3535 
 R5668w 
 
 E WITCHERY 
 of RITA 
 
 THE BERRYHILL CO. 
 
 Phoenix, Arizona
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 The Witchery of Rita 
 
 AND 
 
 Waiting for Tonti 
 
 BY 
 WILL H. ROBINSON 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 "THE MAX FROM YKSTERDAY," "THE STORY OF 
 ARIZONA," "HER NAVAJO LOVER," "THE SOUL 
 OF EODIN JOYCE," "THE KNOTTED CORD," ETC. 
 
 PHOENIX, ARIZONA 
 THE BERRYHILL CO. 
 
 1919
 
 COPYRIGHTED, 1919 
 
 BY 
 THE BEEEYHILL CO. 
 
 HAMMOND PRESS 
 
 W. B. CONKEY COMPANY 
 
 CHICAOO
 
 PS 
 
 3533 
 
 To 
 
 MRS. JOHN COBOBN SARTELLE 
 
 785270
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 IF these stories have a purpose other than the 
 one which should take first rank in fiction 
 that of entertaining the reader it is that 
 they may bring back from the shadowy yester 
 days a suggestion of a life and people long since 
 gone from our golden Southwest. 
 
 The cliff-dwellers of Montezuma's Castle 
 might easily have been the ancesters of Tonti, 
 and all that happened to Rita are well within 
 the picture of old San Xavier. As for our 
 goat Nicolas, he needs neither champion nor 
 sponsor. His ancestors lived on terms of 
 equality with Spanish dons and his posterity 
 today bows the head to things human, only for 
 purposes not in the least connected with 
 humility. 
 
 If Nicolas got royally drunk on Spanish 
 wine he showed no greater frailty than many of 
 his human contemporaries who knew better and 
 doubtless acted worse. 
 
 WILL H. ROBINSON. 
 
 PHOENIX, ARIZ., 
 Sept. 8, 1919.
 
 THE WITCHERY 
 OF RITA 
 
 A STORY OF SAN XAVIER 
 MISSION 
 
 IT was in the old Spanish Mission days in the 
 Santa Cruz Valley, when the quail still called 
 "Cuidado!" instead of "Quit!" and the do 
 main of the king extended as far north 
 through what is now known as Arizona as 
 the viceroy's imagination restrained only by 
 Apache lances could carry; a time when 
 Papago neophytes said their prayers regularly 
 and worked fairly faithfully, and when among 
 the "genie decente" there was always leisure for 
 the gracious word or a copa de vino. 
 
 Outside the mission of San Xavier, then but 
 barely completed, a brilliant winter sun bathed 
 the beautiful facade and towers in a flood of 
 golden light, while Indian laborers, directed by 
 brown-coated friars, were busily clearing away 
 the last of the building litter in preparation for 
 the coming Christmas fiesta. 
 
 Inside, high up on the scaffolding under the
 
 8 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 dome, sat young Rafael Valdez, brought from 
 Guadalajara to do the more important of the 
 interior decorations, and with him Rita Avila, 
 who since babyhood had danced on the hard, 
 brown earth of San Xavier with the lightest 
 foot in the valley. 
 
 Speaking socially but not otherwise they 
 were as far apart as the poles, for the youth 
 had an ancestral tree that was rooted among 
 the dons of Castile, while the girl's father was 
 besotted old Sanchez, ex-sergeant in the king's 
 army, the possessor of a thirst for the fruit of 
 the vine that was guaranteed to be absolutely 
 unquenchable. But what difference did that 
 make? He was gallant and she was fair, and 
 well, that is, in part at least, what this story 
 is about. 
 
 Besides being gallant, right now Rafael was 
 tremendously busy, being engaged, with the aid 
 of a brush and a daub of paint, in attaching a 
 left ear to a comfortable-looking, middle-aged 
 saint; Rita the meanwhile gazing at him with 
 adoration tinctured somewhat with solicitude. 
 "To turn paint into people," she observed, "is 
 truly a miracle, but to allow hot chili-con-carne 
 to become cold is almost a sin. I ran all the 
 way so it would be perfect for you." 
 
 At this Rafael turned, kissed the adorable 
 end of Rita's straight little nose, twisted a piece 
 of tortilla from the basket beside them into a 
 spoon, dipped it into the savory stew, trans-
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 9 
 
 f erred it to his mouth, said, "Wonderful!" and 
 went back to his ear. 
 
 Rita munched happily on a piece of panocha. 
 "They saw the witch again last night," she an 
 nounced conversationally, "Isobel and her 
 mother, both. She was like a ghost walking 
 past them in the moonlight. She was bare 
 footed in December; and they say she has an 
 evil eye." 
 
 "Trust that pair!" commented Rafael. "If 
 there is anything to see, Senora Montoyo sees it; 
 if there is anything to hear, she hears it; and 
 even if there isn't anything to say, she says it." 
 
 "Seguro," agreed Rita, as she always agreed 
 with what Rafael said. "She told me, too, that 
 if a witch looks a girl in the face, it will make 
 her lose her lover." Again the look of adora 
 tion came into her eyes. "I'd hate to have her 
 look at me." 
 
 Rafael had now quite completed his saint, 
 and anybody could tell, almost at a glance, that 
 the ear really was an ear and not a flap of the 
 cap. This triumph being accomplished he 
 dashed his brush down and kissed a pair of 
 lips that were like the roses of Andalusia for 
 loveliness. "No witch on earth could make you 
 lose me or me you," he said with a tone of con 
 viction as though he alone of all the world had 
 discovered that love was ever unfailing. 
 
 Rita sighed contentedly. "That's what I 
 thought, too; only I wanted to hear you say it.
 
 10 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 Senora Montoyo also thinks it is improper for 
 me to bring you dinners up here, all alone." 
 
 "Senora Montoyo is a fat old cat," declared 
 the artist. He looked at his sweetheart with 
 melancholy thoughtfulness. "Think how lonely 
 I am going to be when I go to Tucson, palomita." 
 
 "It's tomorrow?" questioned Rita, suddenly 
 winking hard. "And for a whole week?" 
 
 The young man nodded with the gravity the 
 situation demanded. "Until Christmas; but if 
 I make a good portrait of the alcalde's wife I 
 get fifty pesos, and then, querida, we can get 
 married whether father sends me any money 
 or not." 
 
 Gathering tears fled before this radiant 
 thought. "Then nothing can harm us, and if I 
 see the witch before you come back, I'll cross 
 myself and say an 'Ave' quick like that," and 
 she clapped her little hands. 
 
 "Making devil's horns is good, too, when it's 
 witches," suggested the youth. "What makes 
 witches is that they sell themselves to El De- 
 monio, and when one makes 'horns' that re 
 minds them of who their master is. Do you 
 know how to do it?" 
 
 Excited by the daring suggestion, Rita, with 
 a little gasp, shut the first three fingers of her 
 right hand, and held her plump fist with the 
 thumb and little finger standing straight up. 
 
 The youth regarded the operation critically. 
 "That's the way, only you have to make them
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 11 
 
 quickly." Then being an artist he had an in 
 spiration. "Listen, lindita, Pablo the Papago 
 has a little brown goat with horns that look 
 just like El Demonio. I'll buy him for you, and 
 you can teach him to follow you, and then you'll 
 have devil's horns with you all the time till I 
 come back." 
 
 "Bueno!" beamed Rita. "And every time I 
 look at him I can think of you. Can't we go 
 and get him now?" 
 
 They did, and in less than an hour were sit 
 ting behind the delapidated adobe hut Rita 
 called home, watching the goat, which certainly 
 did bear a startling resemblance to the pictured 
 Arch Fiend in the priest's house, calmly chew 
 up a cactus plant, thorns and all. 
 
 A third spectator to this interesting per 
 formance was old Sanchez, and when the young 
 people were considering what they should call 
 the animal, he waved the cup of vino he held 
 in his hand with tipsy gravity, "Name? Name? 
 Jus' one name for a goat with a face like that. 
 Senor Goat in the name of thy father, El De 
 monio, I christen thee 'Nicolas Capricornus' !" 
 and to the scandal even of Rafael, who prided 
 himself on his broadness of view, doused the 
 beast with the dregs of his wine cup. 
 
 Drunken caprice or not, Rita began to won 
 der the next morning if her father's rash act 
 hadn't made Nicolas a devil's imp in very truth. 
 The comfortable dwelling and trading station
 
 12 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 of the Montoyos, where the Seiiora slept in an 
 open porch at the rear, was but a few yards 
 away from the Avila hut. At daybreak the 
 goat jumped on the adobe wall that divided the 
 two places, walked along it to the open porch, 
 then seeing what any reasoning goat might take 
 to be a pleasantly rounding hillock, jumped on 
 it to his eternal disgrace, for alas, the round 
 ing hillock was nothing less than the ample 
 stomach of the Seiiora Montoyo! 
 
 But after breakfast came the time for Rafael 
 to depart for Tucson. There, in front of the 
 Avilas', was the artist on horseback, sitting his 
 saddle like a grandee of Spain, and, with the 
 goat at her heels, there also stood Rita at his 
 stirrups, looking like some shy, big-eyed dryad. 
 "I feel as though something muy triste was going 
 to happen before you come back. I dreamed 
 you were lost and I was looking for you, and the 
 witch came along and carried me off on Nicolas' 
 back and I woke up all shivering with fear!" 
 
 Rafael patted the girl's hands comfortingly. 
 "Say your prayers, querida, and keep Nicolas 
 with you and you need not have the fright, and 
 on the Noche Buena Christmas Eve- I'll be 
 back with something that will make your eyes 
 shine." 
 
 As he rode away the artist bowed most cere 
 moniously to the Sefiora Montoyo and her 
 daughter who were watching them from their 
 door. "Give the alcalde our greetings; you
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 13 
 
 know we are such friends," called the Senora. 
 And then to the daughter: "Anyone can see that 
 he is just playing with that worthless little 
 pelada. For her own good she should be sent 
 away before the affair becomes a scandal, for 
 of course he couldn't marry her. I shall see 
 Padre Narciso today." 
 
 "Much he'll help you," warned Isobel crossly. 
 "He thinks because old Sanchez used to be a 
 sarjento, Rita is as good as we. I'd like to set 
 that witch on her!" 
 
 At this the Senora Montoyo said, "Ah-ho," 
 and then: "Why not if other means fail? We 
 must think of the young man's father, an 
 abogado in Guaymas. Still we must be careful. 
 There will be a moon tonight; I shall sit up 
 and see the witch." 
 
 Isobel gasped. "But the evil eye; she will 
 look at you !" 
 
 "I have no lover to lose," replied the mother 
 grimly. "Besides, I can say a charm." 
 
 "The Papagoes may see us." 
 
 "They are too afraid to look out of their 
 huts after midnight and that's the time she 
 comes." 
 
