The Hunter Maiden. Ethel Johnston Phelps

      As she worked, she watched the young men of the tribe go forth with their rabbit sticks and stone axes. Later in the day, she saw them return to the village with strings of rabbits.

      “If I were a boy,” she thought, “I could hunt rabbits, and my parents would have meat to nourish themselves.” She pondered this, saying to herself, “There is no reason why I can’t hunt rabbits. When I was a child, my brothers often took me with them on the hunt.”

      So that evening, as the girl sat by the fire with her parents, she told them she intended to hunt for rabbits the next day.

      “It will not be hard to track rabbits in the new snow,” she said. “The young men who went out this morning all returned with strings of rabbits, but we have nothing to barter for meat. The rabbit sticks and axes of my brothers are on the wall. Why should I not use them? Must we go hungry again this winter?”

      Her mother shook her head. “No, no! You will be too cold. You will lose your way in the mountains.”

      “It would be too dangerous,” said her father. “It is better to live with hunger. Hunting is not women’s work.”

      But at last, seeing that the girl was determined to go, the old father said, “Very well! If we cannot persuade you against it, I will see what I can do to help you.”

      He hobbled into the other room and found some old furred deerskins. These he moistened, softened, and cut into long stockings that he sewed up with sinew and the fiber of the yucca leaf. Then he selected for her a number of rabbit sticks and a fine stone ax.

      Her mother prepared lunch for the next day, little baked cornmeal cakes flavored with peppers and wild onions. These she strung on a yucca fiber, like beads on a string, and placed with the weapons for the hunt.

      The girl rose very early the next morning, for she planned to leave before the young men of the village set out to hunt. She put on a warm, short-skirted dress, pulled on the deerskin stockings, and threw a large mantle over her back. The string of corn cakes was slung over one shoulder, the rabbit sticks thrust into her belt. Carrying the stone ax, she set out for the river valley beyond their pueblo.

      Though the snow lay smooth and unbroken, it was not deep enough to hinder her. Moving along steadily, she came at last to the river valley, where she climbed the cliffs and canyons on the steep, sloping sides. In and around the rocks and bushes, she saw the tracks of many rabbits.

      She followed the tracks eagerly, running from one place to another. At first she had little skill. But remembering all that her brothers had showed her, she at last became skillful enough to add many rabbits to her string.

      Snow had begun to fall, but the girl did not heed this, nor did she notice that it was growing dark.

      “How happy my parents will be to have food! They will grow stronger now,” she said to herself. “Some of the meat we can dry to last many days.”

      The string of rabbits had grown very heavy on her back when she suddenly realized it was almost dark. She looked about her. The snow had wiped out her trail. She had lost her way.

      The girl turned and walked in what she thought was the direction of her village, but in the darkness and the strangeness of the falling white snow, she became confused. She struggled on until she realized that she was completely lost.

      “It is foolish to go on,” she thought. “I’ll take shelter among the rocks for the night and find my way home in daylight.”