"Come upstairs." Frank helped Auguste untie his backpack.

The stairs led to a second-floor corridor, and Frank drew Auguste into a

room where an oil lamp with a tall glass chimney burned next to a large

bed. Nicole sat there. The lamplight revealed Elysee's sharp profile

against the white of the pillow.

Nicole jumped to her feet. "Oh, Auguste! Are you all right?"

"I'm getting better. How is Grandpapa?"

"He's only been awake half the time. Gram Medill looked in on him. She

said he wrenched his hip when he fell and had bad bruises, but he hadn't

broken any bones. I've been sitting up with him. What about you--how is

your head?"

Auguste felt as if chains had fallen away from his chest at the news

that Grandpapa was not dying. Then his head started to hurt. In the

excitement of slipping past his enemies, Auguste had forgotten his pain.

Now he rubbed the spot above his right ear where Greenglove's rifle had

hit him. He felt a lump that was sore to the touch. But he was able to

smile reassuringly at Nicole.

He spoke in a low voice so as not to disturb Elysee. "I won't be able to

put my fine beaver hat on over this bump. But I won't be taking my fine

beaver hat where I'm going."

"I'll get some more chairs," Frank said. "We can talk in here. The old

gentleman is sound asleep now. Could you use a drop of brandy, Auguste?"

Auguste nodded. "That might ease the pain." He thought not only of the

pain from the rifle blow, but of the pain in his heart from having lost

Victoire despite his promise to his father. And the pain of tearing

himself away from Nancy.

He and Frank quietly removed chairs from the other upstairs rooms where

the Hopkins children were sleeping. Frank went down to the kitchen and

came back with a tray bearing three small bowl-shaped crystal glasses

and a cut-glass decanter that twinkled in the lamplight.

"Handsome glassware," Auguste said, seating himself and carefully

setting his backpack between his feet.

"From the time of Louis the Fifteenth," Nicole said. "One of the things

Papa brought over from the old chateau in France. And he gave it to

Frank and me as a wedding present. At least Raoul won't get his hands on

this."

Auguste said, "But Raoul has everything else, because father left it all

to me. I told him he should will it to you; I should have insisted." His

face burned with shame.

Frank said, "I doubt we'd have held onto the estate any longer than you

did. And, frankly, I don't want it any more than you do. I don't know

how Nicole feels."

Now that the land was irrevocably lost to him, Auguste was no longer so

sure that he did not want it. He twisted in his chair, angry at himself

for his uncertainty.

Nicole shook her head. "I'm a wife and mother. I'm not prepared to be a

chatelaine. Especially when I'd have to fight that--that beast."

As Frank poured an inch of the warm amber liquid into each of their

glasses, Auguste noticed that his fingers were, as always, blackened. He

must never get the stains of his trade off his hands.

Frank said, "I'm going to write in the _Visitor_ about what happened

today, tell what I saw, so the whole county will know what happened."

Auguste looked at Nicole. He saw fear in her eyes, but she said nothing.

"Why write about it?" Auguste said. "Raoul would do some harm to you.

And it would change nothing. I won't even be here to read it." The last

thing he wanted was these people, whom he cared about, getting into

trouble because of him.

Frank smiled faintly. "You know that unlike just about every other man

in Smith County, I don't carry a gun." He pointed downward, in the

direction of the press on the floor below them. "That's my way of

fighting."

For a moment Auguste felt ashamed that he was running away from that

same fight.

"Because you stood by me today my heart will always sing your praises.

Do you think my father's spirit will be sad if I do not stay and fight

for the land until I die?"

"You almost did die, Auguste," Nicole said.

_And I might yet, before I get away from here._

He sipped the brandy. It burned his tongue and his throat and lit a fire

in his belly. It made him feel stronger.

Frank said, "Nobody's saying you should stay. I don't want to see you

killed."

Nicole said, "Neither would your father. Pierre wanted you to have the

estate, but he didn't want you dead on account of it."

"Amen to that," said Frank.

_Yes_, Auguste thought, despising himself, _but I think he expected me

to keep the land for more than a day_.

Frank went on, "But if you go back to your people, you've got to tell

them--they can no more fight the United States for their land than you

could fight Raoul."

A fierce heat rose in Auguste as he took another sip of brandy. "At St.

George's School I read that the Indian does not make good use of the

land. The whites need the land. Therefore the Indian must yield." He

clenched his fist around the glass in his hand. "We were living on this

land! Doesn't that mean anything?"

Frank said, "Auguste, you know better than any of your people how much

power the United States have. You've got to tell them."

Auguste was silent for a moment.

_The long knives_, he thought. That was what his people called the

American soldiers. But the British Band had no idea how very many long

knives there were. He must make Black Hawk understand.

He sipped a little more of the brandy, and its fire flowed through his

blood.

He sighed and nodded. "I will tell them. Frank, I need a boat."

Nicole said, "Your eyelids are drooping, Auguste. You're tired and

you're still hurt. You can't go tonight."

True. And he wanted to stay long enough to see Grandpapa when he was

awake.

Auguste's last memory that night was of letting Frank lead him across

the corridor into a darkened bedroom, where he fell face down on an

empty bed.

When he came to himself again, he was lying on the same bed, still fully

clothed except for his boots. The room was not as dark as he remembered;

it was in a sort of twilight. The one window was shuttered. A curtain

covered the doorway. He looked around the room, saw boys' clothing

hanging on pegs and piled on the floor, another bed, covered with

rumpled sheets, empty. His own boots and his pack were set neatly at the

foot of his bed.

An urgent pressure inside told him he had been sleeping a long time. He

saw a chamber pot in one corner. Smart of them to leave the pot here, he

thought as he filled it. He didn't dare to go to their outhouse during

daylight.

He went to the window and cautiously looked through the shutter. The

window looked south, and he could not see the sun, only the black

shadows it painted in the ruts of the road that slanted up the hill past

the Hopkins house. It must be late afternoon.

He wondered, were Raoul and his men out there somewhere, looking for

him? Would he live to see another nightfall?

His head ached less than it had last night--until he touched it. Then

the pain was like someone pounding a nail into his brain. The bump felt

as big as a hen's egg.

Opening his backpack, he took out his leather medicine bag and drew out

the stones one by one, rubbing his fingers over each. He opened his

shirt and touched the tip of the bear's claw to the five scars on his

chest.

Then, on impulse, he touched it to the old scar on his cheek.

A black leather bag contained his surgical instruments--two saws, a big

one for legs and a smaller one for arms; four scalpels; lancets for

bleeding; a turnkey for pulling teeth; a probe and tongs for removing

bullets; a small jar of opium. Any of those things might be needed,

where he was going.

Last, he took out a book, chosen almost at random from his small

collection. On the spine of its brown leather cover was stamped in gold:

"J. Milton. _Paradise Lost_."

Reverend Hale had recommended that he take a Bible. This long poem

giving the Christian account of creation was the next thing to a Bible.

But he had read it at St. George's and enjoyed it. And its title and its

story of Adam and Eve being driven out of the Garden of Eden made him

think of how he was dispossessed. Perhaps he would find some wisdom or

guidance in the book.

Today he thought, _Paradise lost? It may be that I'm returning to

paradise._

But then he remembered how Nancy had wanted to "know" him as Adam knew

Eve. He _was_ leaving behind what might have been a great happiness.

He opened the book and read the first verse his eye fell upon:

High on a Throne of Royal State, which far

Outshone the wealth of _Ormus_ and of _Ind_,

Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand

Show'rs on her Kings _Barbaric_ Pearl and Gold,

Satan exalted sat ...

Sounded like Raoul, with his fifty Spanish dollars and his steamboat and

lead mine and trading post. Raoul was better fitted to be Satan than to

be the angel at the gates of Eden keeping sinners away.

He heard voices nearby. One, faint but unmistakable, was Grandpapa's.

His heart leaped. He quickly repacked his treasures.

He pushed the curtain aside and hurried across the hall. It was a joy to

see Elysee's eyes looking at him, open and bright.

"I do not as a rule believe in miracles," Elysee said, smiling at

Auguste, "but it's certainly a miracle that you could charge a man

pointing a pistol at your chest and come out with nothing but a bump on

your head."

"It's a bad enough bump, Grandpapa," said Auguste, dragging over the

chair he had sat in last night and pulling it close to the side of the

bed. "I wish I could stay and doctor you."

"Our local midwife says I too will heal," said Elysee. "I can move all

my arms and legs without extreme pain. I think the worst injury was to

my hip." He touched his right side gently. "I bruised it when I fell.

