ntain, where you can
look down on the grandest scene in the world," said he. "Two hundred
miles of wind-worn rock, all smooth and bare, without a single straight
line--canyon, caves, bridges--the most wonderful country in the world!
Even the Indians haven't explored it. It's haunted, for them, and they
have strange gods. The Navajos will hunt on this side of the mountain,
but not on the other. That north side is consecrated ground. My wife
has long been trying to get the Navajos to tell her the secret of
Nonnezoshe. Nonnezoshe means Rainbow Bridge. The Indians worship it, but
as far as she can find out only a few have ever seen it. I imagine it'd
be worth some trouble."

"Maybe that's the bridge Venters talked about--the one overarching the
entrance to Surprise Valley," Said Shefford.

"It might be," replied the trader. "You've got a good chance of finding
out. Nas Ta Bega is the man. You stick to that Indian. ... Well, we
start down here into this canyon, and we go down some, I reckon. In
half an hour you'll see sago-lilies and Indian paint-brush and vermilion
cactus."

. . . . . . . . . . .

About the middle of the afternoon the pack-train and its drivers arrived
at the hidden Mormon village. Nas Ta Bega had not returned from his
scout back along the trail.

Shefford's sensibilities had all been overstrained, but he had left in
him enthusiasm and appreciation that made the situation of this village
a fairyland. It was a valley, a canyon floor, so long that he could
not see the end, and perhaps a quarter of a mile wide. The air was hot,
still, and sweetly odorous of unfamiliar flowers. Pinyon and cedar trees
surrounded the little log and stone houses, and along the walls of the
canyon stood sharp-pointed, dark-green spruce-trees. These walls were
singular of shape and color. They were not imposing in height, but they
waved like the long, undulating swell of a sea. Every foot of surface
was perfectly smooth, and the long curved lines of darker tinge that
streaked the red followed the rounded line of the slope at the top. Far
above, yet overhanging, were great yellow crags and peaks, and between
these, still higher, showed the pine-fringed slope of Navajo Mountain
with snow in the sheltered places, and glistening streams, like silver
threads, running down.

All this Shefford noticed as he entered the valley from round a corner
of wall. Upon nearer view he saw and heard a host of children, who,
looking up to see t