only mist. Finally she had heard the voice, and found herself in the Fourth World. She had looked down through the emergence hole, peering at Hosteen Tso in what must have been Tsos painted cave. An old man had rocked on a rocking chair on its floor, braiding his hair with string. At first it was Tso, but when the man looked up at her she had seen the face was dead. Blackness was swelling up around the rocking chair.
Listening Woman rubbed her knuckles against her eyes, and shook her head, and called for Anna. She knew what the diagnosis would have to be. Hosteen Tso would need a Mountain Way Chant and a Black Rain Chant. There had been a witch in the painted cave, and Tso had been there, and had been infected with some sort of ghost sickness.
That meant he should find a singer who knew how to do the Mountain Way and one to sing the Black Rain. She knew that. But she also thought that it would be too late. She shook her head again.
Girl, she called. I’m ready now.
What would she tell Tso? With the sensitized hearing of the blind, she listened for Anna Atcitty's footsteps. And heard nothing but the breeze.
Girl, she shouted. Girl! Still hearing nothing, she fumbled against the cliff, and found her cane. She felt her way carefully back to the pathway toward the hogan. Should she tell Tso of the darkness she had seen all around as the voice spoke to her? Should she tell him of the crying of ghosts she had heard in the stone? Should she tell him he was dying?
Listening Woman’s feet found the pathway. She called again for Anna, then shouted for Old Man Tso to come and lead her. Waiting, she heard nothing but the moving air. She tapped her way cautiously down the sheep trail, muttering angrily. The tip of her cane warned her away from a cactus, guided her around a depression and past an outcrop of sandstone. It tapped against a hummock of dead grass and contacted the little finger of the outstretched left hand of Anna Atcitty. The hand lay palm up, and the wind had drifted a little sand against it, and even to Listening Woman’s sensitive touch, it felt like nothing more than another stick. And so she tapped her way, still calling and muttering, down the path toward the place where the body of Hosteen Tso lay sprawled beside his overturned rocking chair the Rainbow Man still arched across his chest.
» 2 «
T
he speaker on the radio crackled and growled and said, Tuba City.
Unit Nine, Joe Leaphorn said. You got anything for me?
Just a minute, Joe. The radios voice was pleasantly feminine.
The young man sitting on the passenger side of the Navajo police carryall was staring out the window toward the sunset. The afterglow outlined the rough shape of the San Francisco Peaks on the horizon, and turned a lacy brushwork of high clouds luminescent rose, and reflected down on the desert below and onto the face of the man. It was a flat Mongolian face, with tiny lines around the eyes giving it a sardonic cast. He was wearing a black felt Stetson, a denim jacket and a rodeo-style shirt. On his left wrist was a $12.95
Timex watch held by a heavy sand-cast silver watchband, and his left wrist was fastened to his right one with a pair of standard-issue police handcuffs. He glanced at Leaphorn, caught his eye, and nodded toward the sunset.
Yeah, Leaphorn said. I noticed it.
The radio crackled again. Two or three things, it said. The captain asked if you got the Begay boy. He said if you got him, don’t let him get away again.
Yes, Maam, the young man said. Tell the captain the Begay boy is in custody.
I got him, Leaphorn said.
Tell her I want the cell with the window this time, the young man said.
Begay says he wants the cell with the window, Leaphorn said.
And the waterbed, Begay said.
And the captain wants to talk to you when you get in, the radio said.
What about?
He didn’t say.
But Ill bet you know.
The radio speaker rattled with laughter. Well, it said. Window Rock called and asked the captain why you weren’t over there helping out with the Boy Scouts. When will you be in?
Were coming down on Navajo Route 1 west of Tsegi, Leaphorn said. Be in Tuba City in maybe an hour. He flicked off the transmit button.
Whats this Boy Scout business? Begay asked.
Leaphorn groaned. Window Rock got the bright idea of inviting the Boy Scouts of America to have some sort of regional encampment at Canyon de Chelly. Kids swarming in from all over the West. And of course they tell Law and Order Division to make sure nobody gets lost or falls off a cliff or anything.
Well, said Begay. That’s what were paying you for.
Far to the left, perhaps ten miles up the dark Klethla Valley, a pinpoint of light was sliding along Route 1 toward them. Begay stopped admiring the sunset and watched the light. He whistled between his teeth. Here comes a fast Indian.
Yeah, Leaphorn said. He started the carryall rolling down the slope toward the highway and snapped off the headlights.
That’s sneaky, Begay said.
Saves the battery, Leaphorn said.