There's swelling there, but I can move my leg. The hip is not broken."

He closed his eyes, and Auguste knew that the old man was feeling a

sharper pain in his heart than in his bones. "You must not think of

staying here. I am afraid Raoul is perfectly capable of murdering you."

_One son dead, the other an enemy. And now I must leave him. How much

more can he stand?_

Nicole was sitting beside Elysee's bed, just as she had been last night

when Auguste arrived. He wondered whether she had slept.

Nicole smiled at him. "I sent the children down to play by the river.

Having two injured adults to care for has been very restful for me."

Elysee sat up a little straighter, Nicole quickly plumping the pillows

behind him, and turned a sharp, blue-eyed stare at Auguste.

"Nicole and Frank told me about your plan to go back to the Sauk. I can

understand why you would wish to do so, but that is not the only choice

open to you. You might consider going where people are much more

civilized than they are around here--back East, where you were educated.

Emilie and Charles would be happy, I am sure, to take you in again for a

time. And I could help you. I have money banked with Irving and Sons on

Wall Street. You could continue your education and follow the medical

profession in New York."

Wishing he did not have to refuse the old man, Auguste said, "Grandpapa,

I must go to the only other people I love in the world as much as I love

you and Aunt Nicole."

Elysee uttered a little sigh. "I understand. Loyalty pulls you back to

your mother's people. It is a family trait. I suppose your father must

have told you about the mystery around the origin of our family name."

"Yes, Grandpapa." Wanting him to know his French forebears, Pierre had

spent hours with Auguste recounting their names and deeds. And he had

told him that, strangely, the de Marion records extended back only to

the late thirteenth century, though the family was wealthy and powerful

even then. According to a murky legend, one ancestor had committed

treason against the King, and that one's son had deserted his wife and

children, simply disappeared. Feeling the original name, whatever it had

been, irreparably tarnished, the first recorded Count de Marion had

destroyed all record of it--apparently with the approval and help of the

royal authorities--and had taken his mother's family's name instead. The

story had left Auguste wishing he could use his shaman's powers to learn

more, but he doubted that the Sauk spirits could see clear across the

ocean.

Elysee said, "We de Marions sometimes display an overabundance of

loyalty, as if we were still trying to expiate that ancient guilt."

Puzzled, Auguste said, "There's nothing wrong with loyalty, is there?"

"Certainly not. But remember this--if I had let loyalty keep me in

France, we would not be here in this primeval paradise."

_He sees this land as a paradise too. But it has not been kind to him._

"Looking back, Grandpapa, do you think you would have done better to

have stayed in France?"

Elysee laughed, a short, humorless bark. "Not at all. I would almost

certainly have lost my head to Dr. Guillotine's wonderful invention. Our

lands would have been confiscated, and that would have been the end of

the family."

"But now, with most of the wealth in Raoul's hands--"

Elysee raised a hand and shook his head. "This is not the end. I do not

believe in divine intervention, but I do believe there is a law of

nature that says a bad man will do badly in the end."

Auguste was about to reply when he heard footsteps coming down the road

toward the house, reminding him of how quiet it had been ever since he

awakened. A good part of the town was sleeping off Raoul's Old Kaintuck,

he suspected.

He heard the door open and close below. A moment later Frank came into

the room carrying a long rifle, with an ammunition bag and a powder horn

slung over his shoulder.

"Well, I bought you a little bateau that will get you across the

Mississippi," he said, "for five dollars, from an old trapper who

doesn't feel up to going out this winter. And for another twenty dollars

I got him to throw in his second best rifle and a good supply of

ammunition." He smiled grimly at Auguste. "I expect you'll find this

useful over in Ioway."

Auguste nodded. "I'll eat better. But--twenty-five dollars. Frank,

that's too much for you to spend on me." He felt a warm gratitude toward

the plump, sandy-haired man who was risking so much to help him. Frank's

newspaper, his printing business and his carpentry all together could

hardly bring in twenty-five dollars in a month, little enough to feed a

family of ten.

Elysee said, "I told you I had some money salted away, Auguste. Let the

boat and the rifle be my gift to you."

Auguste reached out and squeezed his grandfather's bony hand.

Frank said, "I've moved the boat about half a mile below town and hidden

it. We should be able to get down there unseen after dark."

Nicole said, "If Auguste is leaving as Raoul wants him to, why wouldn't

Raoul just let him go?"

Frank said, "We can't take that chance. I believe Raoul won't be content

unless he kills Auguste."

Auguste shuddered inwardly at the thought that there was in the world a

man who would not be satisfied until he was dead. He could not live with

that kind of fear. He asked the White Bear, his spirit guide, to give

him courage.

He tried to push the fear out of his mind. He stood up to go back to the

room where he had slept. He would clean and repack the things he was

taking, he decided. He would get busy getting ready and not give himself

time to think about being afraid.

But nightfall seemed a long way off.

At nine o'clock in the evening by the Seth Thomas clock in Frank's

printing shop, which he reset every day at sunset, it was dark enough

and the town was quiet enough for Auguste to leave. He held Nicole's

ample body tight and kissed her, shook hands with the boys and kissed

the girls. His grandfather had drifted off to sleep again, but the old

man had kissed him on both cheeks, and they had said their good-byes in

the afternoon.

The road down the bluff from the town to the bottomland was empty. Most

people in Victor went to bed soon after sunset, and those who didn't

would be up in the taproom of the trading post inn.

Auguste did see candlelight flickering in a one-room log cabin they

passed. A silhouette appeared in the window just as he looked in. A man

reached out and slammed the shutters closed.

"Bad luck we should pass that house just as he came to the window,"

Frank said. "One of Raoul's men. But he's more than likely still half

drunk."

Frank and Auguste followed the road past fields of corn ready for

harvesting, their way lighted by the nearly full moon.

Up ahead the wooded sides of the bluff came down to the water's edge.

Frank led Auguste out on a shrub-covered spit.

Not until he was nearly on top of the bateau did Auguste see it. Frank

had pulled it up out of the water, covered it with branches, and tied it

to the roots of a tree that had toppled into the water, undercut by the

river.

With sinking heart Auguste saw that though the riverboat was small, it

would be heavier and harder to row than a canoe. Well, Frank had done

his best, and now he would have to do _his_ best.

His heart leaped with fear as he heard hoofbeats.

Horsemen, coming down the road from Victor.

Frank stopped working on the boat and lifted his head. "Damn! That skunk

must have seen you after all."

The pounding was coming rapidly closer. Auguste's heart was beating as

fast as the oncoming hooves. He saw the horsemen by moonlight--_five_ of

them, racing through the high corn.

Frank and Auguste pushed the little boat into the water bow first,

pointed stern resting on the shore. Auguste put his pack in the stern

and the rifle and ammunition in the bow, where they were more likely to

stay dry. The current pulled the bow downstream, the flat bottom

grinding in the mud.

Auguste saw a flash and heard a loud boom. Something whistled through

the bare branches of a bush beside him.

He leaped into the boat.

"Here. Beef and biscuit." Frank tossed a bag to Auguste, who set it on

the seat beside him. Frank pushed the bateau's stern free.

"Now row for your life!"

Pulling as hard and fast as he could, Auguste steered diagonally into

the Mississippi, trying to get beyond pistol range without spending all

his strength fighting the current.

"Hopkins, goddamn it, I'll kill _you_ if he gets away!"

Raoul's voice. Auguste wished he had time to load his rifle and shoot

back, but if he stopped rowing they were sure to get him.

Five bright red flashes and five shots roared out one after the other

from shore.

_If one of those men is Eli Greenglove I'm dead for sure._

Auguste heard a sharp rap on the side of the boat and splashes in the

water on his left. He felt naked sitting up in the boat pulling

frantically on the oars. He could stop rowing and lie down using the

side of the boat as a shield, but then he would remain within range,

drifting south along the riverbank, and Raoul and his men could follow

him and shoot at him at their leisure. He gritted his teeth and kept

rowing, his shoulder muscles feeling as if they were about to tear loose

from his bones.

He heard a ball whiz past his head. They must have stopped riding to

reload and take better aim.

Another ball smashed into the boat just ahead of the wooden oarlock.

His body was coated with the cold sweat of fear. There was nothing he

could do but sit here, a target in the moonlight, and pull on the oars

with all his strength. If he missed one stroke it might be his death.

_Earthmaker, do not let Raoul take revenge on Frank._

Pistol balls splashed water into the boat.

