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returned, smiled at Leaphorn, refilled his coffee cup, refilled Tarkington’s glass, and left.
    “What I really want to know, I guess, is how he got that rug. Then I track it back, find out who made it, and that’s the end of it,” Leaphorn said. “So I need to know his telephone number so I can go ask him.” Tarkington was grinning. “So you can be done with this case, and go back to your usual police duties?”
    “So I can go back to being a bored-stiff-by-retirement former policeman.”
    “Well,” Tarkington said, staring at Leaphorn. “If you do learn anything interesting—for example, who copied it if anyone actually did, and why, and so forth—I’d sure appreciate hearing all about it.”
    Leaphorn considered that. “All right,” he said.
    Now Tarkington took a moment to think. He sipped his water again, while Leaphorn sipped coffee.

    THE SHAPE SHIFTER
    35
    “You may have noticed I love to talk,” Tarkington said, emphasizing the statement with a wry smile. “That would give me something new to talk about.” Leaphorn nodded. “But you haven’t told me his number.”
    “You had the name right,” Tarkington said. “Jason Delos.”
    Leaphorn picked up a second sandwich, took a bite.
    Judged it as very good.
    “Of course I collect stuff myself,” Tarkington said, and gestured into the gallery to demonstrate. “And I collect stories. Love ’em. And that damned Woven Sorrow tale-teller rug collected them like dogs collect fleas. And I want to know what you find out from Delos, if anything, and how this all turns out. Will you promise me that?”
    “If it’s possible,” Leaphorn said.
    Tarkington leaned forward, pointed at an odd-looking pot on a desk by the wall. “See that image of the snake on that ceramic there? That’s a Supai pot. But why is that snake pink? It’s a rattler, and they’re not that color. Well, I guess they are in one deep part of the Grand Canyon.
    There’s a very rare and officially endangered species down there in Havasupai territory, and they have a great story in their mythology about how it came to be pink.
    And that’s going to make that pot a lot more valuable to the fellow who collects it.”
    He stared at Leaphorn, looking for some sign of agreement.
    “I know that’s true,” Leaphorn said. “But I’m not sure I understand why.”
    “Because the collector gets the story along with the pot. People say why is that snake pink. He explains. That 36
    TONY HILLERMAN
    makes him an authority.” Tarkington laughed. “You Navajos don’t practice that one-upmanship game like we do.
    You fellows who stay in that harmony philosophy.” Leaphorn grinned. “Be more accurate to say a lot of Navajos try, but remember we have a curing ceremony to heal us when we start getting vengeful, or greedy, or—
    what do you call it—‘getting ahead of the Joneses.’”
    “Yeah,” Tarkington said. “I could tell you a tale about trying to get a Navajo businessman to buy a really fancy saddle. Lots of silver decorations, beautiful stitching, even turquoise worked in. He was interested. Then I told him it would make him look like the richest man on the big reservation. And he took a step back and said it would make him look like a witch.”
    Leaphorn nodded. “Yes,” he said. “At least it would make the traditional Dineh suspicious. Unless he didn’t have any poor kinfolks whom he should have been helping. And all of us have poor kinfolks.” Tarkington shrugged. “Prestige,” he said. “You Navajos aren’t so hungry for that. I’ll ask a Navajo about something that I know he’s downright expert about. He won’t just tell me. He’ll precede telling me by saying,
    ‘They say.’ Not wanting me to think he is claiming the credit.”
    “I guess I’ve heard that preamble a million times,” Leaphorn said. “In fact, I do it myself sometimes.” He was thinking that at his age, already retired, left on the shelf like the pink snake, he should understand that