 "Teach me the charm and I'll sit up with 
 you," said Isobel. 
 
 Don Manuel Montoyo, as an Indian trader 
 under the sanction of the crown, was a per 
 sonage of some importance in every place in 
 San Xavier save in his own home; there he was
 
 14 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 but a mere man, and naturally was not con 
 sulted when there were matters of importance 
 afoot such as those which then occupied the 
 Senora. 
 
 That night the women made a pretense of 
 retiring at the usual hour, but after the Senor 
 was comfortably snoring, the Senora and Isobel, 
 their heads well covered with black mantillas, 
 slipped out into the moonlight and hurried 
 down the road to the mission, in front of which, 
 it seems, the witch was accustomed to walk, and 
 there they waited in the enveloping shadow of 
 the facade. 
 
 An hour passed and not a living creature 
 appeared. December nights are cold, even in 
 the valley of the Santa Cruz, and Isobel, who 
 had not her mother's opulent proportions, 
 shivered with cold as well as nervousness. 
 "L-1-let's go home," she stammered. "I d-d-don't 
 believe she-sh-e's coming." 
 
 "Go home? Me?" demanded the Senora with 
 memories of the goat still rankling in her mind. 
 "Go home yourself if you want to live and 
 die without a husband!" 
 
 "I'm afraid I'll die without one if if I stay," 
 retorted Isobel with almost a wail. "I I don't 
 want to see any witch." 
 
 The words were scarcely out of her mouth 
 when the mother grasped her by the arm and 
 pointed to the archway leading from the campo 
 santo. "Look!"
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 15 
 
 What they saw was the figure of a woman 
 clad in the usual black, with her mantilla 
 twisted like a monk's cowl about her head. As 
 she walked she held one raised hand before her, 
 all the while mumbling softly to herself. When 
 she came nearer they saw that her feet were 
 bare. 
 
 "Don't try to speak to her," stammered Isobel 
 in a perfect agony of fear. "Remember the evil 
 eye." 
 
 "Chist!" said the mother, in her excitement 
 indiscretely baring a dangerous secret, "I have 
 practiced the art myself; I know how to deal 
 with witches," and making the devil's horns with 
 one hand, and rapidly repeating cryptic phrases 
 she stepped directly in the path of the approach 
 ing one. 
 
 The witch continued to advance. The moon 
 came out from a cloud which heretofore had 
 obscured it, and at that moment her upheld 
 hand pushed back her mantilla. 
 
 As the face came into view, Isobel gave a 
 muffled shriek. The witch was Rita Avila! 
 
 The shock to the mother was almost as great, 
 but indignation soon overcame all other emo 
 tions. "You you little wretch!" she spluttered. 
 "What are you doing here this time of night?" 
 quite ignoring the fact that her own presence 
 might also need an explanation. 
 
 Rita did not answer her. Indeed, she did 
 not seem to hear her at all, but turned a mild
 
 16 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 and vacant stare first on mother and then on 
 daughter. "The evil eye! The evil eye!" cried 
 Isobel, her knees as well as her lips trembling. 
 "Mother she's looking at ME!" and turning pre 
 cipitately, with her skirts held high above her 
 knees, she ran terror-stricken to her home. 
 
 The mother paused for one irresolute mo 
 ment, but Rita now was not only looking at 
 her, but in some occult manner, it seemed to the 
 Senora, fairly through her. It wasn't human. 
 Utterly defeated, Senora Montoyo turned and 
 waddled in her daughter's wake as fast as her 
 handicap of flesh would let her. 
 
 When they were gone, Rita, gentle somnam 
 bulist that she was, in her visions still looking 
 for her lover, walked past the church front then, 
 returning to her hut and bed, finished her dream 
 curled up like a little kitten among her ragged 
 coverings. 
 
 After Senora Montoyo had reached her own 
 pallet, she had plenty of time to think over the 
 situation, and although it did not occur to her 
 that Rita was walking in her sleep she was not 
 slow in perceiving the advantages to herself in 
 the present situation. So the girl presumed to 
 think that she could practice the perilous art 
 of witchcraft! Very well, let her take the con 
 sequences. The penalty of witchcraft, both in 
 the civic code and in the popular wind, was 
 death; that is, if it could be proven that the 
 practices were malignant. The Senora prided
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 17 
 
 herself that she could attend to a little detail 
 like that. 
 
 At breakfast she told her husband, with 
 many an "Oh" and shrugs of the shoulders and 
 openings of the eyes, a marvelous tale how 
 upon being wakened by mysterious noises in the 
 skies at the hour of midnight she had seen Rita 
 Avila fly from her patio on the back of the goat, 
 and later had seen her return when the cock 
 crew, just before dawn. 
 
 The Don Manuel was of a generation when 
 everyone believed in witchcraft more or less, 
 nevertheless he was nobody's fool, and had 
 lived with the Senora Montoyo long enough to 
 have learned some of her little ways, so he 
 unfeelingly remarked that if she continued to 
 eat as many enchiladas for supper as she had 
 been, the next time she'd probably be seeing 
 Rita riding whales. 
 
 However, if her own husband was unsym 
 pathetic, other people were not. 
 
 The two-year old baby of Pedro the Papago 
 was to be used for the Christ Child in a tableau 
 at the Mission on Christmas Eve. To Maria, the 
 mother, who lived near by, she told the tale. 
 "And if the Evil Eye should fall on thy beau 
 tiful boy, he would die in the cradle on the 
 Noche Buena. We must rid the town of her be 
 fore she causes pestilence and other dreadful 
 things." 
 
 Good report goes limping, but evil certainly
 
 18 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 has wings. By noon every Mexican laborer and 
 Papago neophite at San Xavier was talking of 
 the dreadful story of how Rita Avila had become 
 a witch; how Ana Aguilar had pains in the back 
 because Rita had a wax image of her into which 
 she stuck pins; how Isidro Salazar's pigs had 
 run away to the desert because she had be 
 witched mem with raven feathers, and how she 
 rode through the air every night on her devil's 
 goat to meet Rafael Valdez. 
 
 All this may sound very silly in an age we 
 at least believe to be sophisticated, but in the 
 eighteenth century the suspicion of witchcraft 
 carried fateful consequences. 
 
 Rita's first knowledge of the dreadful accusa 
 tion that had been brought against her came 
 from her father, who, having seen his daughter 
 walk in her sleep, not only believed that Rita 
 practiced the illicit art, but took much pride 
 in the fact. The girl listened first in bewilder 
 ment and then in real terror to his words, know 
 ing well enough to what it might lead. In vain 
 she protested. Sanchez only grinned at her 
 and said: "Oh, thou cunning one, thy grand 
 mother, too, was a witch and you look just like 
 her. But be sly and act discreetly. Turn all 
 thy arts on that she-mountain of flesh next door 
 before she gets a chance at thee. Give her boils 
 on the back and put a wart on the nose of that 
 brat of hers. I'd teach 'em to fool with one who 
 is bruja!"
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 19 
 
 That night the Seiiora induced Maria the 
 Papago to sleep in her house, and at midnight 
 with their scared, round eyes peering over the 
 dividing adobe wall, and with fists tightly 
 clenched in devil's horns, they saw Rita with 
 the goat at her heels aimlessly walk up and 
 down. As was the case the night before, the 
 sky was full of passing clouds; and the girl 
 being first in light and then in shade, that simple 
 fact gave ample grounds for tales for the mor 
 row of how Rita could make herself invisible 
 at will. 
 
 The next afternoon the Sefiora sent a mes 
 sage to the alcalde at Tucson saying that the 
 Papago Indians believed that there was a girl 
 at San Xavier who was practicing witchcraft, 
 and as there really seemed to be some evidence 
 to support the theory, she suggested that he 
 come down the next morning and investigate. 
 
 With witnesses to testify to Rita's nocturnal 
 performance as well as the evil consequences 
 that had come to the village, there was needed 
 only one thing more to utterly condemn her, 
 and that would be to find some sort of witch 
 paraphernalia in her home. This might be any 
 thing from a wax image stuck with pins to oc 
 cult herbs for a devil's brew. The possession of 
 raven feathers, the burning of which would sum 
 mon El Demonio himself, would be conclusive 
 evidence. 
 
 Therefore on that night the Sefiora invited
 
 20 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 no witnesses to her house. She did not want 
 any, not even her daughter, for after the town 
 was asleep, and old Sanchez's sterterous breath 
 ing had joined its harmonies with the vocal 
 exertions of Isobel and Don Manuel, the Senora 
 took from her own chest a bunch of raven 
 feathers, and after sticking them into her bosom 
 climbed heavily and laboriously over the adobe 
 wall, and with elephantine caution tiptoed to 
 the Avila door. After satisfying herself that 
 Rita and her father were asleep, she entered 
 and hung the bunch of raven feathers under a 
 poncho of Sanchez on a peg on the wall. Then 
 in the serene and peaceful consciousness of a 
 deed well done, she returned to her home, and 
 soon the trio of vocal exertions in the neighbor 
 hood became a quartette. 
 
 The next morning the Senora contrived to 
 have Don Manuel called to the hills to look for 
 cattle. A little later, when he was well out of 
 the way, while Rita was making tortillas at her 
 out-of-door fire, the girl saw Don Diego Cald- 
 eron, the alcalde from Tucson, alight at the 
 door of the casa de Montoyo, and after a brief 
 conference with the Senora and her daughter, 
 the three start for her own home. 
 
 To Rita the Senora always meant trouble, 
 and when Isobel was with her it simply meant 
 more trouble, but as the alcalde was coming 
 too, she must not disgrace Rafael by looking 
 shabby, Her dress might be faded, but her
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 21 
 
 shoes, a gift from her sweetheart, were new, 
 and within the house she had a filagree pin. 
 She would adorn herself with ceremony. 
 
 The impulse was Rita's salvation, for when 
 she opened the door the wind blew the poncho 
 from its peg, and there grinning like a death's 
 head, were the raven feathers indubitable 
 proofs of her witchcraft. They were not bigger 
 than a baby's fist, it is true, but they were tied 
 witchwise with yellow silk and as deadly to the 
 girl as poison. 
 
 Rita's wits were as nimble as her shapely 
 feet. By some black art the Senora Montoyo 
 had gotten the feathers where they were, and 
 their discovery by the chief magistrate of the 
 country could mean but one thing her con 
 viction and possibly her death. She was 
 trapped lost, unless she could hide the feathers 
 before the people entered. 
 
 She swung the door to and fastened it, and 
 in the half darkness looked around for a hiding 
 place. Already there was a knocking at the 
 door, and she thrust the diabolical feathers into 
 the salt box on the table. 
 
 "What is it?" she called, with her hands 
 pressing against her heart to stop its pounding. 
 
 "It's I, Don Diego, the alcalde," came an 
 answering voice, big with authority. 
 
