Sing Down the Moon Read Online Free PDF Page B

came the sound of whips whistling through the air, striking again and again.
    Nehana pulled at my dress and the three of us squirmed our way through the darkness and found the door. Nehana ran toward the cottonwood trees and we followed her, the black dog at my heels. Nehana did not pause. She ran toward the three pintos tethered at the far edge of the grove.
    The moon was high in the east. We got into the saddles and rode toward it, moving slowly through the mesquite until the sound of weeping and the crack of whips died away in the night.

10
    N EHANA LED the way along a trail that wound downward toward a small pine forest. We had not gone far when we saw a fire burning at the edges of the trees. Nehana pulled in her horse and sat watching.
    "Woodcutters use this trail," she said. "One of them must be camped there now. It is not good if he sees us. But we cannot go back. Nor can we get through the forest without using the trail."
    Slowly she rode on and we followed her. "If he tries to stop us," Nehana said, "we will continue. Whatever he does, we will continue."
    We followed the trail for a short way into the pine grove, until we came to the fire. A man stood up and spoke a word of greeting, which Nehana answered.
    "You travel late," the man said softly.
    His eyes shone in the firelight. He glanced at each of us, at the three horses and their silver bits.
    "We have a long way to go," Nehana answered.
    "You have good horses," the man said, still speaking softly. "They can take you far and at a good pace." He rubbed his forehead. "The horses I have seen before. One belongs to Don Roberto. The small one to Señor Gomez. The third I am not sure about, though I think it was ridden by Francisco Roa."
    The man stirred the fire so that it shone brighter. He walked over to the horse Nehana was riding and looked closely at its bridle.
    "So I thought," he said. "The initial
R. R
for Roa."
    Nehana backed her horse away from the man, but he reached out and grasped hold of the bit.
    "What shall I say to those who come this way?" he asked. "To Señor Gomez and Don Roberto and Francisco Roa? They will wish to know where their horses have gone."
    "Say what pleases you," Nehana told him, glancing at me and making a motion with her head.
    Running Bird and I picked up our reins, ready to flee.
    "If you go south," the man said, "I can tell them that you have gone to the north, to the east, to the west. It is simple. All I ask in return is a bridle and a bit. They are for my poor burro who has neither."
    "I cannot ride this horse without a bit," Nehana said.
    She said no more, but spurred her horse, throwing the man aside into the grass. She circled the fire and we followed her down the woodcutter's trail, leaving the man behind us shouting.
    Near dawn we left the pine grove for country which was open and slanted toward the rising sun. Nehana gave her horse a nudge with her bare heels. We did the same and the horses broke into a trot. Neither Running Bird nor I knew how to ride a horse, but we had learned a little from our journey with the Spaniards and during the long night just past.
    Soon we came to a slow-running stream where we watered the horses. As they drank and began to crop the grass along the bank, I kept looking back at the pine grove and the hill beyond, fearful that I would seethe Spaniards.
    "They have found our trail now that the sun is up," Nehana said, "They will ride faster than we did, having the daylight to go by. Yet they cannot reach this place before the sun is overhead."
    She spread a blanket on the grass, as if we were at a fiesta, and laid out some corncakes for us to eat. Running Bird and I were not hungry, so Nehana ate all the cakes. Then she fell asleep. We walked up and down, listening to her breathe, listening for the sound of hoofs, watching the trail we had come along.
    Nehana did not move. She lay on her back with her lips half-parted, breathing peacefully.
    "Let us take our horses and go," Running Bird