by Sarah Dreher
She squeezed her eyes shut and strained. Part of her mind reached out like a hand.
Come on, Gwen.
She clenched her fists.
Come through, Gwen. Please come through.
"My goodness," she heard a velvet voice say. ''What in the world are you doing?"
Her eyes flew open. "Gwen!" She scrambled to her feet and started toward her.
Gwen backed away. "I don't think you'd better touch me."
''Why not?"
"I don't know exactly how I got here," Gwen said, "but I don't feel very substantial.” She held her hands up and looked at them. "I think I might be an out-of-body experience."
Stoner ached to touch her. "Are you all right?"
"Sort of. I mean, where I am... was... whatever… it isn't the Waldorf Astoria."
"You're with Larch Begay, aren't you?"
"Not willingly, Stoner. You don't have to make it sound like an accusation."
"Can you come a little closer?”
Gwen took a couple of steps forward.
"Are you sure I can't touch you?"
"You better not. If I wake up or something, I'll be back in that cave."
"You're in a cave?"
"It's what we call home. God, Stoner, when am I going to get the men out of my life?"
"Are you alive?" Stoner asked.
''What do I look like? The Ghost of Christmas Past?"
"Is he treating you okay?"
''Well, it isn't exactly Disney World, but he's not into rape. Yet.” She held out a hand, then jerked it back before Stoner could take it. "Look, I might fade any minute. Can we talk fast?"
"Do you know where you are? The part of you that's not here, that is?"
Gwen shook her head. "It was dark when he brought me here. I don't know how he managed it. I didn't see him or hear him or anything. One minute I was walking along, and the next thing I knew I was in a cave, tied up. I'm sorry I stormed out like that, Stoner. It was really stupid."
"You couldn't help it."
''Were you terribly worried?"
"Of course I was, for God's sake."
Gwen sighed. "I hate this. The wrong people are getting hurt."
"I'm all right now," Stoner said. "Gwen, are you sure you don't have any idea where you are?"
"I'm in a cave. That's all I know. There's something in here that Begay wants, but I can't figure out what it is. I think he's planning to trade me for it."
Stoner nodded.
"Do you know what it is?" Gwen asked.
"Yes, but it's pretty complicated."
''Well, if you have a chance to get a message to whoever thought this up, I hope you'll express my undying indignation."
"It has to do with Spirits," Stoner said.
"Lovely. Listen, I don't care if it's about the Second Coming. I have had it with being the victim."
Stoner smiled.
"One of these days,” Gwen went on, "it's going to be my turn. And there are going to be a lot of unhappy people in the world." She was taking on an opalescent quality. She looked down at herself. "Listen, do you think many folks know this trick?"
"I don't know," Stoner said.
''Well, I hope they don't. I can just see uninvited guests dropping in at all hours of the day and night." She shuddered. ''What if my grandmother could do it. We'd never have a moment's peace."
Either the light was fading or Gwen was.
"Don't go," Stoner begged. "Please."
"I can't help it. I think I wore myself out. Literally. Come get me soon." She held out her hands. "I love you. I miss you. I'm so afraid." She was gone, and left behind a great, aching emptiness.
"Don't leave me Gwen. GWEN!" The sound of her own shout woke her. She rubbed her eyes and looked around, dazed. The sky beyond her window was black.
Only a dream.
Except for the candle that burned on the window sill.
But Siyamtiwa could have placed it there while she slept.
She got up, rubbed the stiffness from her knees and hips, and started across the courtyard.
Someone had covered the earth with a gigantic cobalt cup filled with stars.
Words drifted through and around her mind. Strange words, in a strange language.
Ghosts, no doubt. Old Spirits loitering around downtown waiting for a little action.
Could Gwen see the night sky where she was?
Stoner didn’t think so.
God, I hope I did the right thing, coming here.
Of course you did. Laura Yazzie is looking for her back at Spirit Wells. The police are looking wherever police look. You're doing the only thing left to do...
...warp off and check out the Twilight Zone.
She smelled smoke, light, sharp with a touch of sweetness, and realized she was hungry.
