Shefford went out with his host.  The store was as interesting as Presbrey’s, though much smaller and more primitive.  It was full of everything, and smelled strongly of sheep and goats.  There was a narrow aisle between sacks of flour and blankets on one side and a high counter on the other.  Behind this counter Withers stood to wait upon the buying Indians.  They sold blankets and skins and bags of wool, and in exchange took silver money.  Then they lingered and with slow, staid reluctance bought one thing and then another—­flour, sugar, canned goods, coffee, tobacco, ammunition.  The counter was never without two or three Indians leaning on their dark, silver-braceleted arms.  But as they were slow to sell and buy and go, so were others slow to come in.  Their voices were soft and low and it seemed to Shefford they were whispering.  He liked to hear them and to look at the banded heads, the long, twisted rolls of black hair tied with white cords, the still dark faces and watchful eyes, the silver ear-rings, the slender, shapely brown hands, the lean and sinewy shapes, the corduroys with a belt and gun, and the small, close-fitting buckskin moccasins buttoned with coins.  These Indians all appeared young, and under the quiet, slow demeanor there was fierce blood and fire.

By and by two women came in, evidently squaw and daughter.  The former was a huge, stout Indian with a face that was certainly pleasant if not jolly.

She had the corners of a blanket tied under her chin, and in the folds behind on her broad back was a naked Indian baby, round and black of head, brown-skinned, with eyes as bright as beads.  When the youngster caught sight of Shefford he made a startled dive into the sack of the blanket.  Manifestly, however, curiosity got the better of fear, for presently Shefford caught a pair of wondering dark eyes peeping at him.

“They’re good spenders, but slow,” said Withers.  “The Navajos are careful and cautious.  That’s why they’re rich.  This squaw, Yan As Pa, has flocks of sheep and more mustangs than she knows about.”

“Mustangs.  So that’s what you call the ponies?” replied Shefford.

“Yep.  They’re mustangs, and mostly wild as jack-rabbits.”

Shefford strolled outside and made the acquaintance of Withers’s helper, a Mormon named Whisner.  He was a stockily built man past maturity, and his sun-blistered face and watery eyes told of the open desert.  He was engaged in weighing sacks of wool brought in by the Indians.  Near by stood a framework of poles from which an immense bag was suspended.  From the top of this bag protruded the head and shoulders of an Indian who appeared to be stamping and packing wool with his feet.  He grinned at the curious Shefford.  But Shefford was more interested in the Mormon.  So far as he knew, Whisner was the first man of that creed he had ever met, and he could scarcely hide his eagerness.  Venters’s stories had been of a long-past generation of Mormons,