“Thanks!  And now set me to work, Captain,” said Enoch.

The way beside the falls was nothing more than a narrow ledge completely covered with giant bowlders.  Beyond the falls, the river hurled itself for a quarter of a mile against broken rocks that made the passage of a boat impossible.  It was a long portage.  After the bowlder-strewn ledge was passed, however, it was not necessary to make trail, for although the shore was strewn with broken rock and driftwood, the way was fairly open.

After the contents of the boats had been made up into rough packs, both crews attacked the trail-making.  It was mid-morning before pick-ax, shovel and crowbar had opened up a way which Jonas claimed was fit only for kangaroos or elephants.  Rough as it was, when Milton declared it fit for their purposes, the rest without protest heaved the packs to their shoulders.

It was hot at midday in the Canyon.  The thermometer registered 98 degrees in the shade.  Enoch, following Milton, dropped his third pack at the end of the quarter mile portage and sat down beside it.

“Old man!” he groaned, “you’ve got to give me a ten minutes’ rest.”

Milton grinned and nodded sympathetically.  “Take all the time you want, Judge!”

“I’m ashamed,” said Enoch, “but don’t forget you fellows have had ten months of this, as against my two days.”

“I don’t forget for a minute, Judge.  And just let me tell you that if ever I were on trial for a serious offense of any kind I’d be perfectly satisfied to be tried before a real he-man, like you.”  And Milton disappeared over the trail, leaving Enoch with a warm glow in his heart, such as he had scarcely felt since his first public speech won the praise of the newspapers.

For a quarter of an hour he sat with his back against a half buried mesquite log smoking, and now eying the magnificent sheer crimson wall which lay across the river, now wondering where Diana was and now contemplating curiously the sense of his own unimportance which the Canyon was thrusting into his consciousness more persistently every hour.  Jonas joined him for the last part of his rest, but when Milton announced that they had finished the packing and must now portage the boats, Jonas was on the alert.

“That name isn’t dry yet!” he exclaimed.  “I got to watch the prow of my boat myself,” and he started hurriedly back over the trail, Enoch following him more slowly.

Sometimes lifting, sometimes skidding on drift logs, sometimes dragging by main strength, the six men finally landed the Ida and the Na-che in quiet waters.  Jonas and Agnew prepared a simple dinner and immediately after they embarked.  For two hours the river flowed swiftly and quietly between sheer walls of stratified granite, white and pale yellow, shot with rose.  Now and again a cedar, dwarfed and distorted, found toe hold between the strata and etched its deep green against the white and yellow.