Frank Yazzie stared at his youngest son, hurt gleaming in his dark eyes.  Even when he was drinking hard himself, and stole when he ran out of money, he knew that was no way for anyone to live.  He wanted better for his sons and daughter.  He didn't want them to be concerned that the RCMP were looking for them.  He did not want them to have the fear that used to grip his heart every time he saw a patrol car or the uniform of an officer.

He wanted to yell at Louis - to shout that it was wrong for him to break the law.  He wanted to tell him again that the Bible taught them to respect and obey those in authority, but for some reason he couldn't say what he wanted to.

"Louis," he said quietly.  "I know I wasn't much of a father while I was drinking and doing everything I shouldn't, but when I became a Christian I was concerned for you and tried to teach you the way you should live."

The officer waited impatiently for Louis to start talking, but young Yazzie wasn't looking at him.  He was staring at his dad. .

"Dad," he said, his voice breaking.  "I don't know how that coin purse got in my dresser, but I didn't put it there.  The last time I saw it, Mrs. McDonald had it."

Disbelief clouded the officer's features.  "You can't expect us to accept your word as truth when we found her coin purse right where our informant said it was." There was a short silence before he continued.  "Mrs.  McDonald likes you, Louis.  She cried when she told me that she suspected you."

The boy swallowed hard.

"Mrs.  McDonald said she not only liked you, she trusted you.  She's paid you well for guiding her.  If you thought you weren't getting enough, she would undoubtedly have given you more.  Is this the way you reward someone who is so good to you?"

Louis bit his lower lip, ignoring the RCMP officer.  "You believe me, don't you, Dad?"

For a moment or two Frank remained silent.

"I'm not lying.  I want you to know that.  I've seen that coin purse.  I've seen it every time I took Mrs. McDonald out on the lake.  And I knew the ring was in it.  She said the diamond was loose and she was afraid it might come out and she'd lose it.  On the way back to the lodge she told me she'd lost the purse and I wanted to go back and look for it, but a storm was coming up and she was afraid we'd be caught in it. She wanted to wait until the next day to go out and look for it That's what we did, but we weren't able to find it."

"We know all that!" the RCMP officer broke in.  "You did not find it out there because you had put it in your pocket."

"You don't believe that, do you, Dad?"

Frank Yazzie may have had doubts before, but in that instant he knew his son was telling the truth.

"Yes, Louis.  I believe you."

Relief flooded the boy's features.

"How did you decide to come here and look in the room Louis and Robert share?" Frank asked the officer.

"I don't have to answer that, Frank, but you've cooperated with us in this entire matter.  A phone call came in to headquarters yesterday afternoon, telling us to look in the dresser in Louis' room."

The boy's father thought about that.  "Doesn't it seem strange to you that you would get a call like that and you'd find the coin purse exactly where you were told to look?"

"Not when you're dealing with young offenders.  They pull something like this and get to thinking they're ten feet tall and smarter than Einstein.  He probably bragged to some of his so-called friends about what he'd done and where he hid the coin purse.  And they rewarded him by calling us to tell us where the purse was hidden."

"That could be true," Yazzie agreed.  "But there's something else that could be true, too.  If some guy did not like Louis, or wanted to turn the blame away from himself, the real thief could have made the call.  He'd know exactly where the coin purse was."

"Somehow, I thought better of you than that, Frank.  I figured that you'd want me to come down on Louis to teach him a lesson.  But, you're like some of the other parents we deal with.  Their kids would never do anything wrong."

Frank Yazzie frowned.  "You know, there's one thing in this deal that bothers me."

"What's that?"

"Where's the diamond ring that was in it?"' "What do you mean?"

"If Louis stole that coin purse and hid it so well that an informant had to tell you where it was, why wasn't the diamond ring in it?  Why did the coin purse still have the coins in it - which only totaled five dollars, but the valuable items were gone?"

The RCMP officer pulled in a deep breath.  "You may have something there, Frank.  It's worth looking into before we make an arrest." He got to his feet.  "Louis," he said, "if you'll promise me you won't run away, I will leave you here with your dad until we have finished our investigation."

"He'll stay here," Frank said confidently.

"I want to hear it from him!"

"I'm not going to run away, if that's what you mean," Louis assured him.

When the officer was gone, Louis turned to his dad.  "What're we going to do?" he asked.  "How am I going to prove I didn't steal that diamond ring?"

"I don't know.  We'll have to pray for God to guide us."

"I never got in a mess like this before I became a Christian."

