Joe Leaphorn: Lieutenant in Navajo Tribal Police at Window Rock, Arizona office, widowed one year.
Jim Chee: Officer in Navajo Tribal Police, at Shiprock, New Mexico office, reports to Captain Largo.
Jay Kennedy: Long time FBI agent in charge for Gallup, New Mexico, who has often worked with Leaphorn.
Captain Largo: Based at Shiprock office of Navajo Tribal Police, long-time associate of Leaphorn.
Delbert Nez: Officer who works out of Window Rock, shot and killed in the line of duty.
Shirley Thompson: Young clerk at Red Rock trading post, of the Towering House clan.
Janet Pete: Half-Navajo lawyer recently returned to the reservation from Washington D.C., counsel for defenders in federal cases (under Department of Justice), and assigned to Hosteen Ashie Pinto.
Ashie Pinto: Gray-haired Hosteen, about 80 years old, who recalls stories and myths of Navajos during his own life and stories told to him by his elders. He works with academics interested in history or myths. He is an alcoholic who goes long times without drinking. He is a crystal gazer, who helps people find lost items.
Mary Keeyani: Niece to Hosteen Ashie Pinto and relative in the Turning Mountain clan of the late Emma Leaphorn, Joe’s wife.
Louisa Bourebonette: Professor of American studies at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff who is writing a book on the changes in witchcraft beliefs over time, working closely with Hosteen Ashie Pinto. She is a small, gray-haired woman who speaks with a slight Southern drawl.
Christopher Tagert: Professor of history with a specialty in the history of Western US views of the law. He has worked with Hosteen Ashie Pinto and has not appeared for his duties in the current term. He strives for recognition in his field, and has a theory about really happened to Butch Cassidy.
Jean Jacobs: Teaching assistant and doctoral student assigned to Prof. Tagert, who deals with all those wanting to speak with the missing professor. She likes Odell Redd.
William Odell Redd: Doctoral student in Albuquerque. He is now a linguist in Navajo and other languages, having given up history as a field to gain him a job. He did the translations of Pinto's tapes of old stories for the university library. He has interest in coins and stamps. He tells a lot of lies to Chee.
John‘Shorty’ McGinnis: Runs the Short Mountain trading post these last 40 or 50 years in a sparsely settled area, who receives mail for Hosteen Ashie Pinto.
Huan Ji: Teacher of mathematics at high school in Shiprock. He settled in the US after the Vietnam war, when he worked for both Saigon and the US as a colonel in the army of South Vietnam, and a special friend of the CIA, per Agent Kennedy. He likes to take photographs.
Taka Ji: Teenage son of Huan Ji who attends the high school. His hobby is photography, developing his photos in his home darkroom.
Theodore Rostick: Young FBI agent recently assigned to Farmington, New Mexico office.
Janice Ha: cousin of Taka Ji in Albuquerque, where he lives after the death of his father.
Jennifer D: Navajo girl, junior in the Shiprock high school, for whom Taka paints his message.
Judge Downy: Federal judge in Albuquerque for Pinto’s trial.
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