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Shefford wondered why a lonely six months there had not made the trader old in experience. Probably the desert did not readily give up its secrets. Moreover, this Red Lake house was only an occasionally used branch of Presbrey's main trading-post, which was situated at Willow Springs, fifty miles westward over the mesa.
To-night we'll talk." Shefford went out with his host. The store was as interesting as Presbrey's, though much smaller and more primitive. It was full of everything, and smelled strongly of sheep and goats. There was a narrow aisle between sacks of flour and blankets on one side and a high counter on the other. Behind this counter Withers stood to wait upon the buying Indians.
That's at the head of Marble Canyon. We'll get out on the south side of the river, thus avoiding any Mormons at the ferry. Nas Ta Bega knows the country. It's open desert on the other side of these plateaus. He can get horses from Navajos. Then you'll strike south for Willow Springs." "Willow Springs? That's Presbrey's trading-post," said Shefford. "Never met him.
Shefford, remembering Presbrey's hunger for news of the outside world, told this trader and his wife all he could think of; and he was listened to with that close attention a traveler always gained in the remote places. "Sure am glad you rode in," said Withers, for the fourth time. "Now you make yourself at home. Stay here come over to the store do what you like. I've got to work.
Two days' travel from the river, along the saw-toothed range of Echo Cliffs, stood Presbrey's trading-post, a little red-stone square house in a green and pretty valley called Willow Springs. It was nearing the time of sunset that gorgeous hour of color in the Painted Desert when Shefford and his party rode down upon the post. The scene lacked the wildness characteristic of Kayenta or Red Lake.
Presbrey's keen eyes fixed on the receding black dot far down that oval expanse. "That fellow left rather abruptly," said Shefford, constrainedly. "Who was he?" "His name's Willetts. He's a missionary. He rode in to-day with this Navajo girl. He was taking her to Blue Canyon, where he lives and teaches the Indians. I've met him only a few times. You see, not many white men ride in here.
Presbrey's naive admission, however, appeared to detach him from his present surroundings, and with his massive head enveloped by a cloud of smoke he lived in dreams. Shefford respected his host's serene abstraction. Indeed, he was grateful for silence. Not for many nights had the past impinged so closely upon the present.
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