11

Redbird's Wickiup

White Bear rowed upstream on the Ioway River past stands of weeping

willow whose yellowing fronds drooped into the dark green water. Even

though the current was at its weakest now, his arms and shoulders felt

as if they'd been beaten with clubs. If only Frank had been able to find

a canoe for him instead of this heavy bateau that he'd had to push

across the Great River and now up the Ioway.

His heart fluttered in his chest like a trapped bird as he sensed

himself coming closer to the British Band's winter hunting camp. He had

thought he would be happy at this homecoming, but he was terrified.

How would they receive him? After six years they must think he had

forgotten all about them. Would they despise him? Maybe they would just

make fun of him.

And in what state would he find the British Band? They'd had to get

through the summer without the crops they always raised. Had any friends

been shot by white snipers during the siege of Saukenuk? How many,

weakened by hunger, might be ill or dead? Would his mother be alive?

And what of Redbird?

He had already met, just by chance, one member of the band, Three

Horses, who had been fishing in the shallows on the Ioway shore of the

Great River. And Three Horses had certainly been happy to see him. He'd

jumped on his pony and had said he would ride back to the camp with the

news that White Bear was back. He was so excited that he did not wait

for White Bear to ask any questions about how his people had fared.

So they would all be waiting for him by the time he got there. The

thought frightened him all the more.

Ahead, a row of bark and dugout canoes lay bottoms up on a dirt

embankment.

He saw a flash of red in the trees near the canoes. For a moment he

thought, with a joyous leap of his heart, that it might be Redbird. Then

a man wearing a deep red blanket stepped out of the woods. He stood over

the beached canoes with his arms folded.

Wolf Paw.

His eyes were like splinters of coal, and the black circles he had

painted around them gave him a terrifying aspect. The crest of red-dyed

deer hair that sprouted from his shaven skull seemed strange and savage

to White Bear after six years away from the Sauk.

White Bear rowed in close to the riverbank, uncertain how to greet Wolf

Paw. The brave said nothing, did nothing. A maple branch swayed in the

wind. Red leaves fell, and sunlight flashed from a steel-headed tomahawk

that Wolf Paw was holding.

White Bear's belly knotted.

He skidded the boat to a halt on the bank a short distance downriver

from Wolf Paw. He climbed out the front end, pulled the boat up on the

bank, unloaded it and turned it over.

Wolf Paw watched in silence as White Bear slung his pack and bags on his

back, picked up his rifle and rested it on his shoulder. Looking at Wolf

Paw's red crest and blanket and buckskin trousers, White Bear realized

how strange he himself must seem to Wolf Paw in the green clawhammer

jacket he had worn to his father's funeral.

Now they were face to face.

_I will wait for him to move, if I have to stand here till sunset and

all through the night. He chose this strange way of meeting me. Let him

show me what is in his mind._

He heard the boughs creaking in the wind around him. River water rippled

over the stones along the bank. He heard a redbird whistling in the

distance.

Wolf Paw drew a deep breath, opened his mouth and let out a war whoop.

"_Whoowhoowhoowhoo!_"

White Bear's heart gave a great thump, and he fell back a step. He heard

rage in the whoop, and the frustration. Wolf Paw was angry at him. Why?

Maybe just for coming back.

Wolf Paw held the tomahawk high. Corded muscles and dark veins stood out

in his rigid arm. Two feathers dyed red danced just under the steel

head. He repeated his war whoop, and then his lips drew back from

clenched white teeth.

He whirled and plunged into the woods, leaving White Bear shaken and

open-mouthed. He stood still, listening to Wolf Paw crashing through the

trees and shrubs, kicking piles of leaves, until the noise died away in

the distance. No Sauk ran noisily through the woods like that, unless

driven by some madness.

White Bear sighed. Oddly, he felt less frightened than he had before he

met Wolf Paw. Before, he had not known what to expect. Now he felt ready

for anything.

He strode into the woods following Three Horses' directions. As he

walked he began to hear the sounds of people's voices and dogs barking.

Gradually they drew nearer, until at last he broke through the trees

into a clearing.

The sight made his eyes brim with tears.

A hundred or more women in brown, fringed skirts were facing him, and as

he came forward they rushed to form a ring around him. His vision

blurred as he recognized faces he had not seen in six years.

Beyond the women he could see the camp of the British Band. In his joy

it seemed to him that the wickiups were bathed in a golden light. Rings

of gray domes began near the trees where he stood and spread into the

tall yellow prairie grass. Before the wickiups he could see what the

women had been working at, tasks abandoned for the moment, clothing

being mended, skins stretched, meat and fish cleaned and set on frames

to dry.

"White Bear is here!" cried one woman, and he recognized Water Flows

Fast, plump wife of Three Horses.

Three Horses, a short man with broad shoulders, stood beside his wife.

His nose was flat and spread out. White Bear did not remember it that

way. Something must have happened to Three Horses while he was gone.

_Much has happened to them while I was gone._

"I told you White Bear had come back," Three Horses said over and over

again.

White Bear breathed in the familiar smells of campfire smoke and

roasting meat, of leather and freshly cut wood and tobacco smoke. His

delighted eyes took in quillwork and beadwork and paint, blankets and

ribbons, bodies clad in fringed buckskin, warm brown faces, dark,

friendly eyes.

Murmuring greetings, he searched the crowd for specially loved faces.

"Where is Owl Carver?" he asked. After such a long time the Sauk

language came awkwardly to his lips.

Three Horses said, "Owl Carver visits the camps of the Fox and the

Kickapoo, to invite them to Black Hawk's council."

_What is Black Hawk planning now?_

White Bear did not like the sound of the news, but there would be time

to think about it later.

"Where is Sun Woman, my mother?"

Water Flows Fast spoke up. "She has gone to gather medicine plants." She

looked as cheerful as, he remembered, she always had, but her eyes

penetrated him.

"Will no one find her and tell her that I am here?"

Water Flows Fast said, "Redbird should go and tell Sun Woman. Redbird

lives with Sun Woman now."

_Redbird!_

He felt almost dizzy at the sound of her name, a name he had not heard

spoken aloud in six years.

As soon as Water Flows Fast spoke, she started to giggle, putting her

hands over her mouth. Many of the other women in the group giggled too.

White Bear wanted to hide his burning face. He had forgotten how painful

it could be to be made fun of by those who knew him so well.

But joy blazed up in his chest. Redbird living with Sun Woman? He wanted

to whoop with happiness, even as Wolf Paw had whooped with rage. That

could only mean that she had not taken a husband.

Then he took a deep breath and stiffened his body to hide his feelings.

He looked at the laughing faces all around him, especially the bright,

curious eyes of Water Flows Fast. If they saw how excited he was, they

would laugh at him all the more.

Trying to keep his voice steady, he asked, "Where is my mother's

wickiup?"

With a knowing smile--but what was it that she knew?--Water Flows Fast

beckoned to the wickiup of Sun Woman--and Redbird. "Come. I will take

you."

She turned, her fringed skirt swinging. The women parted to make way for

her. Shouldering his rifle, White Bear followed. Three Horses walked

beside him. White Bear heard the whisper of many moccasins and the

murmur of many voices behind him.

Water Flows Fast marched up to a wickiup near the center of the camp.

The dark, rounded shelter of sheets of elm bark and tree limbs was

small, just big enough for two people, three at the most.

White Bear's heart was beating like a dance drum. The buffalo-hide flap

was pulled down over the door, showing that if anyone was within they

wanted privacy.

"The wickiup of Sun Woman," said Water Flows Fast. "And of Redbird." She

looked at him expectantly.

"There is no one here," said White Bear.

This brought shouts of laughter from the women around him. He wished

they would all go away.

"I saw Redbird go in there," said Water Flows Fast, "and I did not see

her come out."

White Bear's discomfort increased as he watched her face redden and her

cheeks puff out. It seemed that mirth would make her burst.

Every beat of his heart seemed to shake his whole body. He looked around

slowly, trying to calm himself. Even if Redbird had waited for him, his

sudden return must have shocked her. She needed time to prepare herself

to meet him. And, like him, she did not want all these women watching

their meeting and laughing. He would simply have to wait until Redbird

was ready to greet him.

A rack of crisscrossed wooden sticks for drying skins stood by the

closed doorway. Slowly, deliberately, he walked over to the rack, leaned

his rifle against it, and laid down his pack and bags.

Then, turning his back on the wickiup, he sat down cross-legged on the

ground.

Water Flows Fast looked at him, open-mouthed.

"Thank you for showing me the way," he said. Hiding his embarrassment,

he made himself smile at the hundred or more women gathered to watch

him.

