“What does a pain look like?” Quiz asked, half convinced.
“Looks just like a fingernail about two inches long,” the Ute answered. “It’s bright red. If you strike it, it goes tinnnggg, like the reed of a saxophone.”
“Stop your nonsense, Ralph,” White commanded, “while I go out and smooth Quail’s ruffled feathers.” He followed the chief and brought him back five minutes later to receive an oily apology from his ancestral enemy.
“You Indians will be broke again, one of these days, if you keep quarreling among yourselves,” Hall said then. “Crooked white men are hanging around the Four Corners. They’re just waiting for something like that so they can trick you out of your oil and uranium rights, or even your reservations.”
Everyone had to agree that this was true, so the little party settled down in reasonable harmony to watch the giant stars come out. Salmon produced a guitar after a while. Then he and Kitty sang Indian and Mexican songs together. Sandy particularly liked one that went:
I wander with the pollen of dawn upon my trail.
Beauty surrounding me, with it I wander.
“That’s a Navajo song,” the Ute said, grinning. “We sing it in honor of Chief Quail. Here’s one by a white man that I like:
Mañana is a lovely word we all would like to borrow.
It means ‘Don’t skeen no wolfs today wheech you don’t shoot tomorrow.’