'Upcountry, Anglo. Safest place when the city gets hot. Things'11 cool in a while, then you can go back, if you're crazy enough.''
'But I've got important things to do in the city. I've got no time to waste.' 'Think staying alive is wasting time?' 'No.'
'Good,' Dancey pronounced with a confirming nod. 'Then shut up. Driving was easier when you were asleep.'
Sam followed his advice, more out of frustration and annoyance than anything else. He tried watching the scenery for a time, but his mind kept clouding. His nagging concerns wouldn't let him go. He fidgeted, worried about Janice.
'Hey hey, Anglo. What's so important about being iii the city, anyway? Filthy place, not good for somebody like you.'
'I'm looking for someone to help my sister.' Dancey made an exaggerated show of looking in the back of the Hummer, then across the prairie. 'Don't see no sister.'
'She's not around here. She can't travel just now.'
'Hey hey, Anglo. Sounds bad. Ya got my sympathy.
Family is real important, but you understand that.
Don't need no old man to tell ya that. What kind of doctor ya looking for?'
Sam hesitated. What did it really matter? Sam hadn't gotten anywhere with his investigation. Maybe it was because he had been so closemouthed about why he was seeking Howling Coyote. Maybe if he had let it be known that it wasn't political, he might have gotten help. If Dancey spread the word in Denver, it might even help. That is, if anyone took the old man seriously. 'Not a doctor. A shaman. She's got
… magical problems.'
Dancey wheezed a laugh. 'So you come looking for the tribal medicine men. Lotsa luck, Anglo.'
'Not just any medicine man. I'm looking for Howling Coyote.'
'Ain't gonna find him in the city.' The old man laughed. 'Ain't gonna find him at all.' 'What do you mean?'
The old man pointed at the sky. 'Good clouds today, Anglo. A man can see a lot in clouds. Things that aren't there and things that are. Clouds change a lot. The stars, now. The stars are different. They're always spinning, racing across the sky even when ya can't see them. They don't change much. At least not so a man can see. 'Cept for the falling stars. Flare, burn, and fall. Not much of a legacy. Ever see a star before it fell, Anglo?'
What did stars have to do with anything? Sam gave up. He turned his head and stared at the sunset.
It wasn't much longer before Dancey pulled the Hummer off the track and bounced them to a stop in a small canyon. He rustled around in the back of the Hummer for a while, emerging first with a bedroll that he tossed to Sam without a word, then later with some cooking gear and a field pack. The old man made a fire and cooked supper in silence. They ate, and then, in silence, they sat watching the glowing embers.
A scuffing in the darkness startled Sam, but Dancey didn't appear to notice. The old man seemed used to the prairie, so Sam dismissed the sound as not dangerous. He looked up at die stars playing hide-and-seek among drifting clouds. The air was chill, cooling quickly, so he wrapped the bedroll around his shoulders. The fire wanned his front.
He heard the furtive noise again and caught the gleam of eyes just beyond the firelight. The old man tossed a supper scrap out. After a moment, a coyote padded over to gobble it down. Dancey tossed another, this time closer to the fire so that the animal had to come well within the firelight to get it. The animal moved forward and took the new offering. Scrap by scrap, Dancey lured it closer until it was taking food from his hand.
A lonesome yipping echoed in from the surrounding buttes. Their after-dinner guest sat on his haunches and raised his muzzle to howl back. The sound conveyed an odd mixture of companionship and isolation. Sam closed his eyes to concentrate on listening to the distant calls. Their coyote howled again, this time in concert with another close by. Sam opened his eyes, hoping to spot the newcomer.
He had not expected what he saw. Dancey had joined the chorus. His head, tilted at the sky, was not that of the old man. A coyote's pointed snout poked from beneath the tilted brim of the battered reservation hat. Sam could almost smell magic in the air. Trickster!
'You!' Sam shouted, scrambling to his feet and frightening away the animal. 'You're Howling Coyote!'