"What are you going to do?" Water Flows Fast asked.

"I am going to rest and thank Earthmaker for seeing me here safely."

"White Bear is a man of sense," said Three Horses, smiling his approval.

"Is that all?" Water Flows Fast asked.

"I am going to wait for Sun Woman, my mother."

"Is _that_ all?"

"That _is_ all," said White Bear.

Three Horses, who was no taller than his wife, gripped her plump upper

arm firmly. "Let White Bear alone."

"But--" Water Flows Fast started to protest, and her husband jerked her

arm.

"We will leave this man in peace," he said.

Her lower lip jutting out, Water Flows Fast let Three Horses pull her

away through the crowd.

White Bear sat with his eyes downcast to discourage people from talking

to him. Gradually the rest of the crowd dispersed.

The back of his neck bristled. He knew Redbird was in the wickiup behind

him. Sooner or later she must come out.

To have her so close after all this time, to know she was there and to

hear nothing but that terrible silence, and yet to sit with his back to

that buffalo-hide curtain, all this was a torment for him. The urge to

jump up and tear the curtain away pressed against his resolve to hold

himself still. He thought he might explode like a barrel of gunpowder.

He forced himself to breathe slowly and pretend that he was hidden in

shrubbery with a bow and arrow, watching for a deer.

After a time--he could not tell how much time--a face was peering into

his. Dark and square. The brown eyes brimmed with tears.

His eyes opened wider. Sun Woman was kneeling before him.

"My son." She reached out to him, and he scrambled to embrace her. When

her strong arms held him he felt like a little boy again.

He sat back to look at her dear face, wet with tears. Resting beside her

on the ground was the familiar basket with blue cloth cover that she

used to gather herbs.

He looked around for the sun. It was low and red on the western horizon.

It had been high when he sat down here. He must have gone on a spirit

walk.

"I knew it would be like this," Sun Woman said. "It would come one day

when I least expected it--my son would be back again."

He sighed deeply. "To see my mother makes my heart as big as the

prairie."

They sat facing each other and she gripped his shoulders. "You are a man

now, a very handsome man." She ran her hand along his cheek, and his

whole face felt warm. He kept his gaze fixed on her eyes.

She said, "You have learned much. You have been hurt. Your face is

scarred." She followed the line of the scar with her thumb, leaning

forward to peer still more closely at him. "I see sadness in you. Your

father is dead. That is why you have come back."

She sat back and closed her eyes for a silent moment. Then she began a

song for the dead.

"Earthmaker, show him the way.

Lead him over the bridge of stars and sunbeams,

Along the westward Trail of Souls.

Take his soul into your heart."

After she had finished the song, Sun Woman wiped the tears from her face

with her blunt fingers. She reached out and stroked his cheeks as well.

He had not realized that he was crying.

But grieving for Pierre reminded him to reach into his medicine bag.

"I have a gift for you, Mother." He took out the flat silver case with

its velvet neck cord, opened it and showed her the pair of spectacles

Marchette had brought to him from Victoire. "Do you know these?"

"Your father wore circles of glass like these. To see the marks on the

talking paper."

"Yes. These are the same ones." He closed the case and pressed it into

her hand. "Now you have something that was close to Star Arrow."

She said, "He was with me for five summers only, but in spirit, ever

since. Now I will feel even closer to him." She slipped the ribbon over

her head and dropped the case down the front of her doeskin dress.

He saw the tracks of more tears on her smooth brown cheeks in the fading

light. This time she did not wipe them away.

"Tell me all that has happened to you," she said.

As White Bear talked, he deliberately made his voice loud enough to

carry, so that Redbird, in the wickiup, might hear.

When he was through telling his story, he felt weighed down by guilt.

"I fled, Mother, even though I promised my father I would care for the

land. And smoked tobacco with him to seal the promise. Should I have

stayed?"

She put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "You kept your promise as

far as you were able. That is all the calumet requires. Your father

would not want you to die fighting for that land. It is better that you

come back here and be a Sauk again."

White Bear looked down, unable to meet Sun Woman's eyes. Feeling an ache

deep in the center of his body, remembering the great stone and log

house, the blizzard of blossoms in the orchards, the fields of green

corn and golden wheat, the herds that darkened the hillsides, he wanted

to clutch his chest where it felt as if it had been torn open. He could

not so easily forget Victoire.

_When I was at Victoire I yearned to go back to my people. Now I am with

my people and I miss Victoire. Will my heart never be at peace?_

Nancy had wanted him so desperately before they parted; Redbird would

not even let him see her.

White Bear saw that once again women had started to gather nearby, among

them the round-faced Water Flows Fast. And now White Bear saw another

familiar face he had not seen earlier, Redbird's mother, Wind Bends

Grass. She glowered at him as she always had, her fists on her broad

hips.

_O Earthmaker! Why would Redbird not come out and speak to him?_

A dozen cawing crows flew over the camp. Laughing at him.

He heard a movement behind him, a rustling of the buffalo-hide curtain.

He dared not look around.

A voice at his back said, "Go away, White Bear!"

A cool, sweet flow poured from his heart like a mountain spring at the

sound of Redbird's voice. He unfolded his legs, stiff from hours of

sitting, and pushed himself to his feet. He turned.

Weakness washed over him; he thought he might fall to the ground.

Redbird stood before him, her cheeks flushed, her slanting eyes

sparkling with anger. Her face was thinner than he remembered, her lips

fuller. She still wore a fringe of her hair over her forehead.

Standing silent and open-mouthed, he felt he must look utterly foolish.

"Go away," Redbird said again. "We do not want you here."

"To see you is a sunrise in my heart, Redbird."

"To see you is a foul day in my stomach!"

Reeling back from her anger, White Bear saw a little boy standing in the

doorway behind her.

He was bare-chested, brown-skinned. He wore a loincloth of red flannel

and fringed buckskin leggings. He was shifting uncomfortably from one

moccasined foot to the other and clutching at himself under the

loincloth.

Now White Bear understood why Redbird had finally come out. She and the

boy must have been inside the wickiup all the time he was sitting out

here, and the boy was about to burst.

It would have been funny, except that a much more important discovery

struck White Bear.

He looked closer at the boy's urgent eyes. Blue eyes.

White Bear's own eyes were brown, but Pierre's were blue. Could eye

color be passed in the blood from grandfather to grandson? Around his

eyes, in the narrow shape of his head, his long chin coming to a sharp

point, White Bear could see that this boy was a de Marion.

_This is our son! Redbird's and mine!_

Joy blazed up in his body like a fire that warms but does not hurt.

He asked, "What is his name, Redbird?"

She glanced over her shoulder at the boy. "What are you standing there

for? You have to go. Go!" The boy ran off toward the woods. White Bear

watched him. He ran well, even though he was very young and most

uncomfortable.

White Bear wanted to reach out and take Redbird into his arms.

She turned back to him, her fists clenched at her sides, her nostrils

flaring in fury.

"_Now_ you want to know what his name is. Now, five winters after he was

born."

He turned to Sun Woman. "Does she have a husband?"

Sun Woman raised her eyebrows. "There were many braves who wished to

marry her. Wolf Paw was most insistent. He offered Owl Carver ten

horses. Little Stabbing Chief of the Fox sought her. There were others,

besides."

Wolf Paw had wanted to marry her. That must have been the meaning of

that strange encounter outside the camp. Wolf Paw probably wanted to

kill him.

"Please, Sun Woman, do not talk to this man about me," Redbird said.

"You are his mother, and a mother to me. But you cannot make peace

between us."

"True," said Sun Woman, picking up her basket of herbs and bark. "Only

you can do that, daughter."

She turned to White Bear. "If Redbird does not welcome you into this

wickiup I share with her and Eagle Feather, I cannot invite you inside."

With that Sun Woman turned abruptly and trudged off toward the river.

_Eagle Feather!_

Redbird threw an exasperated look after Sun Woman.

Redbird's anger made White Bear feel as if one of the long knives'

cannonballs had crushed his chest. Perhaps if he could put his arms

around her she would remember how she had loved him. He took a step

toward her, reaching for her.

She stepped back quickly, bent down and picked up a rock. "Go away.

Now!"

_How graceful all her movements are._

The rock was gray and somewhat larger than her fist. It had sharp,

irregular edges and looked as if it had been used to chip arrowheads.

He said, "You would not be this angry at me if you did not want me back.

Why did you refuse every man who asked for you?"

Her face twisted with rage, she threw the rock.

