but he knew that the blood was gone from beneath the bronze surface, leaving it yellow-white with a green tinge under it. He kept on looking at the arrow, his arrow, with his marks on it.

“You must come out to the light.”

She rose with difficulty, steadying herself against the wall. He supported her to the door.

The arrow had passed through the flesh of the under side of her arm, just missing the artery and the bone. The shaft stood out on both sides. From the barbed, iron head to the wound there was blood in the zigzag lightning grooves. The roundness of her arm was caked with dried blood and already somewhat swollen. To the one side was the barbed point, to the other were the eagle feathers and the wrappings. He took out his knife.

“I shall try not to make it wiggle,” he said.

“What are you going to do?”

“Cut it off just by the hole; I can’t pull all that through your arm.”

“It is a good arrow. Pull it through.”

There was never another woman like this one. “Do you think I would use this again?”

He held her arm very carefully, he cut with all possible gentleness, but the shaft moved and moved again. He heard her take in her breath and looked quickly to see her teeth clenched on her lower lip. She should have been a man. Every dart of pain in her arm went doubly through his heart. The wood was cut short, just above the wound.

“Now,” he said, “are you ready?”

“Pull.”

He jerked it out. She had not moved. She was rigid and her eyes were almost glassy, but she had not made a sign. He still knelt, staring at her, at the fresh blood welling, and at the red stump of the arrow in his hand. She was brave, brave.

She whispered, “Get me some of the whiskey.”

He gave her a stiff dose in a cup. She emptied it at once, and sighed. A little colour came back.

“It will be dark soon. You had better go now. I can take care of myself. But before you go, know this: whatever you have seen, I love you and you only and altogether. Goodbye.”

She handed him back the cup. As he took it, their fingers touched, and he looked into her eyes. Something snapped inside of him. He fell forward, his head close to his knees, and began sobbing. She laid her hand on his shoulder.

“You have been hasty, I think. One should not turn up a new trail without looking around. And you have not eaten, you are tired. This has been hard for you. In a minute I shall heat some coffee, and we can talk straight about this.”

II

The night was plenty sharp enough for a fire indoors. Under her directions he prepared canned goods and coffee, but neither of them did more than toy with the food. He had a feeling that she was going to find a solution for them; the experience that they had just shared had changed everything again, he didn’t know where he was. Landmarks shifted too quickly, he was in a turmoil once more, with his determinations to be made anew.

She asked him to roll her a cigarette; then,

“Make the drink as you have seen me do, only make some for me, too.”

He hesitated.

“Do not be afraid of my medicine.”

He muttered a denial and fixed the drink. She sipped at hers slowly. She needed strength, for she was nearly exhausted, and there was a battle to be fought.

“You cannot know whether a thing is good or bad unless you know all about it, and the cause of it. I do not try to say that what I have done is good, but I want to tell you my story, that you do not know; then you can judge rightly.”

He hardly had expected her to come so directly to the point. He prepared to sift lies.

“Roll me a cigarette.

“I have to begin way back. Hear me.

“When I was still a little girl, they took me away to the all-year school at Wide Water, as you know. They took me because I did well at the day school at Zhil Tséchiel, so they wanted me to learn more. I told you how they tried to make us not be Indians; they succeeded pretty well. I wanted to be American. I forgot the gods then, I followed the Jesus trail. I did well, then, at that school.

“While I was there both my father and mother went underground. My mother had no brothers or sisters living, and I was her only child. I saw no reason for returning to The People. I was an American, with an American name, thinking in American.

“I grew up. I wanted to work for Washindon on a reservation, like that Papago woman who writes papers for the American Chief at T’o Nanasdési. But I could not get that work right away, so they said I could work for a preacher at Kien Doghaiyoi⁠—you know that big town? The Americans call it Oñate.”

“I have heard.” He was studying her intently. Her voice came low and toneless; she spoke slowly, but behind it was something intense.

“I went there, about three years ago. I loved the Jesus trail; I thought it was very good to work for a preacher. That way it was.”

She stared into the fire as she took a sip of liquor.

“He was a good man, and his wife was very good. He did not let her have much to say. I worked pretty hard, but it was all right.

“I learned some strange things. I learned about the bad women⁠—they make their living by lying down with men, just any men who will pay them. Some of them were Americans, some had been schoolgirls like me. The preacher used to preach against them sometimes; I thought, he did not need to do that. Something had happened to their faces, their eyes; their mouths were terrible. They were

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