There was no going back. I would have to chance their sober or drunken condition. I walked up to the fire, and asked, with as much unconcern as possible to muster: “Where is Bitani Bega?”
Silence—that sullen, contemptuous silence of the suspicious Navajo who has not come forward to greet one, and who will hide whatever he knows behind a mask of indifferent and stolid ignorance. I looked them over, wondering if they were all strangers to me. A colony of my Navajo lived in the southern line and traded at the Indian Wells post; but not a man of them could I see. Then, in all that crowd, I sighted an educated face. One learns to distinguish between the Navajo who has been to school and the one who has never had a hair-cut. The former has a keener expression, a brighter cast of countenance, though his hair may be once again uncared for. I walked up to him, and demanded: “Where did you go to school?”
He wavered for a moment, as if to deny his knowledge of English, and then answered: “At Leupp.”
“Why did n’t you speak up before? You know me?” [[307]]
“Yes,” he said. “I remember you at Leupp. I was a little boy then, and you went away. You are superintendent up here somewhere.”
I felt easier now. But I did not care to have any one of them straggle outside, to learn that I had three Navajo handcuffed in my car, and one of them their own, to say nothing of a boy who had been gagged. Just then the trader and one of my deputies, who had waited long enough and were wondering what had happened to me, appeared in the gateway. I told them to stop there; and, as I expected, so long as they were there, no one of the crowd sought to go out.
“You can interpret for me,” I said to the returned student. “I am looking for a man named Bitani Bega, who lives in this district, and who runs booze. He beat up another Navajo this afternoon at Indian Wells. I want to know where he is.”
The young Navajo rattled this off to the crowd.
“Ep-ten,” they began to exclaim, in various tones, shaking their heads, meaning that this was entirely outside their knowledge.
“Do you see that fellow here?” I called to the trader, wondering what I should do if he did recognize him. But the trader shook his head.