Her parents had argued about school. Alice Antone, who sometimes worked for the sisters at Topawa, maintained that education was important.
Joseph Antone disagreed, taking the more traditional view that all his daughter really needed to know was how to cook beans and make tortillas, how to carry water and make baskets-skills she would learn at home with her mother and grandmother and not at the boarding school in Phoenix.
But when Big Eddie's horse plodded into Ban Thak, Joseph Antone was miles away working in the floodplain fields. Big Eddie came over to the open fire where Alice stirred beans in a handmade pottery crock.
He wiped the sweat from his face. 'It sure is hot,' he said. 'Where is your husband?'
'Gan,' Alice said, nodding toward the fields. 'Over there.'
:'Will he be home soon?' Big Eddie asked.
'No,' she answered. 'Not soon.'
'I have come for the children,' Big Eddie announced.
'To take them to Chuk Shon to catch the train.'
Dancing Quail had been to Tucson once with her mother and had found the town noisy and frightening. They had gone to sell her grandmother's ollas-heavy, narrownecked pottery crocks that kept water sweet and cool even through the heat of the summer. Alice had walked the dusty streets carrying a burden basket piled high with ollas, while Dancing Quail had trailed along behind. Once home in Ban Thak, the child had not asked to go again.
Quietly now, Dancing Quail attempted to slip away, but Alice stopped her. 'Ni-niad. Daughter, come back. Go quickly and get your other dress. You are to go with this man. Hurry. Do not make him wait.'
The huge policeman looked down at Dancing Quail with considerable empathy. He, too, had been frightened the first time he left home for school. Dancing Quail was one of those children who would have to be watched closely for fear she might run away before they could put her on the train. It would be better if Dancing Quail weren't the first child he loaded into the wagon.
'Give her something to eat,' Big Eddie said. 'I will go get the others.
It won't be so bad if she's not the only one.'
He climbed back into the wagon and urged the waiting horse forward.
Alice turned to her daughter, who still hadn't moved. 'Go now,' she said. 'Roll your other dress in your blanket.'
'Ni-je'e,' Dancing Quail began. 'Mother, please...'
Alice stopped her with a stubborn shake of her head.
'The sisters say you should go. You will go.'
Dejectedly, but without further argument, Dancing Quail did as she'd been told.
Her grandmother, Oks Arnichuda, which means Understanding Woman, had lived a full, busy life before coming to live, in her old age, with her son and daughter-in-law. No longer able to work and cook, Understanding Woman, Re other old women, had taken to sitting, either in the shade or the sun, depending upon the weather, and making pottery and baskets, which Alice was able to sell or trade.
From her pottery-making place, Understanding Woman had seen and heard that was said. Oks Amichuda sided with her son on the subject of Dancing Quail's education, but an old woman who lives under her daughter-in-law's roof must be circumspect. She got up and hobbled after her grandchild. In the shadowy adobe house, she went to the storage basket in which she kept her few treasures.
Understanding Woman extracted something and brought it to where Dancing Quail was rolling her dress into the blanket.
'Ve'eni,' the old woman said urgently. 'Here! Take it.' Dancing Quail looked up. Her grandmother was holding out a small, tightly woven medicine basket.
The child's eyes grew large. 'Ni-kahk,' she said, shaking her head.
'Grandmother. Not your medicine basket.'
'Yes,' Understanding Woman insisted, 'to keep your spirit safe.'
So the medicine basket went into the bundle. When Dancing Quail emerged from the house, Alice handed her a rolled tortilla filled with beans.
Soon Big Eddie returned, bringing with him five other children from the village. Bravely, Dancing Quail climbed into the wagon behind him.
She didn't look back. She didn't want her mother to see that she was crying- - Brandon Walker found the noisy silence in the turbing.
His mother, Louella, who had never suffered an introspective moment in her whole life, spoke at tedious length about anything and everything.
women who didn't talk made the detective nervous. about as she sat there What was Diana Ladd thinking wind whipping wordlessly on the far side Of the car with the long tendrils of auburn hair around her face?
She seemed oblivious to it and made no effort to shift it away Finally, he could stand it no longer. 'When did You quit teaching on the reservation?' he asked. direction, She didn't answer, and he glanced in her her eyes thinking she had drifted off to sleep, but no, were open. He tried again, almost shouting to be heard above the rushing wind.
This time Diana turned toward him in acknowledgment.
you think that?'
'I didn't quit,' she replied. 'What made you think that?'
