Quails said, "Oh, nothing. We heard something calling behind the
mountains."

Soon the quails called again: "Coyote, you ate your own meat."

"What did you say?"

"Oh, nothing. We heard somebody pounding his grinding-stone. "

So Coyote went on. But at last he began to feel where he had been cut.
Then he knew what the quails meant. He turned back down the trail and
told Quails he would eat them up. He began to chase them. The quails
flew above ground and Coyote ran about under them. At last they got
tired, but Coyote did not because he was so angry.

By and by Quails came to a hole, and one of the keenest-witted picked up
a piece of prickly cholla cactus and pushed it into the hole; then they
all ran in after it. But Coyote dug out the hole and reached them. When
he came to the first quail he said,

"Was it you who told me I ate my own flesh?"

Quail said, "No."

So Coyote let him go and he flew away. When Coyote came to the second
quail, he asked the same question. Quail said, "No," and then flew away.
So Coyote asked every quail, until the last quail was gone, and then he
came to the cactus branch. Now the prickly cactus branch was so covered
with feathers that it looked just like a quail. Coyote asked it the same
question, but the cactus branch did not answer. Then Coyote said,