I wonder what Siyamtiwa eats. Probably not much.
What if it's something exotic, like raw rattlesnake, or fried iguana? Or something occult, like newts' tongues and boiled bat wings?
Wish I'd picked up a couple of Hershey bars.
A whole trading post stuffed with canned and wrapped and plastic food, and I didn't have the sense to pick up a few Hershey bars.
The aroma grew stronger, richer.
Heck, anything that smells that good can't be too bad.
She stood outside the blanket-covered doorway and wondered what the local custom was for making your presence known in the dark. If Siyamtiwa followed Navajo etiquette, which necessitated waiting until she was noticed, and if her advanced age had affected her hearing, it could be a long, cold night.
She cleared her throat softly.
Nobody stirred.
She vaguely recalled—from a book she'd read as a child—that Indians asked permission to enter a tepee by scratching on the cloth. Maybe...
"Hai," Siyamtiwa said.
Stoner brushed the blanket aside. "All right to come in?"
The old woman gestured her forward. "Next time don't stand out there like a bad ghost."
"I was trying not to disturb you," Stoner said, miffed.
''Why? You been making noise all night, you and that other one."
Stoner felt her skin crawl. “I... I guess I talked in my sleep."
"That must've been it." Siyamtiwa turned back to her cooking.
There was a fire in the raised fireplace. Siyamtiwa spread a thin batter on a large flat stone that rested on the fire. She watched it for a few minutes, then peeled it off. It looked like a sheet of marbleized tracing paper.
"Piki," she explained as she rolled it into a cone. "Pretty good stuff."
"It certainly smells good."
Stoner sat cross-legged on the floor and looked around. More cones of piki lay piled in a yucca leaf basket. A pottery bowl held a stew of meat and beans. The teapot steamed, and a freshly cut melon soaked in its own pink juice.
"This is quite an array," Stoner said, wanting to fling herself into the middle of the meal like a pig in garbage and disgrace herself.
"Don't have company so much any more," Siyamtiwa said. "Big feasts in the old days. Ceremonies. People come from a long way, stay a week maybe. Eat and sing, gossip. That was good."
"I guess you've seen a lot of changes," Stoner said.
The old woman nodded. "That's how it goes. Things change. Got to be like Changing Woman, go along, not fight." She peeled off a sheet of piki and spread more batter. "But it's good not to lose the old ways, too." She pointed her chin toward the food. "You eat. I don't get hungry so much any more."
Stoner looked around. "This is all for me?"
"You gonna need it. Won't eat again until you're with your woman."
"Do you really think I'll see her again?"
Siyamtiwa sighed. "Always doubts. I bet your Hermione has a bad time with you."
"Not really."
"I better find out how she does that."
Stoner smiled. "She doesn't pay any attention to me."
"Pretty smart woman."
"I wish you c
ould meet her," Stoner said, "I know you'd get along."
"That might be rough on you, Green-eyes. Two against one."
Stoner nibbled on a piece of piki. "This is good. It tastes like corn."
"That's right,"Siyamtiwa said. "Corn's very big magic out here. Keeps away bad stuff."
"Like evil spirits?"
"And hunger. This is blue corn. Hopi corn." She got to her feet and poured them each a cup of tea. "Drink this. Don't taste so good, but good for you."
It had a smoky, bitter taste. Not really unpleasant. The kind of taste you might acquire a liking for. ''What is it?" Stoner asked.
"Some herbs. Some other stuff. Make you sleep good."
"I've already slept a whole day away."
"That's okay."
Stoner realized, with surprise, that Siyamtiwa was looking at her affectionately. It embarrassed her a little, and made her feel childishly proud.
She picked up the bowl of stew and worn tin spoon. ''What do we have to do to get ready?"
The old woman got to her feet. "I got something to show you." She scrounged in several baskets, at last drawing out a length of snow white woven material. She placed it in Stoner's lap.
Stoner touched it carefully. The weave was complicated and hard to read in the candle-and-fire light, but it looked and felt as if each thread had been put there with great care and purpose, as if—if she only knew the language—the shawl would tell stories to her fingers.
