It was yet so early that hardly any one showed himself out of doors.  The sun peeped up behind the volcanic heights in the east, casting a glow over the summits and crests that rise above the Rio Grande in that direction.  The Tetilla stood out boldly, crowning the black ridges with its slender, graceful cone.

Shotaye strolled down the Rito.  A few people were about; but regardless of these and what they might think or say, she wandered along past the dwellings of the Eagle clan.  What if Tyope should see her?  “Let him see me,” she thought; “let him become convinced that I know nothing, that I rest easy, without any suspicion whatever of the dreadful fate he has prepared for me.  Later on he may find out that his former wife is more than a match for him.”

She went on and on, and passed the big house.  A few men stood on the roofs, gazing motionless in the direction where the sun rose like a mass of melted ore.  Farther she went, always down stream, quietly and with the greatest apparent unconcern.  A girl from Yakka hanutsh greeted her in a friendly voice; she returned the greeting cheerfully.  The cliffs wherein Oshatsh, Shutzuna, and lastly Shyuamo resided were to her left as she passed the grove where Okoya and Shyuote had had their first discussion.  Here she turned to the north, in the direction of the spot where she had met the Tehua Indian.  Even on this upward trail, rocky as it was and overgrown with shrubbery, her form was plainly distinguishable from below.  But Shotaye scorned to conceal herself, she walked without haste or hurry; her errand was perfectly legitimate and everybody might see her undertake it.

Everybody might indeed witness her doings as far as these could be seen.  She simply took a walk on the mesa of the Bird, Ziro kauash.  She hoped also to gather some useful plants,—­such as the shkoa, a spinach-like vegetable; asclepias; apotz, a fever-medicine of the genus artemesia, and many other medicinal herbs known to the Indian and used by him.  For it had sprinkled if not rained every day of late, and last night’s rain was still visible in the drops that covered the leaves.  The ground was soft, and her step left plainly distinguishable tracks.  Not only might every one see her; she almost invited people to follow her on her wanderings.  Tyope, the Koshare Naua, the Chayani, might trail and spy out her movements as much and as long as they pleased, step by step if they wished; for the real object of her stroll they would never be able to guess.

After reaching the top of the plateau, Shotaye sat down on a protruding rock, from which she might look over the whole valley beneath.  She cared little for this; her main object was to rest and to think.  What she now undertook was a step preliminary to the last act.  A trail almost indistinguishable, so little was it used of late, led from the Rito to the north, where the Tehuas dwelt in caves in the rock which they name Puye.  This trail was the object