"It may seem that way to you," his dad replied, "but the truth is that you were in a lot worse trouble, only you didn't know it.  The things you were doing would have gotten you in a lot more serious trouble than this.  You were smoking and drinking and sniffing gasoline.  If God hadn't gotten hold of you, you would have ruined your life."

They prayed together, that God would help the police to find the thief that stole Mrs. McDonald's diamond ring.

"You know, Dad," Louis said when they finished.  "I think I hate the guy who's trying to get me blamed for stealing that ring almost as much as I hate the ones who tried to attack Tawana."

"Don't talk that way," his dad said.  "Don't even think that way."

"Look what could have happened!  Look what might happen to me, even yet."

"You know what the Bible says about that, don't you?  God tells us to hate the sin, but to love the sinner."

"Now, wait a minute.  You can't expect her to love those two guys who attacked her.  And I can't love whoever it was who sneaked in here and put that coin purse behind the dresser drawer, and phoned the RCMP and told them where to look for it."

"It's not easy," Frank Yazzie said.  "That's for sure.  But, you know what Jesus did when He was dying on the cross?  He said, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.'"

"The trouble is, those dudes knew exactly what they were doing.  They ought to pay for it!  Especially those two who grabbed Tawana."

His dad nodded.  "I know what you're saying, and I agree with you.  I hope they're caught and punished so they won't do it again.  And the same goes for whoever tried to blame you for stealing that diamond ring.  But, we shouldn't hate them."

Louis didn't say any more, but he didn't agree with his dad, especially when he thought about what almost happened to Tawana.  How could his dad say what he did after

something like that.  It was almost as though he betrayed her, or didn't love her as much as he should.

And, there was the guy or guys who tried to get him in bad trouble by trying to get the RCMP to believe he was the one who had stolen Mrs. McDonald's ring.  How could he keep from hating someone who would do that.

Officer Starr still didn't completely believe that he was not the thief who hid the coin purse behind one of the dresser drawers.  He still wasn't completely out of that one.  He knew from the look on the RCMP officer's face that he didn't believe Louis and his dad, even though the ring was not in the coin purse when they found it.

The thief might plant something else to make sure everyone thought he was guilty.  How could a guy keep from hating the one who did something as serious to him as that?

Sometime later Rita Yazzie wheeled into the yard beside the trailer, jammed on the brakes and squealed to a halt.  She acted as though she was about to rush into the house, but she sat there with the truck door open, as though she couldn't make up her mind whether to get out or not.  At last she left the vehicle and started toward the house.

"Louis!" she cried when she saw him.  "Are you all right?"

He thought she had been drinking and backed away from her.  "Why wouldn't I be all right?" he asked, defensively.

"Officer Starr was back again.  When I saw his car here I didn't dare to stop." She paused.  "You did not steal that ring, did you, Louis?"

"I already told you I didn't take it.  I told Officer Starr that, too, but I don't think he believed me."

"I got some terrible news at the reserve, Louis.  The story is going around that you're the one who stole Mrs. McDonald's ring!" She grasped his shoulders.  "They say you won't admit it, but everyone knows you did.  Her voice faltered.  "But you didn't, did you?"

He shook his head.

"I was sure you hadn't.  You're not that kind of a boy, but seeing Starr here scared me!  I thought maybe you had done it." She bit her lower lip. "You don't know how good it makes me feel to hear you say that." She pulled in a deep breath.  "I haven't been sleeping much lately," she said.  "I'm finally seeing what a terrible mother I've been ... I don't deserve kids like you and Robert and Tawana.  I'm so glad you aren't like me." She started to cry.  "I haven't been any kind of an example for you.  If you follow my footsteps, you'll have nothing but trouble all your lives.  You'll be in one thing and then another."

"It doesn't have to be that way for you," he said.  "You can come to Christ the way the rest of us have."

Tears trickled down her cheeks.  "It's too late for me," she muttered.  "It's too late!" With that she stood quickly.

"But I'm going to stay home now," she continued.  "I quit my job at the bar, and I'm going to stay here, if your dad'll have me!"

Louis' spirits soared.  "I'll help you take your clothes into the trailer."

But she shook her head.  "I have to talk to your dad before we do that.  I don't know for sure that I want to stay, and I don't know if he'll have me.  I wouldn't blame him if he did not want to have anything more to do with me."

When Frank pulled up shortly after five o'clock, she sent Louis outside.  "I have to-to talk to your dad.  That's going to be hard enough without having you hear everything I say."