 Rita voiced the old feminine defense for 
 gaining time. "In in a minute. I I'm dress 
 ing."
 
 22 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 The feathers could not possibly escape dis 
 covery in their present place. She dug them 
 out frantically and looked hopelessly around. 
 
 Isobel's voice came through the door in acid 
 tones. "Dressing, indeed ! One would think she 
 were the daughter of a hacendado!" 
 
 "We cannot wait," insisted Don Manuel. 
 
 "You must. I" 
 
 But even before she could finish her sen 
 tence, the Senora, who had pushed herself in 
 front of the alcalde, opened the door. 
 
 Rita's face blanched, and thrusting her hands 
 behind her she backed into a darkened corner. 
 Don Diego, as became an alcalde, gently but 
 firmly shoved the Senora into her place behind 
 him, but nevertheless was not the first to enter 
 the room, for Nicolas taking small account of 
 dons darted between his legs and danced imp 
 ishly around the room. 
 
 Back of the Montoyos stood gaping Mexican 
 and Papago women, and still behind them stood 
 besotted old Sanchez, who leered at the crowd 
 with saturnine grins, assured that Rita, with 
 the devil's help, could circumvent them all. 
 
 Don Diego cleared his throat, and after a 
 pompous speech announced he had come to 
 search the house for evidences of witchcraft. 
 
 Rita looked appealingly for someone that 
 might show her mercy, but in every face she 
 saw, unless it were that of Don Diego himself, 
 the look of stupid, fanatical cruelty the cruelty
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 23 
 
 that lights faggots under the feet of little chil 
 dren. She took a step further back into the 
 shadowy corner and with closed eyes whispered 
 a little prayer to her own Santa Rita. 
 
 This is a scoffing generation, yet who are 
 we to be hypercritical, for if Rita believed there 
 was a miraculous answer to her appeal she had 
 reason enough. Even with the silent movement 
 of her lips, in spite of the fact there was no one 
 behind her, there was a tugging at the feathers 
 and then, an instant later, they were mys 
 teriously taken out of her hand. 
 
 The Senora ran quickly to the poncho which 
 Rita had again hung on the wall, and when she 
 found nothing under it she and the other women 
 searched the house, while Don Diego stood by 
 trying, we may imagine, with some difficulty, 
 to make himself believe he was engaged in a 
 pious duty. For a full half hour the searching 
 went on. Under the grinding stones they looked, 
 in the salt box, in the basket of meal every 
 where that would offer a hiding place, but the 
 house was as free from witch's tools as the 
 altar of a church. 
 
 After they had gone, Rita sat down upon 
 the earthen floor, put her arms around Nicolas' 
 neck and cried softly from relief. While her 
 ears were resting against his fuzzy jaws she 
 found herself wondering what he was chewing 
 on with such persistency. And when she looked, 
 behold, the last of the raven feathers was dis 
 appearing down his throat.
 
 24 
 
 First Rita laughed and hugged the goat 
 tighter than ever, then came a thought that was 
 most disquieting. If they were witch feathers, 
 what would be the effect upon the goat that had 
 eaten them a goat, too, that not only looked 
 like the devil, but had been named for him and 
 baptized with the dregs of wine? 
 
 If character in goats, as in people, may be 
 deduced from actions, Rita that day had reason 
 enough to believe that Nicolas was indeed pos 
 sessed with the spirit of the Arch Fiend. In the 
 afternoon the Senora Montoyo washed her best 
 skirt in preparation for the Christmas fiesta 
 and spread it out to dry. Nicolas ate four yards 
 of lace off it, then returning home in Rita's 
 absence accidentally tipped over an uncorked 
 jug of sweet wine, and having been taught in 
 an earlier period to drink from a bottle, and 
 evidently desiring a little liquid refreshment to 
 moisten his lingerie, sucked away at the mouth 
 of the jug until he got as drunk as a lord, 
 and staggering hilariously to the mission door 
 arrived just in time to butt over the Senora 
 Montoyo as she came ostensibly to confess her 
 sins to the padre, but really to drop a few hints 
 into the reverend ear concerning Rita. Paren 
 thetically it may here be stated that after she 
 and the goat were through with each other, the 
 Senora's rancor against Rita had not lessened 
 nor had she diminished her list of sins for the 
 confessional.
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 25 
 
 Altogether it had been a very bad day for 
 the Senora Montoyo. She had failed in her 
 attempt to convict Rita before the alcalde, she 
 had been insulted by the girl's goat, and when 
 she had attempted to repeat her slanderous 
 tales to old Padre Narciso, the priest had said 
 very plain things to her concerning the sinful- 
 ness of a loose and malicious tongue. Worst 
 of all, when she returned to her home old 
 Sanchez leaned leeringly over the adobe wall 
 and asked her if the wart his girl was going 
 to put upon her nose had started yet, and ex 
 plained that if her squint-eyed Isobel ever did 
 succeed in getting a husband, her children 
 would all be club-footed. 
 
 Fairly cold with hatred and anger, the 
 Senora went at once to see Papago Pablo and 
 Maria. She had a good imagination, and she 
 called to her aid all the tales of witchcraft she 
 had ever heard, applying them, of course, to 
 Rita. She repeated her former story, how, if 
 the girl fastened her eyes on the little boy 
 Josito, he would surely die when they put him 
 in the manger on Christmas eve; how Pedro 
 Galvez's little daughter even then lay sick with 
 a fever Rita had given her, and, most damning 
 accusation of all, how she had been seen talk 
 ing with two prowling Apaches the night before, 
 and was doubtless planning to aid them in a 
 raid upon San Xavier. 
 
 What should they, the Papagoes, do? The
 
 26 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 Senora shrugged her shoulders. That was for 
 them to decide, only when a witch in Magdelina 
 had plotted with a hostile tribe, the Papagoes 
 had properly stoned her. 
 
 We need not dwell upon the steps by which 
 the Senora's suggestion followed her stories 
 through the valley, but it went fast enough. 
 That night Pablo met with a dozen of the most 
 irresponsible Papagoes and Mexicans of the 
 place, when plans were made to catch Rita at 
 her home the next afternoon Christmas eve 
 just at dark, and not only rid the town of her 
 but of the goat as well, which poor Marta in 
 sisted had been a perfectly good goat until Rita 
 had bewitched him. 
 
 However, Nicolas, in spite of his bewitch 
 ments, seemed to have no more premonition of 
 the threatened disaster than had his mistress, 
 and throughout most of the next day pursued 
 his usual jocund, impish program. Late in the 
 afternoon, fairly courting destruction, it would 
 seem, he wandered down to his earlier home 
 the jacal of Pablo and Maria, but as these 
 worthies were at that moment rounding up their 
 fellow conspirators, he found no one to receive 
 him but his former playfellow, the little two- 
 year old Josito, who had been left alone, quite 
 contented in the possession of a chicken bone 
 which could be sucked indefinitely. 
 
 Announcing his presence by butting open the 
 door, Nicolas was received joyfully and, after
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 27 
 
 consuming two candles and a string of red 
 peppers, started away as unceremoniously as 
 he had come. Josito, who had taken placidly 
 enough his parents' departure, felt it was quite 
 another matter to be deserted by a goat, and 
 as Nicolas wouldn't stay with him he went with 
 Nicolas, catching hold of the animal's tail and 
 striking out manfully on a pair of sturdy legs. 
 
 After pausing a moment to look tentatively 
 down the path to the Avila's, the goat, possibly 
 feeling the need of a spiritual uplift, headed 
 toward the mission. Straight to the main en 
 trance went the two, and as there was no one 
 to stop them, in they walked, and after sniffing 
 suspiciously at the stale odor of incense, Nicolas 
 led the way through the little door and up the 
 long, narrow stairway to the tower, with the 
 baby puffing and pulling himself up behind. 
 
 In the meantime the plotters had gathered 
 in a sequestered spot in the river bottom and, 
 just as the sun disappeared behind the western 
 hills, with the Senora Montoyo following dis 
 cretely in the rear, they started for the Avila 
 casita. 
 
 Although every precaution had been taken 
 for secrecy, in some way old Sanchez had gotten 
 wind of the affair, and had hurried home full 
 of the pleasant news, confident that all he 
 needed to do was to put Rita on her guard, 
 when she would not only be able to defend her 
 self but to turn the tables on her enemies as 
 well.
 
 28 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 Poor Rita ! After her former deliverance she 
 felt that her troubles were quite over, and with 
 her dress freshly washed and the filigree pin 
 at her throat, at the moment of her father's 
 arrival was looking eagerly down the road 
 toward Tucson to catch a first glimpse of Rafael. 
 Now, as she listened to the appalling news, told 
 with leers and grins, it was again the face of 
 death she saw instead of the smiling counte 
 nance of her lover. 
 
 "Mira!" cried old Sanchez, pointing down the 
 path between the creosote bushes, "there they 
 are Pablo and Maria and the whole wormy 
 brood! Get your goat and fly at them! Put 
 humps on their backs ! Scratch out their eyes !" 
 
 Rita was a resourceful little body as well as 
 brave. She had been through more than one 
 Apache raid and knew not only how to fight, 
 but how to hide. 
 
 One thing was certain her only chance for 
 safety was to get to the mission building and 
 tell her story to her good friend Padre Narciso. 
 However, that was a quarter of a mile away, 
 and among the mesquites and creosote bushes 
 that intervened she could see her enemies 
 spreading out fan-wise. 
 
 Even as she looked, a half-grown Papago 
 boy peered at her from behind a bunch of 
 cactus, frantically making de_vil's horns as she 
 looked at him, and immediately afterwards 
 whistling shrilly. The signal was answered by
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 29 
 
 excited calls from the now rapidly approach 
 ing neophytes. 
 
 Rita disappeared into the house, then darted 
 out the back door, and keeping the hut between 
 herself and the boy ran at top speed until she 
 was enveloped in bushes. Now, as stealthily as 
 any Indian she began making a long detour, 
 shivering with fear as more than once, in the 
 distance, she caught a glimpse of some skulking 
 form, armed with stones or a club, making his 
 way towards her home. 
 
 Darkness all but obscured her when, panting 
 like a spent deer, she reached the rear entrance 
 to the mission patio. Pushing her weight against 
 it, it swung open, but instead of finding the 
 courtyard full of people preparing for the serv 
 ices of Christmas eve there was not a soul in 
 sight; even the kitchen and the open-air ovens 
 seemed to be deserted. 
 
 She hurried into the church, but even there, 
 though candles were lighted and the crude prop 
 erties for the Christmas tableau were in place, 
 there were neither priests, altar boys nor 
 sacristan. 
 
 Down to the main entrance she ran, and 
 then was stopped by a quick return of terror, 
 for through the closed double doors came the 
 shouts of angry, excited people, the noise of 
 hoof beats, and then the startling report of a 
 musket. 
 