For an instant he was blinded as it hit his cheek, stunning him, and his

head snapped back.

He felt a pounding pain in the back of his skull as his vision cleared.

The ache from being hit with a rifle butt had come back.

He heard gasps of dismay from some of the watching women, laughter from

others.

Wind Bends Grass called out scornfully, "I am ashamed to call this fool

my daughter. I cast her out of my lodge because she would accept no

suitors. At last comes the one who ruined her for all the others, and

she drives him away with a rock. I think we should throw rocks at her."

The crowd's laughter was louder, although White Bear saw that Wind Bends

Grass did not mean to be funny.

His left cheekbone throbbed, the cheek Raoul's knife had scarred, and he

felt a trickle of blood. But he would not let himself lift his hand to

wipe it away.

Redbird's hand went up to her own face, as if the rock had hit her. Her

slanting eyes widened with a look of horror.

She whirled and ducked through her dark doorway.

"Go in there after her, White Bear!" one of the women called.

He would not do that. He would not go into her wickiup until she invited

him. And in spite of the heaviness in his heart, in spite of the ache in

his cheekbone and the pounding in his head, he believed that sooner or

later invite him she would.

He turned his back on the empty doorway and sat down again.

The blue-eyed, brown-skinned boy was standing before him. A golden glow

filled White Bear's chest.

"You are hurt," said the boy.

"It is nothing, Eagle Feather. A man must endure pain without

complaint."

"Did my mother do that to you?"

"She wanted to punish me for staying away from you and her for so long.

My name is White Bear."

"I know what your name is."

When he heard that, he was sure that he would win her back.

The boy darted around him.

Resting his hands on his knees, White Bear closed his eyes and let his

mind dwell on a vast white-furred shape. Owl Carver had said that when a

man wished to send his spirit on a journey in the other world, he need

only think of his other self.

He saw the huge golden eyes, the massive, long-muzzled head, the

towering body.

Soon he and the Bear spirit were walking together toward the sun.

* * * * *

Redbird did not understand herself. She hated White Bear, but when she

saw blood running down his face, she had hated herself. She sat in

darkness, biting her lips to keep from screaming.

She crept to the doorway and pushed the curtain open a crack. She could

see him sitting again with his back to her, his shoulders broad in his

green pale eyes' coat.

She drew back into the wickiup and saw the small steel knife she used

to cut up food gleaming near the embers of her fire. She picked it up

and held its edge against her feverish cheek.

The last light of day fell on her as the doorway curtain rose. Startled,

she almost cut herself. She whirled to see Eagle Feather staring at her.

She threw the knife down on the straw-covered floor.

Eagle Feather gave her a questioning look but said nothing.

She drew him down beside her and started telling him the story of why

the leaves change colors and fall to the ground in autumn.

It was dark outside when Sun Woman came back from the river, where she

had been washing the plants she had gathered. Redbird was afraid Sun

Woman would ask her to forgive White Bear, but the older woman said

nothing.

They passed what seemed like an ordinary evening, talking and telling

stories and singing. But Redbird could not forget that figure sitting

like a tree stump just beyond the buffalo-hide curtain.

Much later she went out, and by the light from tonight's full Moon of

Falling Leaves, looked into White Bear's face. It was motionless, as if

carved from wood.

He did not seem to see her. He must be on a spirit journey. Hot with

rage, she kicked at his knee. What right had he to go on a spirit

journey leaving his body to haunt her wickiup?

The impact of her moccasined foot shook him slightly, but it was like

kicking a bundle of pelts.

Redbird's breath came out in a cloud, lit by the full moon. She gathered

up some twigs, brought them into the wickiup and added them to the fire.

Sun Woman went out carrying a blanket. Redbird saw her draping it over

her son's shoulders.

_He does not need that_, Redbird thought, remembering how White Bear had

come back, seemingly frozen, from his vision quest in the Moon of Ice.

Tightly wrapped in her own blankets with Eagle Feather curled up in the

shelter of her body, Redbird lay awake, thinking that she had never in

her life slept with a man. That was White Bear's fault, and she ground

her teeth in the dark as she thought of the wrongs he had done her.

_He left me in the Moon of First Buds, and he returns in the Moon of

Falling Leaves--six summers later._

One afternoon they had been lovers. And then he had gone to live with

the pale eyes. For nine moons she had carried his son and then given

birth to him. He had not been here to give the baby a birth name. Owl

Carver, the baby's grandfather, had to do that, embarrassed at the

necessity, complaining that the people were laughing at their family.

She knew Star Arrow had required that no messages pass between White

Bear and the tribe. But if White Bear really loved her, could he not

have broken that rule--even if he had smoked the calumet with Star

Arrow--at least once? For six summers White Bear had been as silent, as

absent, as if he were dead.

_Even the dead sometimes send a sign._

The next day the sky was cloudy, and the air warmer than last night. All

morning long women walked past Redbird's wickiup, looking curiously at

the man who sat there motionless. Like Redbird herself, they had never

before seen a man while his spirit had gone to walk the bridge of stars.

When men went on spirit journeys they always retired to the forest or to

caves.

In the afternoon He Who Sits in Grease, a Fox brave, came to Redbird as

she and Sun Woman sat before their doorway plaiting baskets, a short

distance from White Bear. The brave was carrying a stout bustard with

feathers striped brown, black and white. He hunkered down facing her and

laid the bird before her.

His thick lips worked nervously. "This is for White Bear," he said.

"When he wakes up. It is the fattest of the three that I killed this

morning. Tell him that He Who Sits in Grease gives him this gift. I want

him to ask Earthmaker to make the animals come to me more willingly when

I hunt them."

Before Redbird could protest, the brave stood up and backed away, his

eyes timidly averted from the figure outside the doorway.

_He thinks White Bear is holy!_ The thought made her more angry at White

Bear than ever. She wanted to kick him again, but women were watching

from a distance, and she knew they would make fun of her.

"Get _up_," she said softly to White Bear. "Go _away_," she said,

grinding her teeth.

She wished Owl Carver would come back from visiting the other camps to

put a stop to White Bear's torturing her like this.

_But he might force me to accept White Bear as my man._

Amazingly, she felt a lift in her heart at this thought. She herself

could never forgive White Bear, but if Owl Carver, her father and the

shaman of the British Band, ordered her to, the decision would be made

for her.

Then, at least, this torment would end.

Sun Woman silently picked up the bustard, sat down and began plucking

the feathers, piling them in a basket to use for adornments and bedding.

To escape from being rubbed raw by White Bear's presence, Redbird went

out into the woods along the Ioway River, as Sun Woman had done

yesterday, to gather herbs. The medicine plants were at their most

powerful now, because they had been gaining strength all summer long.

Late in the day the sky darkened rapidly. The purple-gray clouds seemed

to hang so low that she could reach up and touch them. She heard the

first drops pattering on the branches above her. As the rain started to

fall faster, it drummed on her head and shoulders. Sighing at having to

give up this comforting work, she put a lid on her basket, stood up and

started back for the camp.

Her doeskin shirt and skirt kept the rain off her body, but her hair was

soaked and her face was streaming by the time she got back to the

wickiup. She would build up the fire and dry herself off. Its heat would

feel so good. She hoped Eagle Feather and Sun Woman were already inside.

She stopped before the silent, sitting figure outside the wickiup. The

brown blanket was pulled up over his head. Sun Woman must have done

that. The blanket was sodden with rain, and he looked like a rock

growing out of the ground.

The beating of rain filled her ears.

She squatted down and looked into his face. Water ran in rivulets down

from the blanket into his half-closed eyes. He did not even blink.

She shivered. The cold rain was coming down so hard she could not see

most of the camp. A lump blocked her throat.

"Come inside," she said. She had to raise her voice to hear it over the

drumming of the rain.

White Bear neither spoke nor moved.

"Come in. It is raining. It is cold. You will die out here." She

realized she was screaming at him.

"Oh!" she cried helplessly.

She sat on the ground, looking into the rain-slick, light-complexioned

face with the strong nose and the long jaw that she had loved long ago,

the face she had thought about so many times and had seen so often in

dreams. A black crust of blood had dried over the place where her rock

had gashed his cheek. On the same cheek a raised white line ran from

just under his eye to the corner of his mouth.

To try to wake a man on a spirit journey could be dangerous for him.

But her hands seemed to have a will of their own. She had to touch him.

She reached out, clutching his shoulders through the sopping blanket,

heedless of the rain pouring down her own face, running under the collar

of her doeskin shirt down her back and chest. She shook him.