"Unfold it,"Siyamtiwa ordered.
She hesitated. "I'd hate to damage it, or get it dirty."
"If I gotta tell you everything two-three times, I'm not gonna live long enough to see the end of this."
"Sorry," Stoner muttered. She spread the cloth between them. It was larger than she expected, nearly the size of a bed sheet. The whiteness of it was blinding. It seemed to glow with its own light.
"This is my burial robe," Siyamtiwa said. "You think Masau will like it?"
"I'm sure he will." Stoner looked up at the old woman. "You're not afraid of death, are you?"
"I don't think about death like you do. Not the Big Silence."
Stoner found herself transfixed by the cloth. The pattern of thread almost spoke to her. "You believe in reincarnation, then?"
"Hard to explain," Siyamtiwa said. "I think only one life, sometimes here. Sometimes somewhere else. Sometimes one way, sometimes another. But only one life all the time." She pulled the robe onto her own lap. "You eat now."
The stew was lamb, and delicious. She tried not to wolf it down.
"Pretty good, eh?" Siyamtiwa asked.
''Wonderful.''
"I cook okay. Not like Maria Hernandez, though. She was best cook in Navajo County."
Stoner swallowed hard, cleared her throat, and forced a smile. "Is she still alive?"
Siyamtiwa shook her head sadly. "Gone a long time now. Gray sickness got her. Came and took away her strength and ate up her insides. Wouldn't let her die easy. Lots of months she lay on her cot in her little house and waited for Masau to come."
"I see,"said Stoner.
"One day it was very hot, so hot it was like wet cloths in your nose and mouth, hot like bricks on your chest. Someone came to see her—maybe grocery boy, maybe her nephew Pete, she couldn't see so good by then. When he went away he didn't close the screen door right, left a little space, maybe half an inch. So the flies wanted to come in, but Maria didn't like flies, made her mad, worse than skunks and rats maybe. So she was there on her little cot and watching the flies come in and walk on her white porcelain sink and taste the fruit she couldn't eat any more and it made her mad. Lightning in the brain mad. So mad she got up and thought she'd kill those flies, but she fell down on the floor and it felt so good and cool her spirit could go away."
Stoner scooped up the last drips of gravy on a scrap of piki. "But if what you say is true, about one life and all, then she must be around somewhere."
''Well, I got some. Not cooking, though. Mary Beale got that, I guess. Maybe someone else. Hard to tell."
"Grandmother," Stoner said, "forgive me if this is rude, but do all Hopis believe the way you do?"
"Probably not. Why? You wanta join up?"
"No, thank you," Stoner said with a laugh. "I have enough problems."
Siyamtiwa cleared her plate away. "Yeah, you gotta figure out that '84 election stuff."
"I wish I could. It's the women I don't understand."
''White women got their heads all mixed up. Can't think clear. Tell 'em you're gonna pass a big law, make 'em equal with men, makes' em nervous." She held up a bit of her skirt between two finger and minced around the room. "Ooooo, don't make that big law. I don't wanta marry my girlfriend and go in Army and make pee-pee with men. I'm a lay-dee!"
Stoner fell back on the floor.
''White people always afraid. Afraid of strangers, afraid of friends, afraid of everything. Must be because their Spirits aren't friendly." She sat down and held up a corner of the white cloth. "See that?" She pointed to a tear in the material, a rip about three inches long and unraveling at either side. "This thing got torn. My eyes don't see good enough to fix it. I don't want to go meet Masau looking like a beggar. Think you can mend it?"
"I can try."
The old woman handed her a bone needle and a length of cotton thread.
"I'm not very good at this sort of thing. Will it matter if I break the pattern?"
Siyamtiwa seemed to find that amusing.
"Did I say something stupid?"
"You think things are all stop and go, like traffic signals. I think maybe more like a river." She tapped Stoner's hand. "You can't break pattern, only make new pattern. You understand?"
"I think so." She took a stitch. The cloth felt soft and alive to her touch.
"So," said Siyamtiwa, "each time you draw the thread through, you change the world. How do you like that?"
