"Come! Mount again, Enoch! I
want to have lunch at the river."
Enoch was sullen as they started on but his sullenness did not last
long. As his fear receded, his curiosity increased. He gazed about
him with absorbed interest, and he began to bombard the guide with
questions in genuine boy fashion.
"How far is it to the river? Do we have any steeper trails than the
ones we've been on, already? Did any one ever swim across the river?
Was any one ever killed when he minded what the guide told him? What
guys camp in the Indian gardens? How much does it cost? Did any one
ever climb up the side of the Canyon, say like one yonder where it
looked like different colored stair steps going up? Did any one ever
find gold in the canyon? How did they know it when they found it? Did
Frank ever do any mining? What was placer mining?" And on and on,
only the intermittently returning fear of the trail silencing him until
Frank ordered him to dismount in a narrow chasm within sight of the
roaring, muddy Colorado.
"One of the ways Seaton employed to persuade me to take care of you for
a week was by telling me you were a very silent kid," added the guide.
Nucky grinned sheepishly, and turned to stare wonderingly at the black
walls that here closed in upon them breathlessly.
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