Hour of the Hunter

words.

“In the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.”

The Father he could understand, and he could understand the Son, but who was the Holy Ghost? Maybe, thought Davy, the Holy Ghost was I’itoi. So he bowed his head, just as he had seen Rita do, just like Father John, and he said a prayer for his mother, for Nana Dahd, for Father John, and also for Oh’o. He finished by praying, “In the name of the Father, of the Son, and of I’itoi. Amen.” It sounded a little different, but Davy was sure it meant the same thing.

Just then, as he finished the prayer, he heard a rock go scrabbling down the face of the cliff. He drew back inside the rocky cleft, making himself as small as possible, holding his breath, afraid that somehow the ohb had managed to escape and was coming after him.

He listened. Clearly now, he could hear footsteps coming closer and closer, as though whoever was coming knew the path to the crack, as though they knew all about Davy’s secret hiding place.

“Olhoni?” Someone was calling his name, his Indian name, but it wasn’t Nana Dahd. Who could it be then? No one else called him that. The voice wasn’t familiar, and Nana Dahd had given him strict orders to wait for someone he knew.

Then, suddenly, Bone thrust his spiked head into the entrance to the crack and covered the boy’s face with wet, slobbery kisses. Behind the dog, a man’s face peered in the small opening.

“Olhoni? Are you in there?”

Weak with relief, Davy let his breath out. It was Fat Crack. “Heu’u,” he answered. “Yes.”

“Come on, boy,” the Indian said, gently moving the dog aside. “An old man and I are waiting to take you to the hospital.”

Hospital? The word made Davy’s heart hurt. “Is my mother all right?” he asked. “Is Nana Dahd?”

“Your mother is hurt, but not bad,” the Indian said quietly. “Rita went with Father John. Come on. Everyone will be better once they know you are safe.”

As soon as Davy was outside the cave, Bone careened around him in ecstatically happy circles, but the boy was not ready to play. This was still far too serious. What he had lived through that day was anything but a game.

“What about the ohb?” Davy asked. “Is he dead?”

“No, nawoj,” Fat Crack replied. “The ohb isn’t dead, but he didn’t win. He’s in the hospital, too. Your dog almost bit his hand off. Rita wouldn’t let him.”

“She should have,” Davy said angrily. “What will happen to him now?”

Fat Crack shrugged. “The Mil-gahn will send him back to the Mil- gahn jail, I guess.”

“Will he get out again?” Davy asked.

“Who knows?” Fat Crack said, shaking his head. “That, Olhoni, is up to the Mil- gahn, isn’t it.”

Epilogue

Wanting to be the first to kill, Rattlesnake crept close to Evil Siwani’s camp, so the next morning, when the battle started, Rattlesnake killed first, and he chose the place that is now called Rattlesnake House.

When the battle was finally over, Evil Siwani was dead, and his house and all his people had been destroyed.

So I’itoi told the warriors who had helped him that they should choose where they wanted to live. Some people wanted to be farmers, and they went to live by the river. Since then they have been called Akimel O’odham, or the River People.

Some of the warriors were hunters, so they went to live near Waw Giwulk, which means Constricted Rock and which the Mil-gahn call Baboquivari. There they found plenty of mule deer to hunt and lots of other good food to eat. The people who stayed there have been called Tohono O’odham, or the Desert People.

And that is the story of how the Desert People emerged from the center of the earth to help I’itoi battle the Evil Siwani, and how they came to live here in this desert country where, nawoj, my friend, they still continue to live even to this day.

The feast was well under way. In four days’ time, word had got around the reservation that Rita Antone’s luck had changed for the better. The ritual singing had been well attended, and the feast was a rousing success. The expense was more than Rita alone could have managed, but someone else was helping to defray the cost. Eduardo Jose, the bootlegger from Ahngam, whose grandson, Lucky One, had recently been released from the Pinal County Jail, was more than happy to help out.

Rita had spent two days sitting at Father John’s bedside at St. Mary’s Hospital. Now, she sat at the head of the long oilcloth-covered table in the feast house at Sells. Davy, his face still bearing telltale traces of red chili, sat on one side of her. Diana Ladd sat on the other.

Shyly, a girl of sixteen or seventeen sidled up to Rita’s chair, hanging back a moment before daring to say what she had come to say. “I remember you,” she said almost in a whisper. “You used to make us eat our vegetables.”

Instantly, Davy’s ears perked up. “Wait a minute. You, too? I thought I was the only one.”

Rita laughed. “No,” she said. “I try to get all children to do that. Gordon taught me to eat my vegetables when I was sick in California.”

“Gordon your son?” Davy asked.

“No. Gordon my husband. I was very sick, and he and Mrs. Bailey, the Mil-gahn lady he worked for, told me that if I ate all my vegetables, it would make me better, and it worked. I’m still here, aren’t I?”

They all laughed at that, even Diana.

In four days, that was the first time Davy had heard his mother laugh, so maybe now she would be all right, just like Detective Walker said. He had told Davy it would take time, that the ohb, Carlisle, had hurt her badly, but that if they were very careful of her, she would be okay.

The boy looked around, noticing for the first time that the men had all disappeared.

“Where’s Fat Crack?” he asked.

Rita shrugged. “Out by the truck, I guess.”

Davy promptly set off to find him.

The four men gathered in an informal group around the hood of Fat Crack’s tow truck. The medicine man tried to explain Whore Sickness to the detective. He told him it was Staying Sickness and not the bacon grease that had caused Andrew Carlisle’s blindness. This was all quite strange to Brandon Walker, although he tried to listen with an open mind.

No one was surprised when Looks At Nothing opened his leather pouch and pulled out one of his cigarettes. Walker watched with renewed amazement as once again the old man flicked open his Zippo lighter and unerringly lit the cigarette.

Upon hearing Brandon would be driving the boy and the two women out to the reservation for the baptism feast, Hank Maddern had warned his friend about not being sucked into some strange kind of peyote ritual. Brandon had quickly put Hank’s worries to rest.

“Believe me,” he said. “Tobacco is the only thing in that old man’s cigarettes, and it’s not very damn good tobacco, either.”

Looks At Nothing took a deep drag, said, “Nawoj,” and then passed it along to Father John. The priest had