^ 



XVIII. 



OW this is the end. 

 It is three years since 

 I first became a wo 

 nian-who-goes-hunting- 

 with-her-husband. I 

 have lived on jerked 

 deer and alkali water, and bathed in 

 dark-eyed pools, nestling among vast 

 pines where none but the four footed 

 had been before. I have been sung 

 asleep a hundred times by the coyotes' 

 evening lullaby, have felt the spell of 

 their wild nightly cry, long and mourn- 

 ful, coming just as the darkness has 

 fully come, lasting but a few seconds. 