The vision of the coyote head vanished and the old man looked at him with dark, but human, eyes. 'Been called a lot of things. That, too.' 'I need your help.'
The old man turned his eyes to the ground. His finger traced patterns in the dirt. ' 'Course, I might just be another ragged Coyote shaman limping along in the trail of the Trickster.'
Sam shook his head. He had felt an aura of power, or something, enwrapping the man as he sang with the animals. This was no ordinary shaman. 'No. Not just any shaman.'
The old man met his gaze again. 'Coyote's not a lucky fella. Gets killed a lot. Howling Coyote died, you know.''
'So I heard. All shamans die. A shaman has to die to touch the power. Dog told me.'
The old man's expression became suspicious. 'Dog told ya? Hey hey, they talk to dogs where ya come from, Anglo?'
'They talk to dogs everywhere. It's when the dogs talk back that you get problems.'
The Indian grunted. 'So ya say you're a shaman. Well, show me something. Impress me.'
Sam shook his head. 'That's not what the magic's for.'
'No? Why not? What good's anything if ya can't use it?'
Sam was becoming angry at the man's flippant attitude and mocking tone. 'I didn't say I can't use it.' 'Hot, hot. Leave it for the sun. Hey hey. Pride's trouble, Anglo. Had plenty enough trouble in my time.'
'I don't want to cause trouble. I want to stop it. My sister, she
…'
'She's trouble.' The old man's voice held both sympathy and warning.
'Well, yes. But she doesn't want to be, and that's what will save her.' Or so he believed. 'I'm sure of it.'
'Sure, are ya? Ain't no surety, Anglo. Ya talk about trouble and magical problems. Ya don't say much. Ya gotta talk plain, Anglo. I'm just a stupid old man.'
Sam didn't believe that, but he played along. He told the old man about Janice. He talked about the ritual and its failure, and about his fears that Janice would succumb to the wendigo curse, and his hopes for her salvation. He ended his tale with an appeal. 'You are Howling Coyote. You led the Great Ghost Dance, the most powerful transforming magic the world has ever seen. You're the only one who knows enough about shamanic magic to make the ritual work. You've got to help me.'
The old man stood and turned his back on Sam. 'Don't got to do nothing. Coyote's freedom, ya know. Does what he wants. You're on a fool's quest.' 'IVe got to help my sister.' 'Very noble, Dog.' He spat. 'Blind optimism.' 'No, it isn't,' Sam protested. 'I felt her spirit and I felt the magic. She can be saved, but I can't do it myself. I need you to help me help Janice,' 'Help yourself.' 'Are you refusing to help?' 'I said what I said.'
'Okay, okay,' Sam said, exasperated. 'If you won't help, then at least teach me what I need to know.
YouVe taught others to use magic. Teach me. Teach me how to save Janice.' The old man turned around. 'Why not?'
'Coyote knows all, sees all,' the shaman said 'Tells little.'
'Like you,' Sam observed.
'Hey hey, pup. Sing a sour song and you jinx the magic. Sky ain't gonna change color to suit you. A shaman is what he is because he is what he is. Ya gotta know to do, and do to know. Got that?'
'Sure,' Sam replied dubiously. Clear as mud. The last two days had been full of exercises in frustration. The old man had led him deeper into the wilderness, hauling packs when they left the Hummer behind. Most of the time, Sam's questions and comments fell on deaf ears. The old man only spoke when he wished, and then half the time he spouted nonsense commentaries on life or nature. The other half was split between totally incomprehensible monologues in a language Sam guessed was his native Ute dialect and almost equally incomprehensible orders. So far Sam had listened to how the wind made pifion trees sigh, observed ants scurry about their business, smelled and compared the scents of yucca leaves and flowers, and watched buzzards wheel in the canyon updrafts. Time and again, he had gathered a variety of plant materials and animal remains, only to
