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| 167 18. The Stolen Wife (first version)1 an old woman lived alone. she brought forth a boy. She went out to gather seeds for food, leaving the little boy at home. While she was gone, the boy picked up stones and, throwing them at birds sitting close to the house, killed some. When the woman returned she found them piled on both sides of the doorway. The woman said, “What man was here, who killed so many birds and piled them on both sides of the entrance? I think I will throw them away.” The boy heard what she said and cried all the time. Every morning she went out to gather pigweed seed, piñon nuts, or yucca fruit. When she came home at sunset, she found birds piled by the door, which she carried off and threw away. This happened several times; then she knew her own boy had killed the birds. Then when she returned again she cooked and ate them. The boy was glad and stopped crying. By and by he grew up, and the old woman made him a bow and arrows. The boy carried these about, shooting and killing cottontails and jackrabbits. He brought them home for the old woman to cook, and they ate them. After a time he was a young man and killed many deer. When he was a man, he knew how to make arrows and bows. He hunted all the time, killing many deer. The old woman said to him, “Did you ever see anybody’s tracks or his house when you were out hunting? Did you ever see anything like that? I told you, when you were a little boy, that there were no men living near here. I told you that I live here alone.” The boy said, “No, I never saw anybody’s tracks or houses.” When the boy was hunting on a mountain, he saw another country far distant where the smoke of a fire was to be seen. He saw this 168 | part ii many times but did not ask his mother about it. He said nothing at all. The boy was now as old as that one [about twenty-five or thirty]. The boy asked the old woman about people: “Tell me where there are many people, men and women, living. Tell me about them. I want to know about them. Then when you tell me, I will not stay here. I want to go get a woman; that is what I want. When I was out hunting on a high hill, I saw another country where there was smoke. I think there are many women there, for I had an erection. I saw much smoke in that direction [south] beyond the mountains, and I saw smoke on the other side of the Colorado River.” The boy asked the woman what kind of people lived to the south and what kind to the north. “Tell me. I saw the smoke,” he said. The old woman said to the boy, “Well, I will tell you. What you think is smoke over the mountain is not smoke; it is fog. When it rains, it comes right down to the ground. It looks like smoke. It is the same off to the north. I am sure nobody is living close to us. Of course, I would tell you.” The boy went hunting again. He went near the place where he had seen the fire. He climbed to the top of a high hill and looked for the fire. He did the same thing off to the north. He went close to both fires, and he was sure somebody was living in the south and in the north. The boy returned to his mother’s house and asked again, “I went over close to see and I am sure that was fire. I saw somebody’s tracks,” he lied a little. “Tell me. I am sure I want to go to see them; I want to get a woman for a wife. That is what I want, but you do not tell me.” The old woman said, “Yes, the people living over there in the south are not good men. They are wicked. If a stranger comes to their country, they catch and kill him immediately. I know those people. They call them itcahua’ [enemies, Yavapai]. Those to the north are of the same sort. They are paiyu’dja [Paiute].” The old woman said, “I do...

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