'All right,' said Coyote. 'What do you want me to do?'
'Come with me over here,' said Cottontail. 'First I will plaster your eyes shut with pitch. then, when your eyes are shut, you will hear firecrackers popping. When that happens, you must dance and shout.
When the dance is over, then you may eat me.'
So Cottontail plastered Coyote's eyes shut with pitch, then he led him into a cane field. When Coyote was in the middle of the field, Cottontail set fire to it. Soon the cane started crackling and popping.
Coyote thought these were the firecrackers Cottontail had told him about, so he began to dance and shout. Soon he began to feel the heat, but he thought he was hot because he was dancing so hard. At last, though, the fire reached him, and burned him up.
And that, my friend, is the story of the second time Cottontail tricked Coyote.
From the sound and cadence of that softly crooned chant, someone listening might have thought Rita Antone was giving voice to some ancient traditional Papago lullaby.
It included the requisite number of repetitions, the proper rhythm, but it was really a war chant, and the words were entirely new:
'Do not look at me, little Olhoni.
Do not look at me when I sing to you So this man will not know we are speaking So this evil man will think.he is winning.
'Do not look at me When I sing, little Olhoni, But listen to what I say.
This man is evil.
This man is the enemy.
This man is ohb.
Do not let this frighten you.
'Whatever happens in the battle, We must not let him win.
I am singing a war song for you, Little Olhoni. I am singing A hunter's song, a killer's song.
I am singing a song to I'itoi Asking him to help us.
Asking him to guide us in the battle So the evil ohb does not win.
'Do not look at me, little Olhoni, Do not look at me when I sing to you.
I must sing this song four times For all of nature goes in fours, But when the trouble starts, When the ohb attacks us, You must remember all the things I have said to you in this magic song.
You must listen very carefully And do exactly what I say.
If I tell you to run and hide yourself, You must run as fast as Wind Man.
Run fast and hide yourself And do not look back.
Whatever happens, little Olhoni, You must run and not look back.
'Remember it is said that Long ago I'itoi made himself a fly And hid himself in the crack.
I'itoi hid in the smallest crack When Eagle Man came searching for him.
Be like Titoi, little Olhoni.
Be like I'itoi and hide yourself In the very smallest crack.
Hide yourself somewhere And do not come out again, Do not show your face Until the battle is over.
Listen to what I sing to you, Little Olhoni. Listen to what I sing.
Be careful not to look at me But do exactly as I say.'
The song ended. Rita glanced at Davy, who was looking studiously in another direction. He had listened. He was only a boy, one who had not yet killed his first coyote, but she had trained him well. He would do what he'd been told.
In the gathering twilight, Rita glanced at the clock on the mantel across the room. Seven o'clock. Fat Crack must come for her soon, because the singers were scheduled to start at nine. The very latest he could come was eight o'clock, an hour away.
One hour, she thought. Sixty minutes. If they could stay alive until Fat Crack got there, they might yet live, but deep in her heart, Rita feared otherwise. As he tied them up, she had looked into Andrew Carlisle's soul. All she saw there were the restless, angry spirits of the dead Apache warriors from Rattlesnake Skull Village. They had somehow found this Mil-gahn's soul and infected it with their evil.
Andrew Carlisle was definitely the danger the buzzards had warned her about, the evil enemy who Looks At Nothing said was both Ohb and not Ohb, Apache and not Apache. And although the process had been started, Davy was still unbaptized.
The man sat on the floor in front of her, unmoving, seemingly asleep although his eyes were open. She had heard of these kinds of Whore-Sickness trances before, although she herself had never witnessed one. She knew full well the danger.
Looking away from their captor, Rita stared over her shoulder at the basket maze hanging on the wall behind her. She remembered the ancient yucca she had harvested to find the root fiber to make it. Howi, a yucca, an old cactus, had willingly sacrificed itself that Diana Ladd might own this basket.
And, suddenly, Rita knew that Fitoi had heard her song and sent her a message even without the use of Looks
