I thought so. Coyote yawned, showing long tongue and teeth; his yellow eyes crossed, his tongue licked his dark chops.
Then he told this story:
People, he said, say that once long ago People just went on living and living and never stopping. There was no death. Which was good, except that they also kept having People pups who grew up and ate the food and used up the wealth, and so there were too many of them. They started thinking it would be better if old People just went away somewhere for a while, you know? They’d be “dead.” They could be called back with singing and drumming and so on whenever People wanted them back. There was a lot of talk about whether this was a good idea, and the talk went on a long time. Back then there were People who could talk to us—us not-People—if they learned how and practiced. So when one of those came to us—well, to me—and asked what I thought, I said no, those dead ones should be dead and gone forever. Life’s for the living, I said. That’s something we beasts know and People don’t. Am I right? And this speaker brought my words to their councils, and he got voted down. Having Death was maybe good, they admitted, but the idea of never seeing their friends and kin ever again was just too sad for People.
So here’s what they did: they built this lodge of grass, of the kind they make, to put their dead ones in. And they decided there should be two doors, one for bringing in the dead, which would be shut when the dead were inside, and another for the spirits to return by after they had rested up or whatever they did, and get back into their old bodies. And it was to stay open always.
I still didn’t like this idea. First of all, sharing. Too many to share with, and that included me. That land then was pretty poor. Then, just no. Dead’s dead. If spirits come back so the dead are up and doing again, what do they get to do? What seats do they sit in? Do they get all their wealth back? Not that that was any of my business, but I knew it was wrong, and I thought I’d see what I could do. And here’s what they say happened next: When the dead were tucked up in that lodge, and the wind that brought the spirits back started to blow, I went and closed that spirit door. I pushed it shut and I kept it shut, and the wind blew hard and I held hard, and the wind couldn’t blow that door open.
So at last the spirits went away. They figured that no door had been made for them; that the house was the house of the dead only, where spirits were forbidden. They had better go off and make a land of their own. And they were right.
I did that, Coyote said; I saw to it. Myself and not another.
And the People hated me for it.
And they came to kill me.
But that Speaker to animals—a smart one!—said he could think of a better way to punish me, and he knew how to do it. He said: let him live long, let him not die ever, let him scrabble for every bite, let him be always hungry as the living are hungry, let him never rest, never join the spirits who don’t hunger or thirst or hurt. And let him still fear death just as he does now, fear death forever, and look back constantly to see if Death is following.
Dar Oakley asked, How did they do that? How did they make it so? Was it a stone they gave you, or was it something that was nothing, or—
Too long ago to remember, Coyote said. It worked, though, you see? I’ve been traveling ever since, always looking for a den, my own. Even if People didn’t know my story, they always seemed to know there was a good reason to run me off, shoot me, poison me. Or I’d get in trouble all by my smart self, get caught, get killed again, learn again, forget again. So, for sure, looking backward all the time. Cautious is what I’d say: see what’s gaining on me.
And always moving, Dar Oakley said.
Mostly, Coyote said. Toward morning.
Daywise.
You go a little farther every year, you maybe find things a little easier where nobody knows you, you do a little better—for a while. But here’s the funny part, Crow: ever since back then when Death started, all People die, and no matter how much their dead selves want to come back and be alive again, they never can. All because of me. And my punishment for that? To be more afraid of Death even than they are, and yet never die.
Yes, Dar Oakley said.
That was the last time I got involved with helping them, the Coyote said. That’s for sure.
The world had begun to brighten at last now. Perhaps a night had passed, a day had come. The People began to come from the buildings, carrying their plastic tubs and pulling their children, their silent shadow forms growing more solid. It appeared the Crow and the Coyote had reached a high embankment from which the city over the river could be seen in its endlessness: its streets scribed over the earth, the heights in its center, the ruination for a moment unperceived. Dawn-glow through the smoke of its exhalations, scatter of city lights being put out as day grew bright. Cars on the bridges, which hadn’t been there before.
A couple of poor beasts born to die, Dar Oakley thought. Who got into tangles they never expected. Trying to help People, or save themselves. He realized—it struck him for the first time now as a possibility—that there might be many like the Coyote and the Crow, all around Kits’s wide round world. Maybe one of every sort of beast and bird—one each, caught in People stories and People hopes, foolishly wise, journeying in realms not theirs, seeking or stumbling upon or finding and losing the Most Precious Thing: stealing it for themselves, hiding it and losing it, forgetting where it was. The thing that kills the thing that kills us alclass="underline" Death. Coyote’s gift, the thing People have hated and feared the most and yet can never do without.
Dar Oakley began to laugh. He laughed, his laughter a Crow’s, which sounds so jeering and unkind and harsh to all the world but Crows.
Well, they should be glad, then, he said, that we did it, shouldn’t they? That we stole Death’s death from them, I mean, so that they could never have it, no matter how hard they tried, no matter how much they wanted it. That was good for them, wasn’t it? Aren’t they lucky?
You’re asking me? the Coyote said. He crawled out from his hidey-hole, lifted a hind leg to pass a few drops of water. Overhead Crows were calling Crows to feast, heading in numbers for the mountain at the end of Ymr.
Well, I think they are, Dar Oakley said. And what have we ever got for it?
Stories, Coyote said. Not to tell you something you don’t already know. We’re made of stories now, brother. It’s why we never die even if we do.
It was day, real day, and he was at risk: time to go to earth, to his wife and young. He put his black nose to the ground, learning what he could learn, and found a direction he liked. As he went away he turned his harsh head back, Coyote-style, to Dar Oakley.
See you never, death-bird, he said. And he made a soft snickering that Dar Oakley, for that one moment, knew could remake the world if Coyote had not renounced the power to do it.
That was the last story, the story Dar Oakley told me on this the last day of my own life on earth.
CHAPTER THREE
Barbara has come in the truck. She has put on various bracelets and necklaces of stones and leather that I’ve never seen her wear before. I won’t ask her about them; their use or meaning is perhaps evident. The child’s cheeks and forehead are painted in stripes of black and yellow. I wonder if these are her own invention, or really come from a tradition she still retains; she’s certainly never shown any such knowledge before. She’s hung a little crucifix around his neck as well.
This is the day: we’ve agreed. There’s no particular reason that it be this day, but this is the day.