Wingle, immersed in the novel, read for a while and then glanced up questioningly.

Sundown shook his head.

“Now this here story,” said Wingle; “I read her forty-three times come next round-up, and blamed if I sabe her yet.  Now, take it where the perfesser—­a slim gent with large round eye-glasses behind which twinkled a couple of deep-set studyus eyes—­so the book says; now, take it where he talks about them Hopi graves over there in the valley—­”

“This here valley?” queried Sundown, immediately interested.

“Sure!  Well, I can sabe all that.  I seen ’em.”

“Seen ’em?”

“Sure!  Why Arizona’s got more leavin’s of history and dead Injuns and such, right on top of the ground, than any other State in the Union.  Why, right over there in the canon of the Concho there’s a hull ruined Injun village—­stones piled up in little circles, and what was huts and caves and the leavin’s of a old irrigatin’ ditch and busted ollas, and bones and arrow-heads and picture-writin’ on the rocks—­bears and eagles and mounting-lions and hosses—­scratched right on the rocks.  Them cliffs there is covered with it.”

“Them?” queried Sundown, pointing toward the canon, “Do they charge anything to see it?”

“Well, seein’ they been dead about a thousand years, I reckon not.”

“A thousand years!  Huh!  I ain’t scared of no Injuns a thousand years old.  How far is it to them picture-things?”

“’Bout three mile.  You can take a hoss and mosey over if you like.  Figure on gettin’ back ’round noon.”

“Any snakes over there?”

“Comf’table thick.  You might get a pretty good mess of ’em, if you was to take your time.  I never bother to look for ’em.”

Sundown gazed at his length of nether limb and sighed.

“Snakes won’t bother you none,” said Wingle, reassuringly.  “They get tired, same as anybody, and they’d have to climb too fur to see if you was to home.”

Sundown rose and saddled a horse.  He mounted and rode slowly toward the rim of the distant canon.  At the canon’s brink, he dismounted and led his horse down the trail, stopping frequently to gaze in wonderment at the painted cliffs and masses of red rock strewn along the slopes.  High up on the perpendicular face of the canon walls he saw many caves and wondered how they came to be there.  “Makes a fella feel like sayin’ his prayers,” he muttered.  “Wisht I knowed one.”

He drifted on down the trail, which wound around huge fragments of rock riven from the cliffs in prehistoric days.  He was awed by the immensity of the chasm and talked continuously to his horse which shuffled along behind paying careful attention to the footing.  Arrived at the stream the horse drank.  Sundown mounted and rode along the narrow level paralleling the river course.  The canon widened, and before he realized it he was in a narrow valley carpeted with