mewhere in the rocks at one day's journey, more or less, from the
Rito. Between these Tehuas and the Queres of the Tyuonyi there was
occasional intercourse, and a fairly beaten trail led from one place to
the other; but this intercourse was so much interrupted by hostilities,
and the Navajos rendered the trail so insecure beside, that she had
never paid much attention to it. Still, there was no doubt in her mind
that if she reached the habitations of the Tehuas, above where the
pueblo of Santa Clara now stands, a hospitable reception would be
extended to her. But could she leave Say alone to her dismal fate?

After all, death was not such a fearful thing, so long as no torture
preceded or accompanied it. Death must come to her once, at all events,
and then what of it? There need be no care for the hereafter, according
to her creed. The Pueblo Indian knows of no atonement after dying; all
sins, all crimes, are punished during this life. When the soul is
released from the thralls of this body and its surrounding nature, it
goes to Shipapu, at the bottom of the lagune, where there is eternal
dancing and feasting, and where everything goes on as here upon earth,
but with less pain, care, anguish, and danger. Why therefore shun death?
Shotaye was in what we should call a philosophic mood.

Such careless philosophy may temporarily ease the mind, since it stifles
for a moment the pangs of apprehension and dread. But with the
temporary relief which Shotaye felt, the demands of physical nature grew
more apparent. In other words she felt hungry, and the more so as, being
now almost resolved to suffer death with resignation, it was imperative
to live, and consequently to eat, until Death should knock at her door.
She poured a good portion of the now boiling stew into a smaller bowl
and began to fish out the morsels with her fingers, while between times
she drank of the broth. The warm food comforted her, gave her strength,
and aroused her vital powers, which arduous thinking had almost put to
sleep.

She placed the pot with the stew in a corner and sat down again, leaning
against the wall. No sleepiness affected her. There was too much to
think of as yet. Her thoughts returned to the absorbing subject of the
day, and with these thoughts, random at first, a pale, wan figure rose
before her inner eye,--a form well, only too well, known to her; that of
Say Koitza. She saw that figure as she had seen it not long
ago,--crouching befo