"Get up! Come in out of the rain!"

His body felt lifeless when she shook him. But did she see a flicker in

his eyes?

"Please, White Bear, please!"

He blinked.

She threw her arms around him.

"Oh, White Bear! I do want you back."

She crawled closer to him, pushing her body against his rigid form.

She felt pressure against her back, pulling her closer to him. His hand.

Then his other hand.

She felt his chest rising and falling against hers.

Strong arms were holding her.

She looked up into his face, and color had come into the pale cheeks.

The brown eyes were looking down at her, warm with love. She forgot the

rain and the cold, and nestled in his arms.

She saw tears spill out of his eyes, mingling with the rain on his face.

She, too, was crying. She had been crying ever since she sat down with

him. She held him tight.

Looking past him, she saw in the doorway of the wickiup the small form

of Eagle Feather, staring at them.

12

The War Whoop

Owl Carver held the watch up by its chain; his smile of approval showed

he'd lost a tooth in front since White Bear left with Star Arrow.

"A handsome gift. I thank you for it. But what do you mean by saying it

tells us the time? Do we not _know_ the time?"

White Bear scoured his brain for a way to explain.

Sitting close to the old shaman, White Bear saw that age had bent him a

bit more and carved deeper lines in his brown face. Besides the

megis-shell necklace White Bear remembered, Owl Carver wore a new

necklace made of tiny beads forming a red, yellow, blue and white floral

design, from which hung a sunburst pendant.

They sat facing each other in front of the shaman's wickiup in the

center of the British Band's winter camp. In the fenced-off corral

dozens of horses stamped their hooves and blew steamy breath into the

gray sky. The hunters had returned with braces of pheasant and geese,

with deer slung from poles, with buffalo and elk carcasses mounted on

travois dragging behind their horses. White Bear felt his nostrils

expand to take in the smells of meats being roasted and stewed. In a few

days all the chiefs of the Sauk and Fox, along with representatives of

the Winnebago, Potawatomi and Kickapoo, would be gathering here at Black

Hawk's invitation.

Even sooner, though, a ceremony would take place that meant much more to

White Bear. Tomorrow night he and Redbird would at last be married. And

he had come to Redbird's father today to give him the only present he

had to offer.

White Bear pointed to the dial of the watch. "Father of my bride, if

you want to know when the sun will rise tomorrow, you look at where

these two arrows are at sunrise today. When they are in the same place

again, it will be half the time till the next sunrise. When they are in

the same place after that, it will be sunrise the next day." He

faltered. To himself, his explanation sounded at once useless and

ridiculously complicated. "... Almost. In truth, the sun does not rise

at the same time every day," he finished weakly.

Owl Carver stared at him as if he had uttered nonsense. "The sun rises

at sunrise."

He remembered how Frank Hopkins always reset his clock at sunset. "Yes,

but in summer the days are long and in winter the days are short. But

the arrows on this watch cannot keep pace with the sun."

Owl Carver shook his head. "Many things the pale eyes make are useful,

but I do not understand the use of this thing."

_What a struggle!_

White Bear had a sudden inspiration. "It is true, this watch cannot tell

you as much as the sun does, but it can tell you one thing."

"What is that?" Owl Carver frowned, weighing the watch in his hand.

"It can tell you when a pale eyes will do something."

Owl Carver grunted. "Well, it is pretty to look at. And it moves and

makes sounds."

White Bear snapped open the back of the case, where the key was kept,

and showed Owl Carver how to wind the watch, impressing on him the need

to handle it very gently. Then the shaman went into his wickiup to put

the watch in his medicine bundle.

White Bear sighed. He missed talking with Elysee, missed the library at

Victoire, from which he'd managed to take only one book.

_Well, this world of sky and trees and rivers and animals is a library

too. Owl Carver knows how to read in it, and he has taught me._

The old shaman came out with a long-stemmed pipe. He filled and lit it

with a twig from the fire in his wickiup and smoked thoughtfully for a

while before speaking. White Bear, sensing that Owl Carver had something

important to say to him, waited quietly.

"We need to know more about the pale eyes than we can learn from that

time-teller," Owl Carver said. "We need to know what they will do if we

cross the Great River to Saukenuk next spring."

White Bear felt his heartbeat quicken.

"Is that what Black Hawk plans?"

"If he can get enough Sauk and Fox warriors and their families to follow

him. At the council all the chiefs will hear Black Hawk. The Winnebago

Prophet, Flying Cloud, is coming to the council from his town up the

Rock River. He will add his voice to Black Hawk's. But the chiefs will

also hear the snake's voice of He Who Moves Alertly." He spat

contemptuously.

White Bear knew well why Owl Carver despised He Who Moves Alertly.

During what the pale eyes called the War of 1812, while Black Hawk and

his warriors were away fighting on the British side, the civil chiefs

had appointed He Who Moves Alertly a war chief in case the Americans

should attack the Sauk towns on the Great River. Not only had the new

war chief never fought, he spoke much of the need to make peace with the

Americans. He had about as many followers among the Sauk and Fox as

Black Hawk did, people who believed that the tribes would fare best if

they did whatever the pale eyes demanded. After the war He Who Moves

Alertly was quick to make himself known to the Americans as a friend. In

turn the long knives' chiefs showered him with gifts and honors, even

taking him and his wives to Washington City to visit the Great Father,

James Monroe. He had, in fact, been in the East when Star Arrow had come

to Saukenuk to take White Bear to Victoire.

"Why does He Who Moves Alertly say we should not go back to Saukenuk?"

White Bear asked cautiously. He did not want to anger Owl Carver by

saying so, but he himself was sure that crossing the Great River could

only lead to calamity.

Owl Carver said, "He Who Moves Alertly has always been a friend to the

long knives, and they treat him as if he was a great chief and give

presents to him. Last summer, when we went to plant corn at Saukenuk, he

went among Black Hawk's followers and persuaded many of them to flee

back across the river." The old shaman smiled at White Bear. "But now we

have you, who have also been East and know the ways of the pale eyes.

You will be able to answer him."

_But all I can say is that he speaks the truth._

The words trembled on his lips: _The long knives are more powerful than

you can imagine. We cannot stand against them._

And yet he did not want to speak. He feared that Owl Carver would think

him a traitor, as he did He Who Moves Alertly. And, in a way, he felt as

Owl Carver and Black Hawk did. He became angry every time he thought

about how the tribe had been driven from its homeland.

Owl Carver puffed on his pipe. "You will answer He Who Moves Alertly not

just as one who has been among the pale eyes. The day after tomorrow,

you must go to the cave of the ancestors and seek another vision."

White Bear's heart sank. "But I am to marry Redbird tomorrow night.

Would you have me leave her the next day to seek a vision?"

Owl Carver spread his hands. "The council starts in three days." He

grinned, showing the space where the tooth had been. "And it is not as

if you and Redbird have never known the joy of the marriage bed."

White Bear felt his face grow hot, and he lowered his eyes. Since his

return they had tried to crowd into a few nights all the pleasures they

had missed over the last six years.

"You will not be gone from her for long," Owl Carver said.

"But why do you not prophesy?" White Bear asked. "You have been the

shaman since long before I was born."

Owl Carver nodded sadly. "I have tried. It seems the spirits have

nothing to say to me."

_Maybe because you do not want to hear what they say._

As he thought about seeking a vision, White Bear began to feel more

hopeful. He might not have to displease Owl Carver and Black Hawk by

speaking of the strength of the long knives and sounding like He Who

Moves Alertly. Instead, the Turtle, in that sacred cave looking over the

river, would tell him what he should say. It was sure to be wiser

counsel than anything he could think of himself.

He remembered his boyhood dream of being a prophet for the Sauk. Now he

would be able to tell them where their future lay.

But then he remembered words Owl Carver himself had once spoken to him.

They had stayed in his memory because they had made him so uneasy.

_Many times the people do not want to listen to the shaman. The truer

his words, the less they hear him._

The next night White Bear and Redbird sat facing each other on opposite

sides of the wedding fire before Owl Carver's wickiup. White Bear's

fringed shirt and trousers of soft doeskin, worked until it was nearly

white, were a gift from a brave whose wife Sun Woman had helped with a

difficult childbirth.

Redbird's dress was of white doeskin as well. Around her neck hung the

necklace of the small, striped megis shells that had belonged to Sun

Woman.