 As she listened shouted phrases detached
 
 30 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 themselves from the mingled dissonance of the 
 mob. " 'Twas Rita Avila ! She did it all ! A 
 witch she's a witch! Find her! Stone her!" 
 
 At the girl's right was the little door which 
 opened on the tower stairs, and now, not daring 
 to look further for Padre Narciso, she slipped 
 through it and ascended the long flight. 
 
 Outside the tumult waxed, for more was 
 happening than the Senora Montoyo had 
 planned. Quite inadvertently she had told the 
 truth to Maria when she had said that there 
 were two Apaches about. However, instead of 
 being there to plan for a raid, they were simply 
 rather presumptuous beggars who purposed to 
 turn to their own advantage the white man's 
 season of gift making. After spending the day 
 further down the valley they returned just in 
 time to see a mingled gathering of Christian 
 whites and Papagoes celebrating the birthday 
 of their god of love by hunting down and try 
 ing to slay a girl for walking in her sleep. 
 
 Whatever may have been the thoughts of 
 these bronzed horsemen of the mountains at 
 the sight of the denizens of San Xavier running 
 madly about with stones and clubs in their 
 hands, it did not deter them from their errand. 
 
 They stopped at the house of the Montoyos, 
 and as there was no one there to forbid them 
 helped themselves to a knife apiece and a 
 couple of gaudy rebosas. 
 
 At the Avila's place was old Sanchez, so
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 31 
 
 the marauders went on to the jacal of Pablo 
 the Papago and entered the door left open by 
 Nicolas. The only thing that appealed to them 
 was a sack of ground corn, which they took 
 and hurried out. 
 
 It was at this moment that Maria, becoming 
 apprehensive for the safety of her Josito, started 
 back to her jacal. Through the fast gathering 
 darkness she saw the Apaches leave her door, 
 one of them carrying a sack in her arms, and 
 not unnaturally thought it was her baby. For 
 a moment she halted, stunned by the sight, then 
 screamed with all her might. The Apaches 
 jumped to their horses and rode away. 
 
 Attracted by her cries other Papagoes and 
 Mexicans joined her as she ran to her hut. 
 When she found that Josito was really gone 
 she dropped limply to the ground, and gave her 
 self up to lamentations. A minute or two later 
 Pablo, accompanied by the Serior Montoyo, 
 arrived. The Papago was for the moment al 
 most as much overcome as his wife, but Don 
 Manuel was a man of action. Calling for horse 
 men and mounts, he with Pablo and others was 
 soon spurring hard through the gathering dark 
 ness after the fleeing Apaches. 
 
 When Rita, after climbing the long stairs, 
 reached the tower, by the glow of the torches 
 from the patio she saw the baby Josito with his 
 head pillowed on the goat's side and both asleep. 
 
 She was too tired to wonder much how the
 
 32 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 child happened to be there, but longing for the 
 comfort of human touch, tenderly took him in 
 her arms, and the little hands that went so 
 softly and sleepily about her neck must have 
 touched as well her heart, for she lay down 
 with him crying softly. 
 
 And now that we have found them so safe 
 a sanctuary, we may see how it fared with 
 Rafael Valdez. It was a half hour after the 
 departure of the Senor Montoyo that he arrived 
 at Rita's door, his pocket heavy with the fifty 
 pesos from the alcalde, his heart light with the 
 thought that with all this wonderful wealth he 
 could marry Rita at once. 
 
 Old Sanchez met him with a face lined with 
 cunning grins. Oh, yes, the ancient said, the 
 Senora Montoyo had got the riff-raff of the town 
 to try to stone Rita as though they could really 
 hurt one who was bruja! But she was fooling 
 them! Where was she now? Quien sabe? 
 Flying through the air with Nicolas to some 
 place where she would make a fine brew for 
 those who had dared to affront her. 
 
 Almost crazed by his fears, but unable to get 
 anything further from the grinning dotard, 
 Rafael galloped swiftly to the mission. 
 
 When the knot of people who still stood 
 before the main entrance saw him, their mouths 
 opened like the mouth of a fish on a hook, and 
 they began to back away into the darkness. 
 Rafael, his lips like chalk but his eyes like coals
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 33 
 
 of fire, jumped from his horse and strode toward 
 them, torn between fears for his sweetheart and 
 his terrible rage against them. "You would 
 stone Rita Avila, you scum!" Then seeing the 
 Senora Montoyo slipping backward through the 
 people, he caught her by the wrist. "So this was 
 your work you cat!" He shook her savagely. 
 "Quick!" he said, "tell me what you have done 
 with her." 
 
 Padre Narciso, who had just come from the 
 grief-stricken Maria, now within the church, laid 
 his old, white hand between them. "My son!" 
 It was the voice of authority as well as the voice 
 of love. 
 
 Rafael loosened his hold on the woman, but 
 looked pleadingly at the gray-haired priest. 
 "Do you know what they would have done with 
 her?" 
 
 The priest bowed his head. "To my shame. 
 Oh, my people, that I have been so poor a 
 shepherd that such a thing could have happened 
 here!" 
 
 "But where is she?" pleaded the artist. 
 
 The padre's face was full of sympathy. "I 
 only learned of the matter when this crowd 
 reached here, and at once started Kalka, the 
 Pima trailer, to see if he could find her. You 
 have been to her house?" 
 
 Rafael had not finished his reply when the 
 Pima, who was carrying a torch, came to them 
 through the uneasy crowd. "Too dark. Can't
 
 34 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 see much," said the Indian. "Think maybe 
 Senorita's tracks in patio." Together the three 
 went to the big courtyard where the trailer 
 pointed to the ground. "New shoes, new heels ! 
 Think maybe those be her! She go inside!" and 
 he pointed through the priest's robing room. 
 
 The men filed in with white, fear-lined faces, 
 where they saw poor Maria kneeling before the 
 empty manger. 
 
 Rafael swept the room with frantic eyes. 
 "Padre!" he said, clutching at the priest's sleeve. 
 "In the name of God, tell me where to look!" 
 
 There was another thunder of hoofs outside, 
 and Don Manuel with Pablo the Papago and the 
 other riders burst through the door. "More 
 witchcraft," cried a Mexican wildly. "We 
 caught the Apaches, but by sorcery the boy was 
 turned into a sack of corn!" 
 
 At this Rafael walked up to Don Manuel 
 with hands that opened and shut dangerously. 
 "If there is a witch in this town, it is your wife. 
 She tried to have Rita Avila stoned. If the girl 
 is not dead now it is not her fault. Make her 
 tell us what she had done with her, or, before 
 God, I'll choke it out of her." 
 
 He had scarcely finished speaking when a 
 frantic scream came from the Senora Montoyo, 
 and as they all looked they saw her pointing 
 wildly overhead. "She is flying through the air 
 with Josito ! See, there is the goat, too !" 
 
 All the people turned their eyes to where
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 35 
 
 she pointed, and with whitened faces stared 
 and crossed themselves. High in the air, almost 
 over their heads now, they saw Rita, not flying, 
 but walking in her sleep along the beam that 
 led to the place in the dome where she had 
 watched Rafael at his work. As the Senora had 
 said, in her arms she carried the little Josito, 
 and in front of her trotted the goat, swaggering 
 as devil-may-care as you please. Scarcely wider 
 than Rita's little feet was the beam, and in the 
 church's dim shadows it was no wonder that 
 the people thought she trod on air. 
 
 Never hesitating, and with her eyes gently 
 staring into vacancy, she walked until she 
 reached the dome. 
 
 Many started to cry out, but Padre Narciso 
 held up his hand. "Quiet!" he said, "and down 
 on your knees to God, who by this miracle is 
 returning the baby in the arms of the girl you 
 persecuted, even as the people persecuted the 
 Christ at Jerusalem." 
 
 One long minute went by and then another. 
 Rita looked vacantly about her, and then as 
 though unable to find the object of her search, 
 turned and again passed over the people's heads 
 while they stared trembling. 
 
 The beam ended at the gallery, over the en 
 trance, and from there she passed to the tower 
 stairs and down them into the body of the 
 church, where the villagers with fearful down 
 cast eyes made a path for her.
 
 36 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 
 
 Here she paused for a moment irresolute, 
 and then walked slowly, not to Rafael, who 
 stood looking at her with his heart in his face, 
 and not to the kindly old padre, but to the altar 
 of the Mother of Sorrows, where she sank slowly 
 down and rested her head against the wall as 
 though she were very tired. 
 
 For a while, with closed eyes, she seemed in 
 dreamless sleep. When she opened them again 
 she was looking into the face of her lover, who 
 was bending over her. She gazed at him still 
 in that borderland that lies between waking and 
 sleeping. "I am sure I dreamed I heard the 
 beats of your horse's hoofs," she said. Then 
 waking realities came back to her, and she 
 caught his hands. "Tell me that the other ter 
 rible things were dreams, too, and that you only, 
 Rafaelito, are real." 
 
 A half hour later, perhaps it was, after all 
 these things had happened, with little Josito 
 now in the manger, and the people gathered 
 around looking at the tableau of the Holy Night 
 when a bell sounded. Rafael and Rita, who had 
 wandered into the moon-lit patio, heard it and 
 looked comprehendingly into each other's eyes. 
 
 "It's midnight! Christmas eve!" said the girl, 
 "It's the hour when all the beasts kneel down. 
 Oh, Rafael, if Nicolas would only kneel with 
 the others, maybe his witchcraft would leave 
 him." 
 
 The lover quickly accepted the comforting
 
 THE WITCHERY OF RITA 37 
 
 thought. "I saw him in the robing room as we 
 came through," he said, "and if he won't kneel 
 otherwise I'd best hold him down. My brother 
 converted a heathen Yaqui once that way." 
 
 They hurried back through the open door, 
 and truly as the stars shine over us, the goat 
 was there and down on his knees, and what was 
 more, his head was bowed to the floor under the 
 padre's case of papers. 
 
 "Madre de Dios!" cried Rafael, suddenly hor 
 rified, "he's eating a prayerbook!" 
 
 He started to take it from him, but Rita, hav 
 ing a comprehending heart, restrained him. 
 
 "As you value your salvation, don't stop 
 him, Rafael. Learned men like you and the 
 padre can read their prayers, I can be told them, 
 but how can poor Nicolas get them save he eats 
 them? He got witchcraft through his stomach, 
 why should he not in the same way secure sal 
 vation?"
 
 WAITING FOR 
 TONTI 
 
 A STORY OF THE CLIFF- 
 DWELLERS 
 
 OF course the entire affair could be ex 
 plained by mental suggestion. Mrs. Mc- 
 Rae had received a book by parcel post 
 that dipped into transmigration, metempsy 
 chosis and all that sort of thing, and everyone 
 in camp, including Tonti, had read it, and con 
 sequently was ready to believe that his neigh 
 bor's ego, if not his own, some time or other 
 might have been up to almost anything. 
 
