"I am hearing you speak. I know it is you, and I come," she said.
It was Tula, the younger daughter of Miguel,--one who had carried them water from the well on her steady head, and played with the babies on the earthen floors at the pueblo of Palomitas.
But the childish humors were gone, and her face wore the Indian mask of any age.
"It is at Palomitas. I was in the willows by the well when they came, Juan Gonsalvo and El Aleman, and strange soldiers. All the women scream and make battle, also the men, and that is when my father is hurt in the head, that is when they are taking my mother, and Anita, my sister. Some are hiding. And El Aleman and Juan Gonsalvo make the count, and sent the men for search. That is how it was."
"Why do you say El Aleman?" asked Rhodes.
"I seeing him other time with Don José, and hearing how he talk. Also Anita knowing him, and scream his name--'Don Adolf!'--when he catch her. Juan Gonsalvo has a scarf tied over the face--all but the eyes, but the Don Adolf has the face now covered with hairs and I seeing him. They take all the people. My father is hurt, but lives. He tries to follow and is much sick. My mother is there, and Anita, my sister, is there. He thinks it better to find them--it is his head is sick. He walks far beside me, and does not know me."
She showed him a few grains of parched corn tied up in the corner of her _manta_. "Water I have, and roots of the sand."
"Water," repeated Miguel mechanically. "Yes, I am the one who knows where it comes. I am the one to show you."
The eyes of the girl met Kit's gaze of understanding.
"The hurt is of his head," she stated again. "In the night he made speech of strange old-time things, secret things, and of fear."
"So? Well, it was a bad night for old men and Indian girls in the desert. Let's be moving."
Tula picked up her hidden wicker water bottle and trudged on sandaled feet beside Kit. Miguel went into a heap in the saddle, dazed, muttering disjointed Indian words, only one was repeated often enough to make an impression,--it was Cajame.
"What is Cajame?" he asked the girl, and she gave him a look of tolerance.
"He was of chiefs the most great. He was killed for his people. He was the father of my father."