"Frankly," Stoner said as she bent closer to the work, "it's terrifying." She made a few more changes in the world.
Siyamtiwa took a small pipe and a bit of tobacco from a little box. "I'm gonna make some smoke now. Okay with you? "
"Sure." The rip was closing slowly beneath her fingers. The stitches did seem to make a pattern—nothing that would win any prizes, but distinctively her own.
She heard a soft drumming, and looked up. Siyamtiwa sat cross-legged on the floor. She tapped lightly on a piece of leather stretched over a bone hoop. Designs were painted on the drum—spirals and turtles, rabbits, snakes, stylized deer.
"This bother you?" the old woman asked.
"Not at all. It's kind of relaxing." Between the meal, the tea, the soft light, and the rhythmic pat-pat of Siyamtiwa's fingers on the drum, she was beginning to feel calmer than she could remember feeling in a long time.
She worked for a while, not thinking, listening to the drumming, breathing in the mingled odors of corn and mesquite and tobacco. This is a story, she said to the thread, of a White woman who comes out here from the east and gets mixed up in something about sorcerers and Ya Ya sickness, and mends a burial robe for old Siyamtiwa, and who means well even though she doesn't know what in the world she's doing.
"That's a pretty good story," Siyamtiwa said, drumming. "Hope it comes out okay."
Stoner looked up. "How do you do that, know what I'm thinking?"
"Not hard. A trick. You can do it real easy."
"How?"
"Empty your mind and I'll put something in it."
She did, and came up with nonsense. "I can't do it."
''Why do you say that?"
"Because I heard you invite me to go down a hole in the ground, and I'm not Alice in Wonderland."
"I'm not a white rabbit, either," Siyamtiwa said. "You want to see this hole in the ground?" She stood and took the burial robe. "Come with me. Finish this later."
The plaza was black as ink. Overhead, the stars seemed very far away and very cold. The silence was tangible.
''Watch how you go." Siyamtiwa reached
for her hand, and led her to a break in the packed ground, a round opening the size of a man-hole. A ladder of raw pine trunks protruded from the opening.
"This wasn't here when I came through earlier," Stoner said.
''Weren't supposed to see it." She touched the ladder. "This goes down into kiva. Did secret ceremonies down there in the old days. Whites not allowed, but it's okay now. Nobody down there now but ghosts." She stood aside to let Stoner precede her.
Nobody but ghosts. Very comforting.
She felt as if she were climbing to the center of the earth, from darkness to darkness. The blackness reached up and lapped around her ankles, her legs, her hips. Like warm water. She let herself sink into it. When her foot touched ground she stood away from the ladder and listened to the shape of the room. The ceiling arched overhead in a dome that amplified the sound of her breathing, her heartbeat, even the blood churning in her veins. Beyond that sound she could hear the air moving, and whispers in the air, old whispers like dry leaves blowing over sand, tumbling end-over-end, the hiss of sand falling into the depressions left behind. Grains of sand falling one-by-one with a papery, ticking sound.
The ladder creaked. She reached up to help Siyamtiwa down the last few rungs. The old woman leaned on her arm, as light and hollow-boned as a sparrow.
A candle flame illuminated the kiva and set the ladder's shadow dancing.
It occurred to Stoner that she hadn't heard a match strike.
There was only the sudden light.
She put the thought from her mind.
Ahead she saw what looked like an altar. Elaborately carved sticks placed upright in the ground. Smaller sticks with feathers attached by cotton threads. Brightly painted dolls that resembled the kachinas in Mary Beale's book. A flat basket piled high with blue corn.
Beside her, Siyamtiwa mumbled a prayer.
Stoner waited.
The old woman placed a small deerskin pouch in her hand. "Take this. Keep you safe."
It contained a soft, slightly gritty substance. Corn meal. She clutched it tight.
Siyamtiwa led the way, once slowly around the circle and toward a shadow-darkened hole, a tunnel behind the altar.
Stoner could have sworn it hadn't been there before.
The old woman was nearly out of sight in the shadows. Stoner hurried to catch up. Siyamtiwa moved along smoothly but evenly, almost as if she floated.