 The first person to come in from the outside 
 after we had saturated ourselves with our 
 pseudo-metaphysics was Stuart Osborn, and 
 what with unconscious suggestion and telepathy 
 we might easily have forced the whole affair 
 on him. I say it could be explained that way, 
 but whether that explanation would be cor 
 rectthat's a vastly different matter. 
 
 The manifestations, to use Mrs. McRae's 
 word, began on the very night of Stuart's ar 
 rival. We had pitched our tents on the rim of 
 
 39
 
 40 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 "Montezuma's Well," and after supper were 
 sitting, as usual, around the campfire, with the 
 big Arizona stars over us looking so near that 
 Bill Hewett, the Josselyn guide, said he believed 
 he could light his cigarette on one of them if 
 he would only stretch a little. 
 
 Professor and Mrs. McRae had just returned 
 from a three-days' trip to some newly explored 
 cliff-dwellings on Beaver Creek, and were show 
 ing us a woven cotton belt they had found that 
 had been made by some aborigine not less than 
 five hundred and possibly a thousand years ago. 
 It was faded and worn, but of exquisite work 
 manship. 
 
 Stuart looked at it for a long time in a pre 
 occupied sort of way, and finally said: "There 
 ought to be a lot better one than that in the 
 cave down by the 'Well.' ' 
 
 The professor looked at him sharply. "What 
 makes you think that?" 
 
 "I don't know," he replied, knitting his eye 
 brows as though trying to remember something. 
 "Aren't they always apt to find things like that 
 in kivas?" 
 
 "Kivas!" repeated the professor inquisi- 
 torially, "What do you know about kivas? Have 
 you ever been in Arizona before?" 
 
 "Why, no; guess I must have read something 
 about them." Later he said to me: "What in 
 the dickens is a 'kiva,' anyway. Did I make up 
 the word?"
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 41 
 
 Mrs. McRae overheard him, and naturally 
 that was enough to start her mystery-loving 
 mind to buzzing. "Tracy," she said to me when 
 Stuart turned away, "I can see that your friend, 
 Mr. Osborn, is a very unusual young man. Peo 
 ple with his kind of gray eyes are very apt to be 
 psychic." 
 
 I didn't attempt to reply to this remarkable 
 bit of optical information knowing Mrs. Mc 
 Rae; but instead put up a smoke screen and 
 retreated to my tent in good order. 
 
 Impelled by a desire to get certain long 
 shadows into a landscape on which I was work 
 ing, I was up at sunrise the next morning, but 
 early as I was Stuart was ahead of me, and as 
 I looked over the cliff that runs up from the 
 "Well," I saw him half way down the pre 
 cipitous sides of the big bowl, jumping like a 
 goat from one little foothold to another. 
 
 "For heaven's sake, man!" I yelled to him, 
 "Stop ! You can't get down that way. You'll be 
 killed!" 
 
 He only waved his hand at me, continuing 
 his mad descent until he got to the water's edge, 
 where he disappeared. At this, for a second or 
 two, my hair stood straight up, for as everybody 
 in Arizona knows, "Montezuma's Well" is only 
 a matter of a thousand or so feet deep, with 
 almost unequaled drowning facilities. 
 
 However, wholly uninundated, Stuart soon 
 reappeared, and after lighting a cigarette started 
 up again.
 
 42 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 If it had been anyone but Stuart Osborn who 
 was trying this stunt it might not have seemed 
 so hare brained, but Stuart We were room 
 mates at Harvard where he and all that per 
 tained to the big, broad out of doors were most 
 decidedly not on speaking terms, and in spite 
 of his conscientious work at the gym which he 
 took about as joyously as a cat would a shower 
 bath he was a grind of the most incorrigible 
 type, wasting precious hours over musty books 
 that he might have passed profitably rooting at 
 a football game or driving Beatrix about in 
 her car. 
 
 To my knowledge he had never ridden a 
 horse in his life, never shot a gun nor thrown 
 a line for a fish, and his wildest attempt at 
 exploration had been to make an unchaperoned 
 visit to New York, where unguided and alone 
 he had explored the jungles of Bronx Park. 
 
 By the time Stuart had neared the top of 
 the bowl the entire camp, startled by my shouts, 
 was waiting for him. 
 
 Beatrix Josselyn, Stuart's fiancee, who was 
 usually about as animated as a pond lily in 
 August, was almost excited and suggested to 
 Tonti that they throw down a rope. "Don't you 
 be afraid, Miss Josselyn," I heard Tonti say, "he 
 jumps with straight feet. I think, like myself, 
 he may be part Indian." Whereupon Beatrix's 
 anxiety was quite overcome by gasping indig 
 nation.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 43 
 
 When, with a last agile spring, Stuart gained 
 the top, Mrs. Josselyn was the first to greet 
 him. "And you hadn't even had your coffee," 
 she said reproachfully. "Stuart, how could you 
 be so wildly reckless?" 
 
 Her son-in-law-to-be did not seem to hear 
 her. He was looking at Duncan McRae with a 
 smile all over his face. "Professor, I've a hunch 
 where that girdle is I was telling you about. 
 Let's go down after breakfast and see if we 
 can't find it." 
 
 And they did find it. It was the most amaz 
 ing thing. We descended by the regular trail 
 this time Professor and Mrs. McRae, the Jos- 
 selyns, Tonti and her aboriginal ancestor, old 
 Ky-loo, Bill Hewlett and myself. 
 
 Although none of us had indicated the way 
 and the entrance was screened with brush, 
 Stuart walked directly to the cave, took a candle 
 from Tonti, and stooping over led the way in 
 side and then on to a far corner where roof 
 and floor met. Here he paused uncertainly 
 while the rest of us, in a semi-circle back of 
 him, gaped non-intelligently like the chorus of 
 merry villagers in a comic opera. 
 
 Old Ky-loo shoved a sort of wooden spade 
 into Stuart's hand. "Want to dig?" he sug 
 gested. 
 
 It seemed as though that was what our young 
 friend with the psychic gray eyes did want to 
 do, though apparently unconscious of it, for
 
 44 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 after he had removed a peck or so of loose dirt 
 he exposed a section of wall built up with stones 
 set in the old mud-mortar of the cliff-dwellers. 
 
 It was curious to see Ky-loo and the pro 
 fessor, right at Stuart's elbows, watch him for 
 all the world like a couple of Airdales when one 
 is digging out a ground squirrel. 
 
 It took only a few minutes to loosen the 
 stones, and when they had been removed, there, 
 in a little recess, were two burial ollas, with the 
 usual saucer-like covers, and between them a 
 fiber-covered roll about two and a half feet 
 long. 
 
 Immediately Ky-loo pounced upon the roll 
 and started for the entrance of the cave while 
 Professor McRae and I followed with the ollas. 
 
 When we reached the open air and uncov 
 ered the find, one urn proved to contain the 
 partially incinerated skeletal remains of a man, 
 the other of a woman, while within the roll we 
 found two complete sets of the most wonderful 
 aboriginal ceremonial dress, one masculine and 
 the other feminine, I have ever seen. There was 
 a woman's tunic, a man's kilt, head-dresses of 
 eagle feathers, anklets and wristlets made of 
 wild sheep toes, necklaces, moccasins and not 
 only the one expected girdle, but two, beauti 
 fully woven of heavy cotton cloth like the kilt 
 and tunic, dyed in blue and brown, and with 
 heavy fringe at the ends. 
 
 "For some reason," observed Stuart mildly,
 
 WAITING FOR TONT1 45 
 
 "I had a hunch there might be something like 
 that there." 
 
 "A hoonch!" repeated McRae, whose little 
 bright eyes were fairly crackling with excite 
 ment, "Mon, ye're veery mild with your sub 
 stantives." 
 
 The effect the find had on old Ky-loo was 
 almost as interesting as the discovery itself. He 
 took the feminine toggery and gave it to Tonti, 
 who immediately disappeared into the cave, and 
 by the time he had adorned himself with the 
 man's regalia Tonti reappeared, having effected 
 a most amazing transformation. 
 
 To make the situation plain I must tell you 
 that although Tonti's mother was old Ky-loo's 
 daughter and a full-blooded Hopi Indian, her 
 father was an American, and while considered 
 somewhat eccentric was a man of education and 
 refinement. It seems he had come to Arizona 
 as a botanist to study its flora, and had married 
 little Sun-on-the-hill, as they called her, first 
 because she had nursed him through smallpox 
 when his white companions had left him to die, 
 and secondly because she was a mighty nice 
 little woman, and being a Hopi mustn't be con 
 fused with a Sioux or a Navajo squaw any more 
 than a cultivated English woman should be with 
 a wild Albanian. 
 
 Tonti had a year at Columbia after she had 
 finished with the Government schools, and the 
 first time I met her, in her smart white duck
 
 46 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 with a tennis racket under her arm, I had no 
 idea that she wasn't a white girl. Now as she 
 came out of the cave dressed in the garments 
 of the ancient semi-civilized cliff-dwellers, she 
 was an Indian from the eagle feathers on her 
 hair to the red-soled moccasins on her feet. But 
 she was more than Indian she was part of the 
 forgotten, mysterious past; wild as a doe is 
 wild, but with the same kindly gentleness that 
 is oftener seen among the better Pueblo Indians 
 than among white people. 
 
 Ky-loo immediately struck up a weird sort 
 of a chant and began dancing, swinging his 
 arms in a not ungraceful fashion, like the wings 
 of a great bird. 
 
 Tonti joined him, but after dancing for per 
 haps a minute or two, stopped before Stuart, 
 and taking the eagle feathers off her head 
 reached up and put them on the white man. 
 "This is our old eagle ceremony," she said in 
 a tone that seemed to imply, "Of course you 
 know all about it." Then: "You should dance 
 it, too." 
 
 To my amazement my old book-worm of a 
 room-mate at once complied, falling naturally 
 into both the step and the queer, graceful move 
 ments of the arms. 
 
 After a minute old Ky-loo stopped and be 
 came the orchestra, while Tonti and Stuart con 
 tinued the performance. 
 
 The aboriginal dance is apt to be a jiggly,
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 47 
 
 angular and rather monotonous affair, but as 
 Tonti and Stuart danced it, it would have made 
 a hit on any vaudeville stage. Personally I 
 thought it stunning. I guess we all did but the 
 Josselyns. It was easy to see that Mrs. J. thought 
 it quite uncalled for, while Beatrix was dis 
 tinctly bored. 
 
 When they finally stopped, she said with a 
 decidedly arctic tinge to her voice: "Well, 
 Stuart, if this is the way Arizona air is going 
 to affect you, I think we'd better go back to 
 Cambridge." 
 
