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Old Hosteen Doetin expected to starve, now that the young and strong squaw of his family was gone. Shefford spoke in his halting Navajo and assured the old Indian that Nas Ta Bega would never let him starve. At sunset Shefford stood with Nas Ta Bega facing the west. The Indian was magnificent in repose. He watched the sun go down upon the day that had seen the burial of the last of his family.
Shefford recalled the smooth, brown face, the dark eyes, the weak chin, the mild expression, and the soft, lax figure of the missionary. "Can't tell by what you said," went on Joe. "But I'll bet a peso to a horse-hair that's the fellow who's been here. Old Hosteen Doetin just told me. First visits he ever had from the priest with the long gown. That's what he called the missionary.
Old Hosteen Doetin came to him with shaking hands and words memorable of the time Glen Naspa left his hogan. "Me no savvy Jesus Christ. Me hungry. Me no eat Jesus Christ!" That seemed to be all of his trouble that he could express to Shefford. He could not understand the religion of the missionary, this Jesus Christ who had called his granddaughter away.
It developed, presently, from talk with the old Navajo, that this pile was only a half of the load to be packed to Kayenta, and the other half was round the corner of the mountain in the camp of Piutes. Hosteen Doetin said he would send to the camp and have the Piutes bring their share over. The suggestion suited Joe, who wanted to save his burros as much as possible.
Shefford loosened the saddle-girths on Nack-yal and, leaving him to graze, went toward the hogan of Hosteen Doetin. A blanket was hung across the door. Shefford heard a low chanting. He waited beside the door till the covering was pulled in, then he entered. Hosteen Doetin met him, clasped his hand.
Hosteen Doetin came out and pointed down the slope at the departing missionary. "Heap talk Jesus all talk all Jesus!" he exclaimed, contemptuously. Then he gave Shefford a hard rap on the chest. "Small talk heap man!" The matter appeared to be adjusted for the present. But Shefford felt that he had made a bitter enemy, and perhaps a powerful one.
He spoke in his usual slow, guttural voice, and he might have been bronze for all the emotion he expressed; yet Shefford instinctively felt the despair that had been hinted to him, and he put his hand on the Indian's shoulder. "If I am the Navajo's brother, then I am brother to Glen Naspa," he said. "I will go with you to the hogan of Hosteen Doetin."
They appeared bold and shy by turns. Then a little, sinewy man, old and beaten and gray, came out of the principal hogan. He wore a blanket round his bent shoulders. His name was Hosteen Doetin, and it meant gentle man. His fine, old, wrinkled face lighted with a smile of kindly interest. His squaw followed him, and she was as venerable as he.
"So the red man is passing. Tribes once powerful have died in the life of Nas Ta Bega. The curse of the white man is already heavy upon my race in the south. Here in the north, in the wildest corner of the desert, chased here by the great soldier, Carson, the Navajo has made his last stand. "Bi Nai, you have seen the shadow in the hogan of Hosteen Doetin.
I guess the whole country is here. We waited at Kayenta. What kept you so long?" The Indian, always slow to answer, did not open his lips till he drew Shefford apart from the noisy crowd. "Bi Nai, there is sorrow in the hogan of Hosteen Doetin," he said. "Glen Naspa!" exclaimed Shefford. "My sister is gone from the home of her brother. She went away alone in the summer." "Blue Canyon!
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