Hour of the Hunter

her, if she had asked him on one of those endless Saturday mornings when it had been just the two of them out in the corral with Waldo? Would things have been different if she had known the old man was really her grandfather?

What was it the Bible said? “The truth will set you free.” Was Diana Cooper Ladd free now? Maybe. She felt lighter than she had in years. As the flames charred through the debris, not only did Max lose his grip on her, so did the past.

Just then, Bone dashed up and dropped a tennis ball at her feet. With a laugh, she ruffled the dog’s shaggy head, then threw the ball for him as hard as she could. Eagerly, he raced off after it, returning with it, prancing and proud, tail awag.

“You funny old dog,” she said, and threw the ball again.

Over and over she threw the ball. Over and over he brought it back. It surprised her to find that each time Bone retrieved the ball, the silly, pointless game made her laugh. Laughter felt good, and so did the hot sun on her back.

“Come on, Mister Oh’o,” she said at last when the dog was panting so hard his scrawny sides shook. “Let’s go inside, cool off, and figure out what’s for dinner.”

After their naps, Davy and Rita entered the main house to the surprising but familiar smell of baking tortillas. In the kitchen, they found Diana struggling with stiff wads of tortilla dough, waxed paper, and a rolling pin. A stack of misshapen tortillas sat on a platter next to a smoking electric griddle. The tortillas were amazingly ugly-thick in some places, punched full of holes in others. Some were more than slightly burned, but for a first attempt, they weren’t too bad.

Rita touched one of the balls of dough still sitting in a mixing bowl, on the countertop. “A little more shortening next time,” she suggested. “Then you can pat them out by hand instead of using a rolling pin.”

“Mom, did you make these all by yourself?” Davy asked wonderingly. “Can I have one?”

“If you’re brave enough,” Diana told him. “They’re pretty pitiful.”

Slathering a load of peanut butter on one side, Davy tried a bite and diplomatically pronounced the tortilla “almost as good as Rita’s.” With a second peanut butter-covered tortilla in one hand and a plain one for Bone in the other, Davy and Oh’o went outside to play.

Rita sat down beside the kitchen table and watched Diana work. The Anglo woman seemed self-conscious under the Papago’s scrutiny, but she kept on rolling the dough and tossing the resulting crooked sheets onto the waiting griddle.

“While I was just lying there in Sells,” Rita began, “I was thinking about how you helped me after Gina died, when people wanted me to leave because I was bad luck.”

“Forget it,” Diana said determinedly. “What they thought doesn’t matter. I’ve been delighted to have you with me. With us,” she added.

“But it does matter,” Rita returned. “I thought I was leaving there just to go somewhere and die, but helping you and taking care of Davy gave me back my luck. It made me young again. The other day, the doctors said I was dead in that ambulance, but thinking about Davy made me want to live, made me want to come back.”

Diana Ladd put down the rolling pin and brushed hair from her sweat-dampened face, leaving a white smudge of flour on her face.

“Rita, Davy has always been as much yours as he is mine. You’re the one who’s spent all the time with him, who’s taught him things, and taken care of him. If you’re worried about the Indian baptism, don’t be. Father John told me about it this morning when I saw him at San Xavier.”

“He did?”

Diana nodded. “He explained the whole thing.”

“Good,” Rita said. “You don’t mind?”

“No. How could I mind? When will it happen?”

“Because of the. .”

Rita paused, groping for the proper word. What she felt coming toward them was far more serious than mere danger. Weak as it sounded, that was the only Mil-gahn word she could think of to express the problem. Diana Ladd would not understand the word ohb.

“Because of the danger to us all,” Rita continued, “the baptism ceremony starts tonight. It will continue for four days and nights. Four nights from now, we go to Sells for the last night of singing and for the feast. On that night, the medicine man feeds the child’s parents gruel made from corn and clay.”

Diana made a face. “That sounds even worse than my tortillas, but it won’t kill me, will it?”

Rita smiled. “No, it won’t kill you.”

“What about you?” Diana asked. “You said parents. I’m only one. Will you eat the gruel with me, Rita? The two of us can be Davy’s parents together.”

The offer came from a generous heart and caused a dazzling smile to suffuse Rita’s worn face. She looked twenty years younger. “Yes, nawoj,” she said softly, “we will eat the gruel together.”

Just then, out in the yard, Bone started up a noisy racket. They heard him scrabbling over the high stone wall just as Davy burst in through the back door.

“A car’s coming,” Davy announced. “Oh’o went after it. I couldn’t stop him.”

Dusting the flour from her hands, Diana hurried to the window and looked out. An unfamiliar late-model Buick was easing into the driveway, while Bone, up to his usual tricks, attacked the front tires for all he was worth. Diana recognized Father John before he rolled down the window. “Oh’o,” she called sharply. “Here.”

With one final offended woof, the dog abandoned his attack and came to the porch, where Diana let him into the house. “It’s Father John,” she told Davy. “Take Bone back outside and keep him there while I bring the company into the house.”

Father John entered the house warily, holding his hat in front of him. “That’s quite some dog you’ve got there,” he said. “Are you sure it’s safe?”

“Believe me, Bone’s exactly the kind of dog we need at the moment,” Diana returned, “but don’t worry. Davy took him outside. Would you care for something to eat?”

“No, no thank you. I just came to speak to the boy.”

“Something to drink then. Iced tea?”

“Tea would be fine.”

Diana started for the kitchen but paused when she found the kitchen doorway blocked by Rita’s stocky frame. The old woman stood staring at the priest. Eventually, Rita moved aside and let Diana pass, but she did so without taking her eyes away from Father John. For a long moment, the two old people faced one another in awkward silence.

When Father John had invaded the hospital room in Sells, it had been without Rita’s knowledge or permission. The man who came there was the same one who had abandoned her years earlier, the one who had caused her to be sent away in disgrace. But now, by helping with Davy, Father John had redeemed himself somewhat in the old woman’s eyes. She no longer saw him through a cloud of bitterness.

The old woman broke the silence. “Thank you for helping with Davy.”

Father John nodded. “Nawoj,” he said. “Friend, it is nothing.” He moved into the room. At once his eyes were drawn to the large basket hanging on the wall over the couch, a plaque actually, two- and-a-half to three feet in diameter. Schooled in the subtle aesthetics of Papago Indian basketry, the priest immediately recognized the superior workmanship in the rare yucca-root basket. The red design, a finely woven rendition of the traditional Papago maze, spread out in the four sacred directions. At the top stood the square- shouldered Man in the Maze.

Father John studied the basket for some time before turning to Rita. “You made this?” he asked. She nodded. “Understanding Woman taught you well,” he continued. “It is very beautiful.”

Back on the rocky mountainside with a Styrofoam meat package full of poisoned hamburger, Andrew Carlisle thanked his lucky stars that he had taken the precaution of climbing up to reconnoiter one last time before approaching the house. While he watched in dismay, the crazy dog set up a frenzied roar of barking and then vaulted over the fence to attack an approaching car. Carlisle couldn’t believe it. The ugly mutt charged the front