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had never taken shelter with the other villagers when the snake clouds threatened.
    So — Ana the Wise: a mysterious woman of boundless experience and knowledge and beauty, who lived alone in her cave beside the road and only occasionally ventured afield, who was desired by every man in Pu’este — and who had been possessed by none.
    The villager would enter, blinking, seeing the outline of Ana and her dark hair and breasts, and soon his eyes would become accustomed to the gloom.
    “CanI help you?” she would say, in that husky voice.
    “I … I …”
    “Come over here, and I’ll do what I can.”
    A counter would separate them, a balk of hewn driftwood resting on two stumps. He would see Ana leaning on it, her elbows against the wood, her face cupped in her hands, her eyes looking up at him.
    Her eyes …
    They looked up at him like creatures apart, twins of incredible beauty who knew his every wish. Her face was simply a frame for those eyes; it provided them with a place to live and a window to look out of. He forgot her face and with it her body. He communicated with the eyes of Ana. He told them his longing, his needs.
    They invited him into their home.
    He dwelt there for an unknown time: Time had no meaning in the home of Ana’s eyes. It was a warm place where everything happened, everything good. No man ever spoke of it, afterward. It was a secret place, and to tell about it would spoil the delight. It was a place where a tired man rested and where an angry man found peace and, if they but knew it, where a sick man was healed. Men entered the home of Ana’s eyes with lust in their minds, and they came out gently happy. They could not say why they were happy, but the glow would stay with them all the way back to the village. And only when they were among their fellow men, among the nudges and grins and innuendo, would they grin and wink, too, and the sublime home would be forgotten, and they would convince themselves that they had got what they went for. As, in fact, they had.
    Ana would blink, and the spell would be broken.
    “Thank you,” the villager would say, and prepare to leave.
    Ana would give him a little bag of dried fruit or a pinch of some spice, as a reason for having come.

T HE S MALL R AINBOW
    I
t waslate afternoon when Dad Ose arrived outside Ana’s store. She was beginning to gather in her wares, unpinning a row of children’s dresses from a line strung between two ancient trees. Dad Ose would have found it difficult to explain why he had come to see her, but it had something to do with Manuel’s having mentioned her name, and a lot to do with a curious mood of restlessness and uncertainty that had come over him. He sensed that big events were afoot. Something was happening that was much more important than the wretched Horse Day celebrations, and he wanted to be a part of it. So he had come to see Ana, who knew everything, and was understanding and beautiful. Did he need any other reason?
    She looked at him, reaching up for a tiny dress.
    He said quickly, hoping she hadn’t seen him looking at her body, “Manuel’s back.”
    “That’s good. He’s the only one who can keep the Quicklies in order.” Ana smiled her wonderful smile, and Dad Ose tried to concentrate on what she was saying. “They’ve been bothersome recently. I think they’re at war again. They leave the beach when they’re unhappy, you know. They come up the road and take things from the store. I can’t stop them. One minute a sapa cloth is hanging there, the next minute, poof! it’s gone.” And she smiled again, as though to say the Quicklies were no problem really, in the greater scheme of things.
    “Alwaysfighting,” Dad Ose grumbled.
    “No more than Humanity, really. Cultures and factions come and go so fast with the Quicklies. We only notice their bad times. Manuel will set them right.”
    “I hope so.” Dad Ose’s concern was dogmatic. It was wrong that creatures should fight, particularly