Ride the Rainbow Home by Susan Aylworth

cottonwood broke the sheer planes of the canyon, its spreading branches reflected in the quiet waters where the creek pooled. In other places, the water rippled and rushed over rounded stones or dropped in lacy flourishes of white.
    Meg looked up. The skyline was a narrow strip of brilliant azure. This place was exotic and primal, essential and ageless. And Jim was a part of it. She stared at him, amazed at all she suddenly thought and felt and knew about him. He was now as she had first seen him on the bluff, only now she knew that it was his nature to be here, amid the timeless elements, a part of all that was pure, perfect, and unchanging.
    "Come with me," he said, taking her hand, and Meg thought she understood how Eve must have felt when she entered the garden with Adam.
    They walked a sandy stretch of beach, a sheer wall of rock towering above them. "Like it?" he asked.
    "I love it," she answered fervently. "It's incredibly beautiful, and almost out of time. If a band of Anasazi dressed in loincloths suddenly came around the bend, I doubt if I'd be too surprised."
    "I know," Jim answered. "I've felt that too. It's almost as if they're here with us." He paused, looked up as if searching for something, and then pointed. "There. Look."
    She did, and caught her breath. "Oh, Jim! I didn't know there was anything like this left!" Above them on the cliffs were centuries-old petroglyphs scratched into the ancient rock of the canyon walls.
    "More over here," Jim said, leading her by the hand. "This one is the sign for 'travel.' "
    "I wonder how far that artist must have traveled."
    "Probably not far. It's likely that a band of Indians lived right here in the canyon."
    Meg reached out, gingerly touching the drawings nearest her. "I had no idea," she said. "I've seen the pictographs on the rocks in the Painted Desert, but this is just... just here, not in a park or anything."
    "Some of us have been working on that."
    "Working on it? How?"
    "The rangers at Walnut Canyon, near Flagstaff, are aware of the findings here and in other locations along the Little Colorado. I've done some work with the National Park Service, putting together a proposal to protect this stretch of canyon."
    She shook her head. "Is there anything you don't do, Jim McAllister?"
    He smiled, dismissing the compliment. "When you think about it, this is just another form of Native American art. Only there isn't any more where this came from."
    "You're right about that." She meandered along the canyon wall, tenderly touching the finer selections. "These must be some of the finest petroglyphs in the country."
    "They're excellent examples," Jim agreed, "but not the finest. One of the richest finds is in Chevlon Canyon, just outside of Joseph City."
    Meg thought of the tiny, poverty-ridden town just west of Holbrook. "Are you trying to protect that stretch too?"
    "We've talked about it, but it's on private land and the only access is by a poorly kept dirt road maintained by the county. Besides, there are only a few hundred people in the world who know how to find the place. It's probably safer if we leave it alone."
    "I wanted to ask that," Meg said, looking around her at the richness of the find. "If you open this up to tourists, won't that increase the risk of destruction?"
    "That's one of the hazards," Jim agreed, "but it seems better than leaving all this unprotected. Here, let me show you something." He led her farther downstream to a place where some local kid had already scratched through an ancient picture to write, Conner was here . “Vandalism is already a problem," he said.
    "I can see that." Meg's eyes clouded over as she examined the centuries-old art, covered now in scratch-overs and spray paint.
    For a time, they merely wandered along the creek, hand in hand, one and then the other pointing out sights worth noticing. After a time, they stopped beside another sheer wall of red, its last two feet mortared closed with gray cinder blocks.
    "What's this?"