White Bear looked beyond the fire. Hundreds of men and women were

standing in the shadows watching the ceremony, those of Redbird's Eagle

Clan on her side of the fire, the Thunder Clan, kin of Sun Woman and

himself, on this side. The daughter of the shaman was marrying the son

of a pale eyes father and a medicine woman, and White Bear had returned

from a long journey among the pale eyes and was a shaman himself. It was

a wedding that people wanted to see.

Wind Bends Grass, standing behind Redbird, spoke of her daughter's

character. Even though she had spent all of her life scolding her,

tonight she extolled her to the skies. She was beautiful, loving,

skilled, obedient. Then Wind Bends Grass instructed Redbird in her

wifely duties, making one small change from the usual speech. Instead of

telling her to give White Bear sons, she told her to give White Bear

_more_ sons.

Strangely, at this moment, White Bear found himself thinking of Nancy

Hale. Was she still longing for him somewhere across the Great River?

If Raoul had not driven him out of Victoire, his promise to Pierre might

have kept him there. He might never have come back here, not found out

till much later that he had a son, never have been united with Redbird

as he was tonight. Truly this was coming home. He felt so at peace, he

could almost be grateful to Raoul.

White Bear was especially honored to have as his wedding sponsor the

Thunder Clan's most prominent member--Black Hawk himself.

Black Hawk addressed Redbird and her relatives in his harsh, sombre

voice. "I have known this young man since he was born. His father, Star

Arrow, was a pale eyes, but he was a French pale eyes, and the French

were always the best friends of the Sauk and Fox, even better than the

British. White Bear has been trained in the way of the shaman, and he

has lived among the pale eyes and learned their secrets as well."

_What have I learned that my people can really use?_ White Bear wondered

ruefully. _All I can tell them is that they cannot win a war with the

long knives._

"You must cherish Redbird and protect her," Black Hawk said to White

Bear. "You must give her the benefit of your wisdom. Because you

yourself are a shaman, your responsibility to her is all the greater."

Then Owl Carver stood before the fire, between the bride and the groom,

and raised his arms. "O Earthmaker, bless this man and this woman. May

they walk with honor on the path they follow as one."

Redbird sang a wedding song to White Bear. Her voice rose clear and pure

into the night air, and it seemed to White Bear that even the crackling

fire quieted itself to listen.

"I will build a lodge for you,

I will grind the corn for you.

I have no home but where you are;

The trail you walk is also mine."

Then White Bear got up and went around the fire to Redbird. He handed

Redbird a bouquet of pink roses that Sun Woman had carefully collected,

dried and preserved. The orange glow of the fire danced in her black

eyes, and White Bear felt an answering love blaze up within himself.

He was so much taller than Redbird that he had to bend his knees deeply

so that Redbird could throw her braids over his shoulders, and he heard

some chuckles and giggles from the watching people. But as her braids

fell lightly on him he thought that he had never in his life been

happier than at this moment.

Together they walked sunwise around the marriage fire, keeping it on

their right: and on the east, south, west and north sides White Bear

said loudly, "Redbird is now my wife!"

Eyes gleamed at him out of the darkness when he came back to the east

side. Standing to the side and just a little behind Black Hawk was Wolf

Paw. White Bear could not resist feeling a little thrill of triumph at

the realization that he had won Redbird despite the best efforts of this

mighty warrior, this chief's son, this man who owned many horses.

_Not because I deserve it_, he reminded himself. _Only because Redbird

would have it so._

_And now, because she would have it so, we will be together forever._

Owl Carver bade them depart with the good wishes of the tribe, and

White Bear and Redbird walked to the new wickiup they had built on the

edge of the camp. Eagle Feather would live there with them, but tonight

Eagle Feather would stay with his grandmother, Sun Woman.

Tonight they would have it to themselves.

* * * * *

Next day, in mid-afternoon, White Bear stood again in the center of the

camp wearing the same black bearskin he had worn six years ago. Owl

Carver did a shuffling sunwise dance around him, shaking a gourd rattle

and chanting:

"Go forth and dance with the spirits,

Become a spirit yourself.

Bring back a gift for the people,

Bring back the words of the spirits."

Black Hawk, standing in the circle that had gathered to watch, stared at

him with an intensity that frightened him. Sun Woman and Redbird stood

with smiles of quiet pride. This time Redbird need not fear that he

would freeze to death on his spirit journey.

It would be painful to be away from Redbird, he thought, as he looked

into her eyes, saying a silent good-bye. Now, after a brief feast of

love, they must go hungry again. But only for a night or two.

White Bear turned his back on the declining sun. The ceremonial bearskin

swung heavily on his head and shoulders as he trotted out of the camp

toward the trail that ran along the river's edge. As he entered the

woods, another pair of eyes, hostile, suspicious, caught his. Wolf Paw

again, standing with folded arms.

_Wolf Paw still loves Redbird. And hates me._

He felt much stronger than he had when he arrived at the camp.

Alternately walking and running, he moved quickly and surely down the

Ioway River, and he remembered the way to the bluff of the sacred cave.

Several times along the way he met Sauk and Fox warriors. They

recognized the sacred bearskin, with the bear's skull covering his own

as a partial mask, and stepped aside with eyes averted as he passed

them.

The sun had sunk behind him by the time he had come to the end of the

almost-imperceptible trail to the top of the bluff. He stood there a

moment, looking out across the clear blue sheet of water that was the

Great River. He stared at the Illinois shore, the rich, flat bottomland

at the river's edge, the wooded bluffs, much like the one he was

standing on, forming a wall, beyond which rolled the autumn-tan, endless

prairie.

A beautiful and fertile land, from which his people--and he himself--had

been exiled. Would his vision show them a way back?

He scrambled down the face of the bluff to the cave and swung into the

entrance.

In the shadows he could barely make out Owl Carver's wooden owl standing

over the row of skulls with their stone necklaces; or the white bear

statue guarding the unknown depths of the cave.

He settled himself facing the entrance and chewed some scraps of sacred

mushroom Owl Carver had given him. Nothing to do now but sit and wait.

Surely no watch made by pale eyes could measure the passage of this kind

of time.

He heard a scraping and a grumbling from deep in the cave. He felt no

fear now, only a warmth, as at the approach of an old friend. The White

Bear, he now understood, was himself in a spirit form.

The huge snuffling Bear was at his side, and confidently he rose to step

out of the cave, the Bear accompanying him with its rolling walk. He

stepped on clouds, violet and gold and white and soft as snow under his

feet.

The pathway through the sky turned northward. Through breaks in the

clouds he looked down and caught glimpses of the river, a glistening

blue snake. Ahead he could see clouds piling up on clouds, shot through

with pale, blended rainbow colors, like the ornaments carved from shells

gathered along the eastern sea.

Then he was inside the cloud tower, peering beyond the Tree of Life at

the Turtle on his crystal perch. Drop by drop from the Turtle's heart

flowed the waters of the Great River.

"What would you ask me, White Bear?" said the ancient voice like distant

thunder.

"Is my father with you?"

"Your father walks the Trail of Souls far in the West," said the Turtle.

"He will come back to earth soon, and he will be a great teacher of the

people."

"Owl Carver and Black Hawk have sent me to ask, should the British Band

go back to Saukenuk?"

The wrinkled voice said, "Behold."

The clouds changed to the walls of a room big enough to hold a Sauk

camp, where curtained windows alternated with mirrors in gilded frames.

Under each mirror was a fireplace. Three glittering chandeliers hung

from the high ceiling. In the center of a vast flower-patterned carpet

stood Black Hawk.

To White Bear's astonishment, Black Hawk was wearing the blue uniform of

a long knife, with ropes of gold on his arms and fringes of gold on his

sleeves and shoulders. But he carried no weapons. His face as usual was

gloomy.

There were other men in the room, but White Bear could only clearly see

one. A pale eyes.

He was exceedingly tall and thin; his hair was white, and his bright

blue eyes stared piercingly at Black Hawk. He wore a black cutaway

jacket and tight black trousers with shiny black leather shoes; and a

white stock, a strip of silk, wound around his throat.

White Bear had seen this man before and recognized him at once.

He was known to red men as Sharp Knife--Andrew Jackson, President of the

United States.

The man Raoul had called "a good old Indian killer."

Black Hawk was talking, and Sharp Knife was listening. But White Bear

could not hear what Black Hawk was saying.

The room seemed to change. Black Hawk and Sharp Knife disappeared, and

where Sharp Knife had been standing there was now another tall, thin

man. He also wore black, but he had a black ribbon at his neck. A black

beard covered his chin, and the expression on his sun-browned face was

one of inconsolable grief. His sadness reminded White Bear of Black

Hawk's.

