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forgot about it.
    If it had been Thungür or Kuy-Kuyen who had seen them scratching in this way, either would have pestered them until they gave an answer. Kume, though, was naturally taciturn. He spent many
hours on his own, observing the world from his solitary lair with a mixture of melancholy and hostility. It was not surprising therefore that he left them alone without repeating his question. Now
he soon fell into one of those self-absorbed moods they all knew so well, but did nothing to try to change. He walked in silence a little way back from the others until they reached home.
    ‘Here we are at last!’ exclaimed Old Mother Kush. ‘Take off your cloaks and sit by the fire. I’ll make some mint tea with honey to ward off the cold.’
    Dulkancellin was hanging up his cloak when he saw the carved wooden chest that appeared together with the rain and disappeared as soon as the sun shone again. He smiled to himself, and shouted
to Kush, who was busy with the fire:
    ‘What will you choose from your chest this time?’
    ‘Who knows?’ his mother replied.
    ‘I hope it’s Shampalwe’s comb,’ said Kuy-Kuyen. ‘Then you can tell us again what her wedding was like.’
    ‘No,’ Thungür objected, warming his hands at the fire. ‘I’d like it better if you took out the red rock from the volcano and told us about the day the earth opened
and the lakes were bubbling with heat.’
    ‘All I can promise is that I will tell you a story.’
    Every Husihuilke family kept a chest that was passed down through the generations. Even though it was less than two hands high, and could be carried by a young child, in it were keepsakes of
everything important that had happened to the family throughout time. When the nights for story-telling arrived, the chest was turned over four times: first forwards, then backwards, and finally to
each of its two sides. Afterwards, the oldest member of the family would plunge a hand into the chest and pull out the first thing it touched, without hesitating or choosing. That object was a
token of the story that would be told that year. Sometimes this referred to events none of them had witnessed, because they had happened many years before. Yet the story-teller talked of them as
surely as if they had indeed been there. In this way too the tales became rooted in the minds of those who would have to tell them again years later.
    The Husihuilkes said it was the Great Wisdom that guided the hand of the oldest member of the family so that their voice would recover from memory all that had to be remembered. Some of the
stories were repeated tirelessly. Some were told only once in the course of a generation; others perhaps would never be recounted.
    ‘I wonder about the old stories that have always remained in the chest,’ said Thungür. ‘If no one has told them, no one has heard them. And if no one has heard them
...’
    ‘ ... No one remembers them,’ said Kush, coming over with her bowl of herb tea. ‘You always say the same thing, and I always give you the same answer. When something really
important happens, many pairs of eyes are witness to it. And many tongues will say what they have seen. Just remember, old stories which are not told around one fire will be told at another one.
And the memories one family forgets will still live on in other homes.’
    Kush dragged over a hide rug to sit by the fire.
    For a moment, none of them spoke. Then Dulkancellin said:
    ‘Thungür is concerned about the stories in the chest. I’m worried about Kupuka . . .’
    Wilkilén and Piukemán jumped when they heard the Wizard’s name.
    ‘I wonder why he didn’t come to join us,’ Dulkancellin went on. ‘What could be more important than our meeting in the Valley?’
    ‘A lot of things have been happening,’ said Kush, finally deciding to share her disquiet. ‘Too many not to notice. The lukus’ strange behaviour, the drums in the forest,
the oriole’s feather, and Kupuka’s absence