Before abandoning Zion Canyon we drove into the famous rift between the cliffs which the Indians worship and which was called the "Temple of the Sinonuava." In the middle of this rift on a tremendous socle sat a horrible bellied god. We stared at him for a long time before it dawned upon us that he had been shaped by man, not by nature. Around the monument a little river ran noisily, churning the pebbles.
We were no longer wondering at the fact that nature had excelled Indian architecture, Indian drawings and even the Indian himself. Such conclusions, inevitable after the Navajo desert, seemed at Zion Canyon ] too poor and inconclusive. It was clear here that all art—Egyptian and Greek and Chinese and Gothic and the Empire style and even formalism —had already existed before and had been invented by the genius of nature millions of years ago.
"Let's rejoice," said Mr. Adams, when we, having learned the road to Las Vegas, again picked up speed. "I ask you to bear in mind that we did not pay a single cent for all this beauty."
But he had scarcely said it, when we came to a booth from which a man in a uniformed cap looked out invitingly. He stopped us, took two dollars, and after licking his tongue over the round green paper, pasted it on the windshield of our car.
"Good-bye," said Mr. Adams sadly, and added immediately, "Seriously, gentlemen! Only two dollars for all this beauty! I figure that we get off very cheaply."
Our Baptist fellow traveller asked us to let him off at the nearest town. He shook our hands for a long time and kept repeating that we were good people. He placed his little paper suitcase on his shoulder, tucked his yellow duster under his arm, and went off. But after walking several steps away, he turned back and asked:
"If I came to Russia, could I have work too?" "Of course," we replied, "just as all the other people in Russia." "So..." said the young Baptist. "So I would have work? So ..." He wanted to say something else, but evidently he changed his mind and quickly, without looking back, went down the street.
29 On the Crest of the Dam
ALTHOUGH ON numerous occasions we had pledged our word of honour to Mr. Adams not to drive with the approach of twilight, our experienced car was entering the city of Las Vegas in complete darkness. The moon had not yet risen. Somewhere ahead, slowly, a white beacon gleamed. After some time it turned to the left and then appeared behind us. Its place was taken by another beam. At this point our path coincided with the route of the air line bound for Los Angeles. Occasionally out of the darkness broke a wavering light. It grew quickly. And there, high ahead of us, appeared two automobile eyes. For a minute they ran to meet us, then they disappeared again, and then quite close to us jumped out once "more. The road went in waves from hill to hill. The great silence of the desert was broken only by the heavy sighs and mutterings of Mr. Adams.
"Becky! Becky! Not so fast. Forty miles an hour is too much!"
"Let me alone," Mrs. Adams replied, scarcely able to contain herself, "or I'll get out and let you all drive yourselves."
"Why, Becky, that's impossible!" groaned her husband.
"I don't want to talk to you!" exclaimed his wife.
And the couple had a verbal battle in English. The aerial beacons lighted their angry profiles and the glass of their spectacles.
Finally, ahead of us appeared the lights of Las Vegas.
What wouldn't a Muscovite imagine of a frosty December evening, hearing over the teacups talk about the bright shimmering lights of the city of Las Vegas? Las Vegas! He will quickly imagine passionate Mexican glances, lovelocks, curled like Carmen's, on saffron cheeks, the velvet breeches of toreadors, Navajos, guitars, banderillas, and tiger passions.
Although we had been certain for some time now that American cities never startle the traveller with the unexpected; nevertheless, we vaguely hoped for something even slightly out of the ordinary. Altogether too intriguing was the play of lights of the strange city in the warm black desert. Who could tell? Suppose, suddenly, upon awakening in our camp, we should go forth into the street and behold southern sidewalk cafes under tents, picturesque markets, where over mountains of vegetables would tower the arrogant snout of a camel, and would hear the chatter of bazaar crowds and the braying of donkeys! But—the United States with their united effort delivered a new blow to our imagination. Upon awakening in our camp and driving out into the street, we beheld the city of Gallup in all its glory of petrol pumps, drug-stores, empty sideewalks, and streets chockfull of automobiles. It even seemed to us that any moment now, just as in Gallup, a green little demi-truck would bob out from around the corner and swipe us sidewise, and Mr. Adams, that composed smile on his face, would walk through the show window of an automobile store. It was dull to look upon this standardized wealth. Passing through the desert we had stopped in a score of cities and, not counting Santa Fe, and perhaps also Albuquerque, they were all Gallups. It is scarcely possible to find anything more paradoxical in the world: standardized cities in a varied desert.
Las Vegas cured us completely. From then on we did not hope to run across anything unexpected in any new town. That helped a lot, because in the course of our journey remarkable surprises awaited us. The less we expected them, the more pleasing they were to us.
In Las Vegas we stopped just long enough at a drug-store to eat Breakfast No. 3 and, gathering momentum at a square overgrown with electric-light poles, we dashed out of town. We did it so hastily that we violated the traffic rules of the city of Las Vegas and faced a flood of automobiles: near the square each direction had its separate traffic lane. A police car immediately drove up to us. The policeman sitting in it ordered us to stop.
"I am very, very sorry," said Mrs. Adams meekly.
"Very, very, Mr. Officer." That old panicmonger, Mr. Adams, supported her.
But this time we did not get the dreaded ticket. The policeman was happy that the naive New Yorker provincials promoted him to an officer, and limited himself to a short speech about the traffic rules of the city of Las Vegas, to which Mr. Adams listened in profound silence.
Finally the policeman told us what road to follow to Boulder City.
After going three blocks, we noticed that the police automobile was again chasing us. Was it possible that "Mr. Officer" had changed his mind and would, after all, give us a ticket? Mrs. Adams raced ahead, but the police Packard quickly caught up with us, and Mr. Officer, sticking his head out of the window, said:
"Lady! I drove after you because I was 'fraid you might miss the road. And that's just what happened. You went two extra blocks!"
"Thank you very, very much!" exclaimed Mr. Adams, breathing a sigh of relief.
"Very, very!" Mrs. Adams supported him.
"Very much!" we chimed in, like the echo in Zion Canyon.
It was only thirty miles to Boulder City. About fifty minutes later we were already driving up to the government booth, the same kind you find upon entering every American national park. Here the booth stood at the entrance to Boulder City, a town which sprang up during the construction of the biggest dam in the world, Boulder Dam, on the Colorado River. In the booth we were given tickets, on which were printed the rules for visiting the construction, and we drove into the little town.
Strange as it may seem, we heard little about Boulder Dam in America. The newspapers almost never mentioned its construction. Only when it was being completed, when Roosevelt participated in its solemn opening, did the newsreels devote a few flashes to it. We had seen that newsreel and we remembered the President's speech. He spoke about the significance of this government enterprise, praised some governors and senators who had something or other to do with the construction, but did not say one word about the men who designed the project and who built the dam—that great monument to man's triumph over nature.