 During the days that followed, to the Jos- 
 selyn's increasing consternation, Arizona air, 
 or some other mysterious impulse, continued to 
 incite Stuart to all sorts of startling things 
 for him. He went out hunting with me, learned 
 a lot of Indian lore of old Ky-loo, and had Bill 
 not only teach him how to ride, but give him 
 lessons in wrestling as well. The only fault he 
 had with the guide's camp was that it contained 
 too many luxuries. 
 
 "Let's tie a blanket apiece and a bag of 
 tortillas behind our saddles and trek across the 
 country," he suggested to me one morning. "I 
 want to get a taste of the real thing." 
 
 "Stuart," I replied firmly, "Nature is all right 
 in its place, and a solo of tortillas would doubt 
 less be quite satisfying for old Ky-loo if he 
 couldn't get anything better; but, speaking per 
 sonally, I prefer my rugged penetration into the
 
 48 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 wilderness tempered with a mattress and straw 
 berry jam. Bill is a dispensation of Providence 
 and his camp isn't any too de luxe for me." 
 
 Naturally this new Stuart and Beatrix didn't 
 get along at all well together. I watched her 
 try to entertain him one morning. She began 
 with an annual report she had just received 
 from a Ceramic Art League, followed with a 
 paper she was preparing on prison reform and 
 wound up with a poem by Tagore. 
 
 Stuart listened politely with his eyes on the 
 distant mountains. "I got a new view yesterday 
 from the top of Cherry Creek Hill," he said when 
 she had finished. "I'll bet the gods on Olympus 
 never saw anything that could touch it." 
 
 Beatrix was looking at a letter. "The Apollo 
 concerts, they say, are better than ever with 
 the new leader." 
 
 "Uh-huh!" agreed Stuart. "And speaking of 
 music, did you hear that canyon wren this morn 
 ing? Talk about divine melody, that bird's song 
 went straight up to Heaven's dome. Beatrix, 
 let's take a hike down to Montezuma's Castle or 
 some place. I'll shoot some cottontails and we 
 can broil them on spits." 
 
 Beatrix sighed. "I'll never let anyone I 
 really care for come West again. You'll never 
 be the same you were, Stuart. Go off and play 
 with Tonti. She doesn't mind getting sand in 
 her shoes or ants down her neck. Besides, she 
 doesn't freckle."
 
 WAITING FOR TONT1 49 
 
 And, of course, being a mere man, Stuart 
 didn't know any better than to take her at her 
 word and go off with Tonti. 
 
 One day Tonti, Stuart and I were riding 
 together. "I believe the feel of the Southwest 
 has really gotten into your veins," said the girl, 
 looking at Stuart's tanned face and easy posture 
 in his saddle in obvious admiration. 
 
 "Tonti," he replied he always called her 
 that now "the first night I was here I had a 
 curious feeling that this whole country was my 
 house that I had a key that could unlock every 
 door. Now, though my objective self knows the 
 desert a lot better, and I never want to leave it, 
 some way that first feeling is dimmed. My key 
 doesn't fit as well as it did." 
 
 "Perhaps it fitted too well at first," she re 
 plied, looking at him thoughtfully. "Perhaps 
 you were remembering more than the gods 
 permit." A wistful, eager look came suddenly 
 to her eyes. "I envy you, though, with your 
 key. If you unlock other doors will you let 
 me see inside, too?" 
 
 This seemed to be just a bit too mystical for 
 Stuart, for he replied in a matter-of-fact sort 
 of a tone, "I think you have seen inside every 
 one I know anything about. Anyway, they didn't 
 seem to open into anything more tangible than 
 moonshine the stuff that dreams are made 
 of." 
 
 "Dreams about things out here? The cliffs?"
 
 50 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 He nodded. "A patchwork of disconnected 
 things; and I forget." 
 
 Tonti's manner was still very serious. 
 "Listen, Stuart," she hesitated just a moment 
 over his first name "if you dream about them 
 again, wake yourself up and go over the inci 
 dents in your mind before they fade, then tell 
 me. I have a special reason for asking." 
 
 It was that same afternoon that the Navajo, 
 Hastin Nez, who afterwards played such a sin 
 ister part in what happened, first visited our 
 camp. He was a bold, good-looking chap, in a 
 swaggering sort of a way, and in his dark 
 trousers with the green velveteen shirt that the 
 Navajo dandies affect, was decidedly pic 
 turesque. 
 
 He was working for a cattleman on the 
 Verde, and rode in, with two others of his 
 tribe, to fill their canteens. I had been making 
 some sketches of Tonti in her cliff-dweller cos 
 tume, and when Hastin came around the corner 
 of the tent where I was working, after pausing 
 to stare at Tonti first in surprise and then in 
 admiration, walked up to her and greeted her 
 like an old friend. 
 
 They talked in English, and I learned that 
 some years earlier they had been in a Govern 
 ment school together, but while it was evident 
 that he was much taken with pretty little Tonti, 
 she seemed not only to dislike him and look 
 upon him for what he was, an uncouth savage, 
 but for some reason to fear him as well.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 51 
 
 She was polite enough, but I could see that 
 her unconscious air of superiority galled him. 
 Finally, to get rid of him, she started over to the 
 Josselyn tent, and as she did so he said gruffly: 
 "You think you too smart. You see; I come 
 back and tell you some things." 
 
 He made his word good. Several days later 
 Stuart and I were returning to camp from a hike 
 over the hills. Our path took us along the 
 creek bottom where at places it was grown up 
 with brush. Suddenly from behind a thicket 
 we heard voices which we recognized as be 
 longing to Tonti and Hastin. As we listened the 
 man's amazing words sent hot, fighting blood 
 to our faces. "My fathers always stole their 
 wives from the Hopis. We pick out the girl 
 we want and we marry her. You better come 
 with me now. If don't come, I come back some 
 night and make you." 
 
 The girl cried out in terror, and we plunged 
 through the bushes in their direction. As we 
 came upon them, the Navajo had Tonti by the 
 wrists and was pulling her toward him. Stuart 
 was ahead of me, and I could see his fists tighten 
 as he lunged forward to strike the brute. I 
 caught hold of him and held him back just in 
 time to save him, for with an incredibly swift 
 movement Hastin had loosened his grip on the 
 girl and had whipped out an ugly looking knife. 
 
 For a second or two the white man and 
 Indian stood there with tense muscles, glaring
 
 52 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 at each other; then Hastin dodged backward 
 behind a sycamore, and by the time we caught 
 sight of him again he was on horseback spurring 
 his beast down the creek. 
 
 Naturally Tonti was pretty well shaken, and 
 I thought at the time rather hysterical, for as 
 she looked up at Stuart she said : "He has been 
 after me to drag me down from a thousand 
 years ago." 
 
 After we got back to camp and sat smoking 
 in our tent, Stuart said: "No; I don't know just 
 what Tonti did mean, but it was not hysteria." 
 He looked thoughtfully at his pipe a while and 
 then went on. "I believe, too, it is in some way 
 connected with something I have been thinking 
 about lately. I have a firm conviction that every 
 man in this world has an instinctive, inevitable 
 enemy that he meets sooner or later, and as a 
 part of the struggle that man has had from the 
 stone age, he has had to fight him to the finish." 
 
 "You've met your enemy?" I suggested, for 
 this new Stuart was certainly interesting, if not 
 always understandable. 
 
 "Yes; today. I know it sounds foolish to 
 dignify a brute like that Navajo with anything 
 so important, yet in a way I can't explain, he 
 represents my enemy of all the ages repre 
 sents the kind of thing that something in me 
 seems to want to fight against." He was smok 
 ing placidly now. "It must sound like awful 
 rot, but I believe there is something in it if 
 you get me."
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 53 
 
 I didn't get the idea very well at the time, 
 but I did from what happened later, and that 
 is why I am writing this story. 
 
 That night as we all sat around the camp- 
 fire we were talking, as we often did, about what 
 had become of the cliff-dwellers. There were 
 hundreds upon hundreds of their houses built 
 in the recesses of the cliffs in the Southwest, 
 and although many of them are in good repair, 
 even now, there was not a soul left living in 
 them when the Spaniards came up in the six 
 teenth century, and judging them by the articles 
 left in their deserted dwellings, there were no 
 people left in the country that could compare 
 with them in civilized advancement. Just what 
 had become of them was the great unsolved 
 mystery that Professor McRae was working on. 
 
 As we talked the usual theories volcanoes, 
 earthquakes, pestilence, warfare and the like 
 were suggested, when finally Beatrix, who was 
 allowing the friendship between Tonti and 
 Stuart to get decidedly on her nerves, remarked : 
 "Well, if they feel like I do about this God-for 
 saken country, they probably all died of ennui." 
 
 "Jus' naturally yawned themselves to death," 
 translated Bill. "Maybe it was some kind of a 
 bug that bit 'em. How about it, Professor?" 
 
 "Theer may have been a veeriety of reasons,*' 
 began McRae with his usual caution. "This 
 afternoon Stuart here was tellin' Miss Tonti a 
 maist reemarkable tale, which rather follows
 
 54 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 my own convictions. Wheer did ye get the 
 story, lad?" 
 
 Osborn looked decidedly uncomfortable at 
 thus being drawn into the limelight. "Just a 
 weird sort of a dream I had after all the quail 
 pie the other night, though I will say it would 
 have made a corking movie. It must have been 
 those Navajoes that suggested it. I thought a 
 horde of such ruffians came down from the 
 north and overran the country like the Goths 
 did Rome. It really was tremendously vivid," 
 he went on, warming up to his tale. "The at 
 tacking bands used sort of notched poles with 
 a hooked branch on the end for scaling ladders. 
 They fought with stone hatchets and spears, as 
 well as bows and arrows, while the cliff-dwellers 
 rained stones on them, holding other weapons 
 in readiness for closer combat." 
 
 The professor was watching him curiously. 
 "Hoo did the fight come oot?" He spoke softly 
 as though fearing to break some kind of a spell. 
 
 "I don't seem to remember," replied Stuart, 
 knitting his brows as he did when puzzled. "It's 
 all kind of hazy. I thought I was watching the 
 fight down at Montezuma's Castle. The cliff- 
 dwellers were making their defense from the 
 top story where the parapeted gallery is. They 
 were a short, stocky people like Ky-loo, but put 
 up a wonderful fight against the savages, who 
 were half as big again." 
 
 "Didn't I tell you he was psychic?" whispered 
 Mrs* McRae into my ear.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 55 
 
 I pretended not to hear her. 
 
 "What I remember clearest," went on Stuart, 
 "is a personal encounter between the chief of 
 the cliffmen and the leader of the invaders a 
 big, ugly brute." 
 
 "The cliff man killed him?" Mrs. McRae 
 couldn't any more let a person tell a story un 
 assisted than she could live without eating. 
 
 Stuart drew a choking breath. "No; the 
 savage killed him threw him over the parapet. 
 It was a sickening thing." 
 
