Page:Laughing Boy-1929.djvu/90

ia 78 | LAUGHING Boy one could make a good cornfield by that spring. | and plant peaches, perhaps. If they were to have | food like this all the time It was important | to find that pasture for the horses, he must tend | to it to-morrow. The town could wait. A swift movement caught his eye, lifting the coffee-pot | aside. Ei! she was beautiful. Y They talked as they ate, lounging, while night | filled the valley. | ‘Do you speak American then?’ Laughing Boy asked. ‘Is it hard to learn?’ ‘It is not hard; we had to learn it. They put me in a room with a Ute girl and a Moqui and a { Comanche; all we could do was learn English. | Sometimes some Navajo girls sneaked out and | talked together, but not often. They did not want | us to be Indians.” She rested on her elbow, staring into the fire. ‘They wanted us to be ashamed of | being Indians. They wanted us to forget our | mothers and fathers.’ ‘That is a bad thing. Why did they do that?’ | ‘Do not talk about it. I do not want to think | about those things.’ When she had put away the dishes, as they lit their cigarettes she said, ‘If ever they come tc take a child of ours to school, kill her.’