"But she just uses her powers for good," snorted Number One. Their sarcasm proclaimed disbelief, but there was a tone of defensiveness in their voices. Neither of them seemed to take lightly the girl or even the possibility that she was a witch.

"Do you believe all the things she says?" asked One.

I shrugged.

"I don't like it-all her talk about death," said Two.

One had a watch, and he kept us posted on the time. They talked about when she ought to be back and how much longer they'd wait before they gave up and hitched in themselves. Though I suspected she wouldn't come back. I expressed faith in her return to the others and did not include myself in their deadlines.

The girl did return with a tow-truck after about an hour and a half. One and Two rode on the back of the truck and the girl and I rode in the cab with the driver. The driver was going to try to fix the car at his station, and if he couldn't, he'd take us to a Volvo dealer in Albuquerque. The girl said something to me, but for the benefit of the driver, about how she wished her "father" had gotten the car checked out before she left L. A. By this time, I was quite sure that the car as well as the credit card was stolen.

At the station the driver called in the inevitable check on the credit card. Then he apologized to the girl and said the card was no good and that he had been instructed to pick it up. Furthermore, we couldn't have the car until we payed forty dollars for the tow. And it still had to be repaired.

The girl said her father had been threatening to cancel her credit card and that he had picked a bad time. The driver apologized again to her.

She had three dollars cash. I had six. The other two had quite a bit of money, over a hundred dollars, plus a credit card which was good, but they wouldn't pay on a stolen car. I didn't blame them, but the girl got made and suggested that they "do their own trip." They agreed and left.

She asked me if I still wanted to go to Taos and I said sure. I got my pack and she got her sleeping bag-all she had with her-and we started hitching.

We hit the road, giddy with liberation, dancing and skipping with sheer joy. Relieved of the worry of whether or not the car would run, leaving that big expensive piece-of-shit-machine behind and setting off for a new town together as total strangers, we were free. She asked my name; I told her my first name and asked her

"My name's Yana," she said. "but it used to be Linda. The Devil gave me the name Yana when he cut all my hair off."

The Devil was named Charlie. Sometimes she called him the Man. He was the leader of the people she had been living with in L. A. Yana's hair had been down to her waist before he had cut it all very short in some kind of name-giving ceremony. All except for that one braid in back.

Charlie had learned through meditation about the existence at several places around the world of holes which went down to the center of the earth. Down the Holes will go the Beautiful People to escape the wrath of Black Man who will rise up and slaughter his hateful master. White Man. Some time after White Man has been killed off. Black Man will realize that he has learned all he knows from White Man and that he cannot develop civilization any more on his own. Then the Beautiful People will be invited out of the holes to rule Black Man and further civilization. Only the Beautiful People will love Black Man and will not mistreat him as White Man had.

Charlie and the people he lived with in L. A. were not the only ones who knew about these holes. Donovan knew; in one of his songs he sings, "Take me down through a hole in the ocean." The Beatles knew, and they knew Charlie knew. Charlie and his friends had listened to "Helter Skelter" with headphones for months until they could hear, quite distinctly below the sounds of the instruments and the singing, the Beatles in speaking voices saying, "Charlie, can you hear us? Charlie can you hear us? Call us in London. Call us in London." Charlie had called London and the Beatles had refused to accept the call. Still, their faith was unbroken.