 "And then" 
 
 "And then, the girl Did I tell you that 
 the women were in it, too? The girl she 
 seemed to be the chief's sweetheart when she 
 saw what had happened, without a word or a 
 cry, climbed to the top of the parapet at one 
 end where there was no one to stop her, stood 
 there poised for one terrible moment and 
 jumped!" 
 
 "And the savages won?" 
 
 "They must have. It all got very confused 
 after the chief was was killed. Even the death 
 of the girl seemed to come to me afterwards. 
 And that's all." He rubbed his eyes as one 
 might on wakening. 
 
 The silence that followed was broken by 
 old Ky-loo, who, though he spoke English but 
 brokenly, understood it very well. "I sabe fight 
 ing like that," he said excitedly. "I heap know 
 those fightings." And he poured forth a torrent 
 of words to Tonti in his native tongue.
 
 56 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 "He says," translated the girl, "that that is 
 the way the Hopis think the cliff-dwellers 
 around here really were killed or driven out. 
 The few who were left, we of the Eagle clan 
 believe, were our ancestors, and the Navajoes, 
 in part, may have descended from those who 
 fought us. Do you wonder we think them 
 enemies?" 
 
 As we were going to our tents, Stuart and 
 Tonti were standing near my door looking into 
 each other's eyes as lovers look. "You saw the 
 face of the cliff man chief?" she was asking 
 him. 
 
 "No; no, but I did see the girl. Do you 
 know who she was?" 
 
 Tonti did not reply, but rested her hand in 
 his. 
 
 "She was you." 
 
 I went into my tent and could still hear them 
 talking things, heaven knows, I had no busi 
 ness to hear, so I started the victrola! That 
 stopped it! 
 
 Ever since Stuart and Tonti had danced the 
 eagle dance I had it in mind to try a painting 
 of the two dressed as ancient cliff-people, using 
 a room in the Montezuma's Castle as a back 
 ground. On Beatrix's account I didn't want to 
 take the two off by themselves, so I suggested 
 that the entire camp go down in my car, have 
 a picnic supper and return by moonlight. I 
 would take a canvas along and make a start on 
 the picture.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTl 57 
 
 My suggestion met with general enthusiasm, 
 and in a half hour we were on our way Pro 
 fessor and Mrs. McRae, Tonti, Stuart and even 
 Ky-loo, whom I wanted for a special purpose. 
 Hewlett remained in camp to look after the 
 horses. 
 
 Just before we reached our destination we 
 passed the three Navajoes, when Hastin waved 
 his hand at us in impudent assurance and called 
 a greeting to Tonti. 
 
 "I have a feeling that some day I'll kill that 
 fellow," said Stuart; at which mild suggestion 
 an atavistic gleam of approval came into Tonti's 
 usually gentle eyes, and I wondered whether it 
 harked back to red ancestors or white. 
 
 After we had climbed up the ladder into the 
 big house in the cliff, with Ky-loo's assistance, 
 it took less than a half hour to make a perfectly 
 good aborigine out of Stuart, accomplished by 
 applying a nice brown stain to his skin and 
 thereafter adorning him with the ancient rai 
 ment. 
 
 Tonti had worn her costume from the camp, 
 and it was wonderfully becoming. The finely 
 woven tunic, made to expose her left arm and 
 shoulder, reached to her knees, her moccasins 
 were red soled and the aboriginal puttees were 
 of fine deer skin. Her hair she had arranged 
 with the Hopi "squash blossom" whorls, and 
 altogether when I had the two perched on the 
 gallery that made the fifth story of the "castle,"
 
 58 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 they made a picture that was mighty easy to 
 look at. 
 
 "Mr. Osborn's features don't look like Tonti's 
 people," whispered Mrs. McRae, who was watch 
 ing me work, "but the attitude and the spirit 
 behind his face certainly do." And although 
 the remark irritated me in an irrational sort 
 of a way, I knew she was exactly right. 
 
 I tried to switch her from her line of talk, 
 but without success. 
 
 "You two look as though you had lived here 
 all your lives," she went on. 
 
 "My ancestral grandmother quite likely used 
 to spin cotton up here," replied Tonti. She 
 looked at Stuart curiously. "I wonder what 
 your ancestors were doing then." 
 
 "Some of them might have been wild men 
 in the Hebrides, or helping St. Patrick drive the 
 snakes out of Ireland," he said with a frank 
 grin. 
 
 This was not at all satisfactory to Mrs. Mc 
 Rae, for she added quickly, "But your ego may 
 not have been with your ancestors. It may have 
 been, at that time, occupying the body of some 
 cliff-dweller at the Well." 
 
 I thought this was piling the ego business on 
 a little too thick, even for Mrs. McRae. "You 
 got that out of that idiotic transmigration book," 
 I said crossly. "You'll be seeing spooks up here 
 next." 
 
 "If I do," she returned imperturbably, "I'll 
 introduce them to you."
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 59 
 
 By the middle of the afternoon my models 
 became tired of holding their positions, and 
 Tonti and Mrs. McKay wandered down to one 
 of the lower stories where the professor was 
 explaining how the old ruin probably was built, 
 while Beatrix came up and talked with Stuart. 
 
 I was at one end of the gallery working on 
 some background, and as usual the couple at 
 the other end paid about as much attention to 
 me as though I had been a pile of rock. 
 
 "You know, Stuart, we'll never marry in this 
 wide world," Beatrix began in her usual placid 
 tone. "I've been thinking it over, and it has 
 just come to me that we aren't even engaged." 
 
 Stuart had been looking out above the para 
 pet at the white clouds that were drifting over 
 head, but at this startling bit of information he 
 turned to his vis-a-vis with blinking eyes. 
 "Aren't we?" he said. But while there was sur 
 prise there was no consternation in his tone. 
 "A man I used to know 'back East,' a certain 
 Stuart Osborn, once asked me to marry him; 
 but that wasn't you. You are Running Elk or 
 Tall Cactus, or some other aborigine. Just think 
 how bored we'd be with each other if we ever 
 did marry." 
 
 "Stuart was looking over the parapet again. 
 "Maybe," he admitted absently, and then added : 
 "Beatrix, did you ever watch a treetop from 
 above? Did you ever see anything more grace 
 ful than the way it sways in the wind?"
 
 60 WAITING FOR TONT1 
 
 Beatrix looked at him and laughed. "Did 
 the good Lord ever make such a man before? 
 Do you know what we were talking about?" 
 
 "Yes; you said we never were engaged. Do 
 you really mean it?" 
 
 I decided I'd heard about enough of that, too, 
 and called out, "Do you folks know that it is 
 going to rain?" 
 
 Beatrix lazily looked first at the clouds, 
 which really were rapidly growing black and 
 threatening, and then at her wrist watch. "We 
 may as well eat supper and wait till it's over," 
 she said. "We would be drenched before we'd 
 get to the car even if we should start now." 
 
 That was evident enough, for rumblings of 
 distant thunder could be heard and occasional 
 big drops were already falling. By the time we 
 sat down to supper it was raining in a good, 
 business-like downpour, and when we had fin 
 ished, in spite of the full moon that was sup 
 posed to be somewhere behind the clouds, it 
 was uncomfortably dark. 
 
 Stuart and I went to an opening and looked 
 out. On our arrival we had been obliged to 
 leave the car on the other side of Beaver Creek 
 and walk across to the cliff on stepping stones. 
 Through the fast-coming night we could see that 
 the creek was steadily rising. 
 
 "I hope the leddies will not be mindin' trifles 
 like bats," suggested the professor. "It looks 
 verra mooch to me that we'll bes stayin' here 
 the nicht."
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 61 
 
 It looked that way to me, too, and as we 
 would need a fire for light if not for heat, I 
 began searching corners for wood. However, 
 there was nothing to be found except structural 
 beams that it would be all but sacrilege to use, 
 so Stuart and I decided to brave the elements. 
 
 I had a raincoat, but at that my old room 
 mate had the best of me, for as we descended 
 the long ladders, when the rain beat back from 
 the cliffs, a young Niagara ran down the inside 
 of my collar while Stuart, still outwardly a 
 cliff-dweller, was as comfortable as a surf 
 bather in a bathing suit. 
 
 When we reached the base of the great rock 
 we found that Ky-loo had accompanied us, and 
 after stumbling about for a while actually se 
 cured some fairly dry wood. 
 
 We were hurrying back through the swiftly 
 gathering blackness when, as we neared the 
 ladder, we saw the forms of three men gathered 
 about it. 
 
 As unconcernedly as though they had been 
 a bunch of cats, Stuart hurled a chunk of wood 
 into their midst. "Our Navajo friends," he ex 
 plained as they disappeared in the darkness. 
 "What deviltry do you suppose they are up to 
 now?" 
 
 "Better take up bottom-side ladder," sug 
 gested Ky-loo. "That way cliffmen fix 'um." 
 
 A cheerful thought struck me. "Do you sup 
 pose they will steal the tires off the car?"
 
 62 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 "They don' want steal tires," replied Ky-loo 
 softly. "Want steal my girl. You got gun?" 
 
 Unfortunately neither of us had, but in view 
 of the steadily increasing rain that all but swept 
 us from our footholds, after we had pulled up 
 the lowest ladder, I decided that nothing less 
 at home in water and air than a flying fish 
 would be able to negotiate the cliffs on that 
 night. 
 
 We took our soggy wood to the top gallery, 
 where Stuart, by some sort of legerdemain, suc 
 ceeded in making a fire, while Ky-loo and I 
 wrung vast quantities of quite superfluous 
 water from our clothes. 
 
 "To think of spending a night in such an 
 awful place!" moaned Mrs. Josselyn. "I know 
 Stuart will catch his death of cold, un ungar- 
 mented as he is. Even his paint is washed off." 
 Her remarks were temporarily stopped by a 
 small, dark object that careened through the 
 air past her head. "Oo ooh!" she shrieked. 
 "Was that a scorpion?" 
 
 "Them be just bats !" explained Ky-loo sooth 
 ingly. "Like mice with wings! They no hurt." 
 
 "Mice with wings!" repeated Mrs. Josselyn 
 wailingly. "Beatrix, if we ever reach Boston, 
 never mention the West to me again." 
 
 We had brought robes and cushions from the 
 car, and these, spread out in the chamber back 
 of the upper gallery, made a possible sleeping 
 place for the women, while we men arranged
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 63 
 
 ourselves for the night in the next story lower. 
 
 I had succeeded in getting my clothes rea 
 sonably dry before the fire, and in spite of the 
 fact that our only mattress was the earth- 
 covered floor, went to sleep readily enough, 
 though what with the unyielding disposition 
 of my bed, the noise of the bats and the beating 
 of the rain, my rest was, to speak mildly, some 
 what disturbed. 
 
