"So when evening came, he waited for it to get dark, then he started for the kiva of the big Snake.
"When he got there his friend was waiting and had a nice fire and received him with good welcome and told him to come right in and get warm.
"Now the Water Plume Snake was sure surprised when the Coyote got in and kept going round and round, pulling his long tail after him, and being wise he saw just what was going on, and now he knows the Coyote is making fun of him. So he just says nothing and makes room enough for the Coyote by going outdoors himself.
"So the Snake just put his head in and was very nice and polite and they have a good visit. But the Snake got very cold and still the Coyote will not go home and the Snake is nearly freezing.
"At last the Coyote says he have to go and the Snake is pretty cold and pretty mad, too. So he says good night to the Coyote and crawls right down into his house quick as the Coyote's body is out, and when he sees all that big tail rolling out he just holds the end of it over the fireplace and gets it burning.
"But the Coyote is very pleased with himself and he don't look back but just goes right along. After a while he notices a fire behind him and turns around and sees the grass is burning way back there. So he says to himself, 'Well I better not go into my house for the Hopi have set fire to the grass to drive me away, and I'll just go on, so they won't find me at home.'
"But soon the fire got going fast in that cedar bark and before he can get that tail untied he is burned so bad that he just keeps running till he gets to Bayupa (Little Colorado River). There was a great flood going down the river and he was so weak from running that he could not swim, so he drowned. And that is what he got for trying to get even with somebody."
Quentin Quahongva, who tells the next story, lives at Shungopovi, Second Mesa. He is a good-natured, easy-going man of middle age, and usually surrounded by a troop of children, his own and all the neighbors'.
