By-and-by the old man asked if he were not thinking of something in coming to the house of a stranger. And the young man replied, it was very true; he had thoughts, though he felt ashamed to say it, but he even wished to be accepted as a suitor for his daughter.
The father referred the matter to the girl, and she said she would be very well satisfied; then she took the young man aside and spoke a few words to him,—in fact, told him what were the conditions of his becoming her accepted husband. He smiled, and said he would certainly try to the best of his ability, but this was a very hard thing she asked.
“I know it is,” said the girl; “that is why I ask it.”
Now, the young man left the house forthwith. The next day he very quietly went down into the corn-fields belonging to the girl, and over toward the northern mesa, for that is where her corn-fields were—lucky being! He dug a great deep pit with a sharp stick and a bone shovel. Now, when he had dug it—very smooth at the sides and top it was—he went to the mountain and got some poles, placing them across the hole, and over these poles he spread earth, and set up corn-stalks just as though no hole had been dug there; then he put some exceedingly tempting bait, plenty of it, over the center of these poles, which were so weak that nobody, however light of foot, could walk over them without breaking through.
Night came on, and you could hear the Coyotes begin to sing; and the whole army of pests—Bears, Badgers, Gophers, all sorts of creatures, as they came down slowly, each one in his own way, from the mountain. The Coyotes first came into the field, being swift of foot; and one of them, nosing around and keeping a sharp lookout for watchers, happened to espy those wonderfully tempting morsels that lay over the hole.
“Ha!” said he (Coyotes don’t think much what they are doing), and he gave a leap, when in he went—sticks, dirt, bait, and all—to the bottom of the hole. He picked himself up and rubbed the sand out of his eyes, then began to jump and jump, trying to get out; but it was of no use, and he set up a most doleful howl.
He had just stopped for breath, when a Bear came along. “What in the name of all the devils and witches are you howling so for?” said he. “Where are you?”
The Coyote swallowed his whimpers immediately, set himself up in a careless attitude, and cried out: “Broadfoot, lucky, lucky, lucky fellow! Did you hear me singing? I am the happiest creature on the face of the earth, or rather under it.”
“What about? I shouldn’t think you were happy, to judge from your howling.”
“Why! Mercy on me!” cried the Coyote, “I was singing for joy.”