202. The next night, travelling still to the east, they camped at Tseʻbináhotyel, a broad high cliff like a wall, and here a woman bore another strange creature. It had no head, but had a long pointed end where the head ought to be. This object was deposited in the cliff, in a hole which was afterwards sealed up with a stone. They left it there to die, but it grew up and became the destroyer Tseʻtahotsĭltáʻli,[142] of whom we shall tell hereafter. Because he was closed into the rock, his hair grew into it and he could not fall.
203. The next night, when they stopped at Tseʻahalzĭ′ni (Rock with Black Hole), twins were born. They were both roundish with one end tapering to a point. There were no signs of limbs or head, but there were depressions which had somewhat the appearance of eyes. The people laid them on the ground, and next day, when they moved camp, abandoned them. Tseʻahalzĭ′ni is shaped like a Navaho hut, with a door in the east. It is supposed that, when they were abandoned to die, the twin monsters went into this natural hut to dwell. They grew up, however, and became the Bĭnáye Aháni, who slew with their eyes, and of whom we shall have more to tell.
204. All these monsters were the fruit of the transgressions of the women in the fourth world, when they were separated from the men. Other monsters were born on the march, and others, again, sprang from the blood which had been shed during the birth of the first monsters,[71] and all these grew up to become enemies and destroyers of the people.
205. When they left Tseʻahalzĭ′ni they turned toward the west, and journeyed until they came to a place called Toʻĭntsósoko (Water in a Narrow Gully), and here they remained for thirteen years, making farms and planting corn, beans, and pumpkins every spring.
206. In those days the four-footed beasts, the birds, and the snakes were people also, like ourselves, and built houses and lived near our people close to Depĕ′ntsa. They increased and became the cliff-dwellers. It must have been the flying creatures who built the dwellings high on the cliffs, for if they had not wings how could they reach their houses?
207. From Toʻĭntsósoko they moved to Tseʻlakaíia (Standing White Rock), and here they sojourned again for thirteen years. From the latter place they moved to Tseʻpahalkaí (White on Face of Cliff), and here, once more, they remained for a period of thirteen years. During this time the monsters began to devour the people.
208. From Tseʻpahalkaí they moved to the neighborhood of Kĭntyél[72] (Broad House), in the Chaco Canyon, where the ruins of the great pueblo still stand. When the wanderers arrived the pueblo was in process of building, but was not finished. The way it came to be built you shall now hear:—
209. Some time before, there had descended among the Pueblos, from the heavens, a divine gambler, or gambling-god, named Nohoílpi, or He Who Wins Men (at play); his talisman was a great piece of turquoise. When he came he challenged the people to all sorts of games and contests, and in all of these he was successful. He won from them, first, their property, then their women and children, and finally some of the men themselves. Then he told them he would give them part of their property back in payment if they would build a great house; so when the Navahoes came, the Pueblos were busy building in order that they might release their enthralled relatives and their property. They were also busy making a race-track, and preparing for all kinds of games of chance and skill.
210. When all was ready, and four days’ notice had been given, twelve men came from the neighboring pueblo of Kĭ′ndotlĭz, Blue House, to compete with the great gambler. They bet their own persons, and after a brief contest they lost themselves to Nohoílpi. Again a notice of four days was given, and again twelve men of Kĭ′ndotlĭz—relatives of the former twelve—came to play, and these also lost themselves. For the third time an announcement, four days in advance of a game, was given; this time some women were among the twelve contestants, and they, too, lost themselves. All were put to work on the building of Kĭntyél as soon as they forfeited their liberty. At the end of another four days the children of these men and women came to try to win back their parents, but they succeeded only in adding themselves to the number of the gambler’s slaves. On a fifth trial, after four days’ warning, twelve leading men of Blue House were lost, among them the chief of the pueblo. On a sixth duly announced gambling day, twelve more men, all important persons, staked their liberty and lost it. Up to this time the Navahoes had kept count of the winnings of Nohoílpi, but afterwards people from other pueblos came in such numbers to play and lose that they could keep count no longer. In addition to their own persons the later victims brought in beads, shells, turquoise, and all sorts of valuables, and gambled them away. With the labor of all these slaves it was not long until the great Kĭntyél was finished.
211. But all this time the Navahoes had been merely spectators, and had taken no part in the games. One day the voice of the beneficent god, Hastséyalti,[73] was heard faintly in the distance crying his usual call, “Wuʻhuʻhuʻhú.” His voice was heard, as it is always heard, four times, each time nearer and nearer, and immediately after the last call, which was loud and clear, Hastséyalti appeared at the door of a hut where dwelt a young couple who had no children, and with them he communicated by means of signs. He told them that the people of Kĭ′ndotlĭz had lost at game with Nohoílpi two great shells, the greatest treasures of the pueblo; that the Sun had coveted these shells and had begged them from the gambler; that the latter had refused the request of the Sun and the Sun was angry. In consequence of all this, as Hastséyalti related, in twelve days from his visit certain divine personages would meet in the mountains, in a place which he designated, to hold a great ceremony. He invited the young man to be present at the ceremony and disappeared.