of the esteem in which
the Indian held the “Great White Man,” Lorenzo Hubbell, the well-known
settler who has made history for Arizona during his life on the edge of
the Desert. Rightly this man has been called “King of Northern Arizona,”
but, unlike many monarchs, this one is beloved and reverenced by his
people, the Navajos.
That night, the second in Navajo Land, the scout party was entertained
by native dances and songs by the Indians in Ganado, and then they
retired to the hospitable Mission House owned by the “King.”
Early the next morning the tourists set out, carrying a pair of
water-kegs slung across the back of one of the pack-horses. The air was
as “heady” as champagne, though the scouts were not acquainted with the
effect of that wine, taking Mr. Gilroy’s word for it that it was a
stimulant that immediately induced the drinker to feel full of life and
free of care, but later would leave traces of wormwood in his soul. Not
so this atmosphere of the mesa.
“No wormwood as an aftermath here,” said Mr. Vernon.
As the trail dropped down from Ganado, the scouts rode past _hogans_
where the sheep were corraled in the most primitive manner. Navajo
children were seen driving their flocks of sheep to the water and back
again.
After riding for a time, Lo pointed out to his party a rim of distant
peaks which looked a lilac and green with snow at the tips—“Them San
Francisco Mountains,” said he.
The scouts traveled over the miles and miles of gray sea of sage-brush,
the delicate perfume of the sage-blossoms greeting their nostrils in a
haunting scent. After riding for hours across the mesa, the wonders ever
increasing, the tourists came to a forest of cedars. Still going on
through these woods that appeared to stretch out and onward forever,
the trail continued to descend without the riders realizing the fact.
Finally Lo reined in his horse at a spring which was guarded by a wall
of stone; upon the face of the stone were stern rules and laws cut in by
“first tourists” regarding the value of water in the desert.
“This water-pool ha’f-way to Keam’s,” said Lo, as Tally and he started
the dinner.
“Where will you camp to-night, Lo?” asked Mrs. Vernon.
“Mek camp here, Captain; plenty water, good shelter for hoss; early
mornin’ we go on trail to Keam’s Cañon. Not to-day. Hard ride all day,
better good rest for scout and beast.”
After dinner the scouts started to explore this wonderful spot, but that
night the scouts found to their surprise that they were muscle sore.
“This is funny, Captain, because we never felt stiff or sore when we
first started on the trail at Raton,” remarked Julie.
“And the three green Tenderfeet—they never seemed to mind the riding at
all; but now look at them limping around like ‘Mrs. Jarley’s Wax
Works,’” commented Joan.
“I know why!” said Hester. “Lo said it was the aftermath of living at
such altitudes in New Mexico, and now coming to lower levels once more.”
The scouts slept out on the open desert that night, the soft
purplish-blue sky seeming to come down to blanket them, and the stars
apparently near enough to be reached and their light switched off, as
one does to the electric lights in a Pullman berth.
But shortly after midnight the air became so cold that Tally and Lo got
up to build a fire, around which the shivering scouts could crowd, and
finally go to sleep again.
After an early breakfast, where the hot coffee proved to be the most
acceptable item on the menu, the scout-party resumed the ride across the
Desert.
They were about ten miles along the trail when Lo reined in his horse
and consulted with Tally in a low tone. The two dashed their horses up
to the crest of a rock and gazed anxiously across the waste to the
lavender-tinted horizon.
“Shure’s shootin’ he’em comin’,” said Tally to his companion.
The scouts had halted their horses to see and hear why the guides had
acted so strangely.
“Lo say one big sand-storm blow up. We get ready queek for he’em. Scouts
get goggles and caps out of bags, ’en we ride far as we can get to rocks
ahead,” said Tally, as soon as he came within hearing.
“Oh, goodness me! I hope this isn’t going to be another experience like
that one on the Bad Lands in the Colorado Rockies!” cried Anne, who
claimed that she never did get over the effects of all the alkali dust
she inhaled that day.
“It may be necessary for us, Anne,” replied Julie, hoping to encourage
the girls. “We’ve not eaten our usual peck of sand this year, you know.
Now we have to have it all in one swallow.”
Meanwhile every one was busy getting ready to battle with the simoon, or
sand-storm, as the Indians call it.
Finally it began to be felt. The wind, which had been increasing in its
velocity ever since the guides returned from the lookout crest, now blew
the dust-like grains of sand across the desert and soon obliterated all
trails and other land-marks. But the horses battled on, urged by their
riders to reach the upthrust of mesa which was now but half a mile
ahead.
Before the scouts could more than hope to reach the scanty protection of
this irregular formation of rock and yellow pumice, the storm was
blowing in all its fury. Several times the horses, first one, then
another, lost footing and slithered half-over in the drifting sand.
Joan’s horse heretofore had been considered one of the best mounts in
the group, but in the test of endurance it failed to measure up to the
Indian ponies bought at the Mission, or with the raw-boned animals the
other scouts were riding.
Every scout was now fighting a single-handed battle with the hurricane,
fighting the stinging, blinding sand while trying to guide the horse
after the Indians who led the way. The great billows of dust were caught
up in clouds and were kept driving over the waste-lands in such volume
as to create a panic in any heart.
Then came the unexpected. From somewhere near by—possibly the whirling
gale brought it from the very same rocky haven they were
seeking—something as large as an orange struck Joan’s horse on the side
of the face. The half-crazed animal failed to respond to his driver,
and, in one leap, was away from the rest of the riders.
Down a hilly declivity dug out by the gale went the mad horse, sliding
upon its haunches with Joan almost standing upright in the stirrups.
Then up a sand-dune, staggering and pulling on the reins till his rider
was dizzy with the swaying. Finally the beast reached a gravel-pit
whence the covering of sand had just been swept up and the next blanket
of sand had not yet been deposited. Momentum sent him sliding down into
this yawning pit.
Instantly Joan saw she must force the breathless animal up out of this
hollow or they both would be buried alive. Her breath came like blasts
from an exhaust pipe, her eyes flamed as with a thousand fiery sparks,
the blood pounded in her head with triphammer regularity, still the
scout could think, and think she did!
With a mighty effort she pulled on the tightly gathered reins and
fairly lifted her horse up the bank of the hollow. His hoofs slipped in
the shifting sand, but at last he stumbled up to the edge. Here, for a
sickening moment, he tottered uncertainly in the blast of the simoon.
Joan leaned far over his neck and commanded. He obeyed. In another
minute he was galloping at the end of the line of horses which was now
turning to the left to the mass of rock.
No one had missed Joan, as the heavy sheets of wind-driven sand had been
so persistent that each rider was fully occupied with his or her horse.
Not until after the storm had blown over were the scouts aware of Joan’s
narrow escape.
Resuming the trail, and gazing again at the wonderful colorings of land
and sky, the scout-party rode on until they hailed the Navajo children,
with their goats and sheep, taking them to drink, and then entered
Ream’s Cañon, where they rested the weary horses and spent the night in
the hospitable shelter provided by the white trader.
The following morning the scouts visited the monument commemorating Kit
Carson, the famous pioneer in the west; they attended the school where
several hundred Navajo and Moki Indian children are taught, and they
secured the necessary permits to continue the trail across the Painted
Desert. Obtaining the permit was not difficult, because every one in
Ream’s Cañon knew Lorenzo and he vouched for his party.