“Let them do as they please.”

“Woman,” he warned, “speak not thus.  Their disposition toward you is not a matter for indifference.”

“What reason have they to follow my path?  I am a woman like many others in the tribe, nothing more or less.  I stay with my husband,” she went on with greater animation.  “I do my duty.  What have the Delight Makers to say that might not be for my good?”

“And yet, you are not precious to them—­”

“Neither are they precious to me,” she cried.  Her eyes sparkled.

Her father heaved a deep sigh.  He shook his head and said in a husky tone,—­

“Woman, your ways are wrong.  I know it, and the Koshare know it also.  They may know more, much more than I could wish,” he added, and looked into her eyes with a searching sorrowful glance.  An awful suspicion lay in this penetrating look.  Her face flushed, she bent her head to avoid his gaze.

To the gloomy talk succeeded a still more gloomy silence.  Then the woman lifted her head, and began entreatingly,—­

“My father, I do not ask you to tell me how you come to know all this; but tell me, umo, what are these Delight Makers, the Koshare?  At every dance they appear and always make merry.  The people feel glad when they see them.  They must be very wise.  They know of everything going on, and drag it before the people to excite their mirth at the expense of others.  How is it that they know so much?  I am but a woman, and the ways of the men are not mine,” she raised her face and her eyes flamed; “but since I hear that the Delight Makers wish me no good, I want to know at least what those enemies of mine are.”

The old man lowered his glance and sighed.

“My child,” he began softly, “when I was young and a boy like your son Okoya, I cared little about the Koshare.  Now I have learned more.”  He leaned his head against the wall, pressed his lips firmly together, and continued, “The holders of the paths of our lives, those who can close them when the time comes for us to go to Shipapu, where there is neither sorrow nor pain, have many agents among us.  P[=a]yatyama our Father, and Sanashtyaya our Mother saw that the world existed ere there was light, and so the tribe lived in the dark.  Four are the wombs in which people grew up and lived, ere Maseua and Oyoy[=a]u[=a] his brother led them to where we are now, and this world which is round like a shield is the fourth womb.”

The woman listened with childlike eagerness.  Her parted lips and sparkling eyes testified that everything was new to her.

“Father,” she interrupted, “I knew nothing of this.  You are very wise.  But why are women never told such things?”

“Don’t cut off my speech,” he said.  “Because women are so forward, that is why many things are concealed from them.”

“But,” she continued, heedless of his rebuke, “where are the other three worlds?”