“Ho! Ho! Ho!” they said, “so you have come to work for us, have you? What can you do, you lame boy, and what can you do, blind boy? And what wage do you ask of us?”
“At the end of the spring, our wage shall be the Sacred Silver Stone,” said the boys. “At the midsummer, our wage shall be the Sacred Turquoise Stone, and at the time of the harvest, you shall pay us the last sacred stone of gleaming purple shell. Will you make this bargain with us, people of the Hopi?”
“Yes,” said the Hopi people mockingly, never dreaming that the twins meant what they said. And they gave the twins an almost roofless room in an old part of their pueblo, and told them to go and work in the fields.
All the early spring, the lame boy and the blind boy worked hard helping the Hopis plant their corn. The corn of the Pueblo Indians is not straw-yellow like ours, but of all colors; it is orange, it is orange-gold, it is garnet-red, it is purple like the grape.
When the spring was at end, and the young corn was well started in the fields below the mesa, the twins asked for the Sacred Silver Stone.
“We have kept you alive, and that is enough,” said the Hopis angrily. “Do you suppose we should ever part with the Sacred Silver Stone?”
The twins said little, but remembered the frost magic which their father had given them in the first buckskin bag. In the middle of the night, when the stars were shining on the desert, and everybody in the pueblo was asleep, the twins opened the bag. The cold that crept out of the pouch nipped and numbed their fingers, and through the broken roof, they could see the stars veiling over.
For three days, the twins left the pouch open, for three days it was cold in the Hopi country, and for three nights there were frosts which damaged the growing corn. The Hopis presently held a council to see what could be done.
After the Hopis had talked and talked, and everybody in the pueblo had been asked for his advice, an old man chanced to say:
“We have not yet asked the lame boy and the blind boy. Suppose we ask them to the council, too. They may be able to give us some advice.”