 The real apex of the storm, of which the 
 earlier performances were but mild prelimi 
 naries, must have struck us about midnight. I 
 was wakened by a flash that was like an in 
 candescent ball of fire before my eyes, followed 
 instantly by a crash of thunder that shook the 
 cliff. Almost immediately there was a second 
 flash, by the light of which I saw that McRae 
 was sitting bolt upright, and also noticed that 
 the other two men, who had been lying near 
 us, had disappeared. 
 
 "Where's Stuart?" I shouted. 
 
 McRae seemed too dazed to reply, but in 
 the darkness that engulfed us again I could 
 feel him get up and grope for the ladder lead 
 ing upward to where the women were. I fol 
 lowed him and as I pushed my way up through 
 the opening in the floor made out three huddled 
 forms at its edge forms which I knew to be 
 Beatrix and her mother and Mrs. McRae. 
 
 "For God's sake!" cried Beatrix, as she 
 gripped me by the wrist, "look there!"
 
 64 WAITING FOR TONTl 
 
 I strained my eyes in the darkness. At 
 first I could see nothing, but my ears were filled 
 with strange noises. The thunder for the time 
 being had died down to distant rumblings, but 
 added to the swish of rain against the rocks 
 outside, the gallery was filled with an unearthly 
 chattering and murmurs, and a noise as of the 
 shuffling of many bare feet. 
 
 Gradually my eyes seemed to be able to 
 penetrate the darkness, and in an unearthly and 
 unnatural way the place seemed to be full of 
 people, ghostly shapes, dressed in moccasins 
 and kilts as Stuart had been. With muffled 
 sounds they would pass swiftly up and down the 
 gallery, going within a few feet of us. 
 
 "It's shadows !" I heard McRae mutter. "The 
 noise is the bats!" 
 
 There was a sharp whistling sound over our 
 head, and looking up I could swear I saw ar 
 rows going through the air, and strike against 
 the rocks. 
 
 The Scotchman was repeating to himself 
 between set teeth. "It's bars of rain, I tell ye! 
 Bars of rain!" Mrs. Josselyn, who was lying 
 prone upon the floor, moaned in abject terror. 
 
 Steadily I could see the ghostly forms plainer, 
 until in a strange way they seemed to become 
 real, while the group around me became uncer 
 tain and fanciful. The forms I now noticed 
 were of little people, no taller than Tonti, but 
 strongly muscled. The parapet, which fronted
 
 WAITING FOR TONT1 65 
 
 the gallery, was lined with men, stripped to the 
 waist, who were hurling stones down into 
 the darkness. Behind them, and passing them 
 the stones, were women, also bare from the 
 waist up. 
 
 Suddenly the fighting seemed to converge at 
 a point on the far end of the gallery. The 
 muffled voices grew louder, and a hellish chorus 
 seemed to come up from below and outside the 
 parapet. I felt McRae's arm pass over mine as 
 he rested his bony hand reassuringly on his 
 wife's trembling shoulder. "Alice," I heard him 
 say doggedly, as though trying desperately to 
 hold his sanity, "it's the noise of the wind ye 
 hear, that's all and the rain against the rocks !" 
 But there was not one of us that did not know 
 that he was gallantly lying. 
 
 There came another vivid flash of lightning 
 and, as the glare lit the gallery, most of the 
 ghostly forms seemed to skurry back into the 
 shadows. One group, though, remained, and in 
 that brief interval of light there was burned 
 upon my vision a scene I shall never forget. 
 
 At the point where the fighting had been 
 the thickest, pushing up his bulking form from 
 the outside of the parapet, was Hastin Nez, 
 shouting as though leading an attacking force 
 and swinging a gleaming knife. Opposed to him 
 was Stuart Osborn, who fought him with bare 
 hands. At the instant of the flash the Navajo, 
 apparently having pushed Stuart back, pulled
 
 66 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 himself over the wall onto the gallery. I thought 
 I caught a glimpse of Tonti and Ky-loo just back 
 of them. 
 
 When the darkness fell again, immediately 
 I could both see and hear the ghostly forms 
 skurry back to the wall, but this time, instead 
 of resuming fighting, all seemed to stand watch 
 ing the conflict between their white champion 
 and the Navajo a conflict it suddenly seemed 
 to me that typified the eternal struggle between 
 the force that would lift up and that w T hich 
 would destroy. 
 
 I could scarcely make out the forms of the 
 two men now locked in deadly embrace, but it 
 seemed that for a moment a third form joined 
 them, only to be stricken down. 
 
 Again it lightened, and as the little people 
 skurried back I saw that Stuart's fingers had 
 closed about the wrist of the savage hand that 
 held the knife, and was pushing it back above 
 his head. At the feet of the two lay old Ky-loo 
 with a red blotch on his face. 
 
 Up to this time my impulses of action seem 
 to have been numbed with the uncanniness of 
 it all. Now, the sight of the little Hopi chief 
 lying wounded on the floor, even more than 
 Stuart's peril, put the fighting spirit into my 
 veins, and I started forward over the crouching 
 women. 
 
 I had only taken a step or two when increas 
 ing darkness so blotted the scene before me that 
 I could not tell friend from foe.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 67 
 
 While I paused uncertain I heard Hastin's 
 voice in vindictive, brutish grunts. "I kill you 
 before! I kill" 
 
 The sentence was never finished. From the 
 inky clouds that had caused the intense dark 
 ness shot fork after fork of dazzling light that 
 seemed to illuminate the scene for an eternity, 
 and to the accompanying bellow of thunder 
 which followed, the rocks quivered and trem 
 bled like things alive. I saw Tonti, with her 
 hand on the top of the parapet, watching the 
 conflict with eyes that dilated with horror, 
 and I thought of the other girl of the distant 
 past that had followed her lover over the cliffs; 
 saw Stuart snap his antagonist's hand that 
 held the knife back against the stone front of 
 the chambers, and the knife go clattering to 
 the floor; I saw Stuart push the Navajo's head 
 front and downward, then catching him from 
 the back, under the armpits, hurl him over his 
 shoulder and the parapet wall. 
 
 Blackness came again, and in my mental 
 vision I could see that falling body turn over 
 and over in the darkness and crash against the 
 stones. From the shadowy chambers back of 
 us came wild yells of exultation. Then all was 
 quiet. 
 
 For a space of time the rain came down with 
 great roaring. When it suddenly ceased the 
 clouds broke, and through the rift shone the 
 moon. I remember thinking quite idiotically
 
 68 WAITING FOR TONTI 
 
 how remarkable it was that the moon could 
 take all that had happened so unconcernedly. 
 
 Stuart and Tonti were helping old Ky-loo 
 to his feet, for it seemed that the old chap was 
 not seriously hurt. Then as I took him in charge 
 the two walked to the edge of the parapet. 
 
 A little later as I turned to them, their hands 
 were clasped together on the protecting wall, 
 and she was looking up at him with eyes that 
 seemed to be giving him her very soul. "It was 
 decreed that I must win," he was saying very 
 softly. "I have waited a thousand years for you, 
 Tonti, my very dear." 
 
 Then perceiving that I, as usual, was hang 
 ing about in the vicinity, what else could they 
 do but call me over, and together we examined 
 the crude scaling ladder by which the Navajo 
 had pulled himself up, and which followed very 
 nicely the specifications set forth in Stuart's 
 dream. 
 
 Suddenly moving forms at the base of the 
 cliff attracted my attention. At first the shadow 
 seemed so dense I could scarcely see them, but 
 slowly moving away they came into a little 
 patch of moonlight, when I saw it was two men, 
 undoubtedly Indians, who were carrying away 
 the body of a third. 
 
 The sun rose the next morning in a cloud 
 less sky. Beaver Creek fell as quickly as it had 
 risen, and by ten o'clock we were able to cross 
 to our car which, to my surprise, I found quite
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 69 
 
 unharmed. In an hour more we were in camp. 
 
 It was curious that on our return trip no 
 one attempted to talk of what had happened. 
 The time doubtless would come when we would 
 be loquacious enough about it, but not only did 
 the tragedy seem to put a seal upon our lips, 
 but the very nature of the other things seemed 
 to forbid idle discussion. 
 
 Stuart and I spent most of the afternoon in 
 our tent where he looked through papers and 
 wrote letters while I smoked and thought or 
 at least I thought I thought. 
 
 Once he remarked, "I suppose retribution is 
 compensation turned wrong side out. I did 
 what I did only because there was no escaping 
 it." Later he said: "When you hear it ob 
 served that a man answers the call of his 
 destiny, perhaps it simply is meant that he 
 found his day's work laid out for him, and he 
 did it." 
 
 That night, just as the light had faded from 
 the western sky, the moon rose gloriously, flood 
 ing the tableland with wonderful light. As usual 
 we were sitting about the campfire. Suddenly 
 Stuart looked over to Tonti. "Well," he smiled, 
 "I guess it's time." 
 
 The girl rose and went over to old Ky-loo, 
 who with a big bandage across his face was 
 smoking peacefully. They talked for a minute 
 in their native tongue, when the old man rose, 
 led her ceremoniously over to Stuart, and put 
 her hand in his.
 
 70 WAITING FOR TONT1 
 
 Stuart included us all in a sweep of his quiet 
 eyes. "I don't want to be theatrical about this, 
 and heaven knows you don't want me to be, or 
 to take time to go into a long explanation now. 
 Tonti and I belong to this desert country and 
 to her people and mine. We have work to 
 do, and we are going to do it together." 
 
 He evidently had an understanding with 
 Bill Hewlett, for at that moment the guide 
 brought up their two horses with a blanket roll 
 and a canteen apiece tied to their saddles. 
 
 Quickly they mounted, and with a wave of 
 the hand and an "Hasta la vista!" rode away 
 to the north." 
 
 "But it isn't proper! It's it's downright 
 scandalous," gasped Mrs. Josselyn, "to say noth 
 ing of" 
 
 "Oh, there are ministers in Flagstaff, if that's 
 what you mean," said Beatrix indifferently. 
 Then turning to me added : "Tracy, I don't envy 
 them what they are going to do; but to feel that 
 exaltation they had in their faces well, it must 
 be a wonderful sensation." 
 
 "But his engagement to you!" insisted the 
 mother, still mentally gasping. "Has he gone 
 entirely out of his senses?" 
 
 "That, my dear Mrs. Josselyn," I ventured to 
 say, "belongs to the yesterdays, which are as 
 old as the cliffs themselves. Beatrix is going 
 to marry me." 
 
 And she did.
 
 WAITING FOR TONTI 71 
 
 Stuart and Tonti rode steadily to the north. 
 We watched them until they disappeared among 
 the rocks and trees. 
 
 Of what was I thinking? I had suddenly re 
 membered that certain bones of the skeleton of 
 the woman found in the cave showed evidences 
 of being broken as if by a fall from a great dis 
 tance, and it was slowly dawning on me who 
 it was that so many years ago had clothed those 
 whitened bones with fair and softly rounded 
 flesh.
 
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