All at once White Bear was on a broad field covered with short grass,

divided by stone walls and wooden fences, with clumps of trees growing

here and there. Terror clutched his belly as he saw coming at him

thousands of long knives in blue uniforms with rifles and bayonets. He

looked about frantically for a place to hide, but there was none. He was

caught in the open.

But before the men could reach him they began to die.

Blood spurted from their blue tunics. They stopped running, staggered

and fell to the ground, dropping their rifles. Faces vanished in bursts

of red vapor. Arms and legs and heads flew through the air. Flashes of

flame and smoke and flying shards of iron tore bodies to bits.

But no matter how many of them died, more and more of the white men in

their blue jackets and trousers came marching over the horizon holding

their bayonets before them. There was no end to them.

White Bear felt as if his heart might stop. He put his hands over his

eyes.

And when he looked again he was back in the cloudy hall of the Turtle.

"What have you shown me?" he asked.

"I have shown you the future of both the red people and the white people

on this island between two oceans," the Turtle rumbled. "It is given to

you to know two futures because two streams of blood flow in you. You

belong to both, and to neither."

It was painful to hear this. The Turtle was uttering thoughts that had

occurred to White Bear many times; he had always tried to put them out

of his mind. Could he not forget his years among the pale eyes and

become entirely a Sauk?

Wisps of cloud drifted around the Turtle's scaly body. White Bear heard

the drip-drip of water from the Turtle's heart into the blue-black,

fish-crowded pool that fed the Great River. The sound was like the

ringing of a hammer on an anvil, reverberating through the vast space in

which they stood.

The Turtle spoke again. "Earthmaker has willed that the pale eyes shall

fill this world of ours from the eastern sea to the western sea."

"_Why?_" cried White Bear in anguish.

"Earthmaker bestows evil as well as good on his children. Sickness and

hunger and death come from Earthmaker, just as strong bodies, and good

things to eat, and love."

"Will all Earthmaker's red children die?"

"Great numbers will die, and those who remain will be driven to unkind

lands."

"What of the Sauk?" White Bear asked, trembling.

"The many who follow Black Hawk across the Great River will be few when

they cross back."

_Oh, no!_

This was what he had come here to learn, but hearing it was like being

cast down from this lodge in the clouds to crash to the earth.

"Then the British Band should not go back to Saukenuk?"

"You cannot stop them. For you as for all of my people, this is to be a

time of testing and pain. I charge you to see that those who hurt my

children do not gain from it. You will be the guardian of the land that

has been placed in your keeping."

"But I have already lost that land," White Bear cried.

As if he had not heard White Bear, the Turtle said, "Know that long

after all who live now have walked the Trail of Souls, my children will

be many again, and let the knowing lift up your heart." The Turtle

touched his own claws to the deep crevice in his under-shell from which

the water perpetually dripped.

White Bear knew it was time to go.

When he awoke in his body he would grieve. He saw nothing but heavy,

unending sorrow ahead for him and for those he loved.

* * * * *

Black Hawk slowly stood up. A mantle of buffalo fur draped over his

shoulders and a crown of red and black feathers woven into his scalplock

made him look even bigger and taller than he was.

White Bear sat close to the fire for its heat. The day was cold and

overcast, and the damp air around him and the chill ground under him

made him shiver in the white doeskin shirt he had worn for his wedding.

Because Owl Carver had asked him, on the band's behalf, to seek a

vision, he could now consider himself fully a shaman. He had costumed

himself accordingly--three red streaks painted across his forehead,

three more on each cheekbone, silver disks hanging from his ears, a

three-strand necklace of megis shells around his neck. Silver clasps on

his arms and silver bracelets around his wrists. All these things had

been supplied by Owl Carver or traded for by Sun Woman. If he had to

speak he might at least hope his words would be greeted with respect.

Redbird pressed against him, and her nearness warmed him. Flames danced

over the pile of blackened logs in the center of the British Band's

winter camp. Light gray smoke rose from the fire, the same color as the

blanket of cloud that hid the afternoon sun.

Fear twisted its knife in White Bear's stomach. He did not want to tell

this assembly what he knew. Most of them would hate him. The chiefs and

braves and warriors of the British Band, Black Hawk and all the rest,

would never forgive him. Owl Carver would feel betrayed.

_Let them settle this without me._

But he knew it was a forlorn hope. When Owl Carver had asked him what he

learned in his vision, he had answered evasively. And now Owl Carver was

counting on him.

Around the fire sat the council of seven chiefs who governed the Sauk

and Fox tribes, including Jumping Fish, Broth and Little Stabbing Chief.

Beside them sat He Who Moves Alertly, the friend of the long knives, the

war chief who had never made war. Prominent braves like Wolf Paw sat

with them. The older and the younger shamans of the British Band sat

there, Owl Carver and White Bear.

And there was another shaman at the fire as well, Flying Cloud, better

known as the Winnebago Prophet. He was a broad man with a wolfskin

thrown over his shoulders. Unlike nearly all the men of the tribes that

lived along the Great River, he had a thick black mustache that drooped

over the corners of his mouth. A silver nose ring rested on the

mustache. He was head man of a Winnebago village called Prophet's Town,

a day's journey up the Rock River from Saukenuk.

In the quiet that greeted Black Hawk, White Bear heard, over the crackle

of the fire, the rattle of the war chief's bone bracelets as he held out

his hand.

"I only want to go back to the land that belongs to me and dwell there

and raise corn there. I will not be cheated. I will not be driven out."

Black Hawk did not have a pleasing speaking voice; it was hoarse and

grating. But the assembly listened intently, because for over twenty

summers there had been no greater warrior among the Sauk and Fox.

"With this hand I have killed seventy and three of the long knives.

Every Sauk and Fox brave, every Winnebago and Potawatomi and Kickapoo,

can do as much. Yes, we know the long knives outnumber us. But we can

show them that if they want to steal Saukenuk from us, they will have to

trade too many of their young men's lives for it.

"Last summer the long knives surrounded us and drove us out of Saukenuk.

But that was because we were not ready to fight, and some of us were not

_willing_ to fight."

Black Hawk looked pointedly at He Who Moves Alertly, who sat

expressionless, as if unaware of Black Hawk's disapproving gaze. His

face was round and ruddy, like the full moon when it first appears

above the horizon. He wore his glossy black hair long under an

impressive buffalo headdress with gleaming horns, and had wrapped

himself in a buffalo-hide robe painted with sunbursts.

Black Hawk said, "Next summer, it will be different. I have had messages

from the Winnebago and the Potawatomi promising to help us if the long

knives attack us. The Chippewa, up in the north, say they want to help

us."

A burning log split in two with a noise like a gunshot, and the halves

fell deeper into the fire with a shower of sparks.

Looking over the heads of those seated near him, White Bear saw columns

of smoke from a dozen or more other campfires rising into the late

afternoon sky. Around those campfires, feasting and gossiping, sat most

of the people of the British Band and their guests from other Sauk and

Fox bands, as well as some Winnebago, Potawatomi and Kickapoo braves.

What was being decided here now would mean life or death to all who

chose to follow these leaders.

Black Hawk said, "The pale eyes say we sold our land. I say that land

cannot be sold. Earthmaker gives land to those who need it to live on,

to grow food on, to hunt on, as he gives us air and water.

"The land has been good to us. It has given us game and fish, fruit and

berries. It has let us grow our squash, beans, pumpkins and corn on it,

and bury our mothers and fathers in it. The pale eyes are destroying the

land, cutting down the trees, fencing off the prairie and plowing it up.

The land is the mother of us all. When a man's mother is dishonored, he

must fight. Earthmaker will give us this victory, because he is our

father and he loves us."

With a chill that did not come from the air, White Bear remembered the

words of the Turtle: _Earthmaker bestows evil as well as good on his

children._

White Bear prayed his own prayer to Earthmaker: that he not be asked to

speak to this gathering.

Black Hawk lifted his rasping voice in a shout. "I, Black Hawk, raise

the war whoop!"

He threw out his chest, lifted his head, and let loose an ululating cry

that seemed to pierce the very clouds that hung over the camp. Wolf Paw,

Iron Knife, Little Crow, Three Horses and a dozen other Sauk and Fox

braves leaped up, waving rifles, tomahawks, bows and arrows, scalping

knives, screaming their battle cries. Owl Carver beat furiously on a

drum painted with a picture of the Hawk spirit.

The Winnebago Prophet lunged to his feet and joined the outcry, his

gestures so wild and his shouts so loud that he almost seemed to be

competing with Black Hawk.

Redbird spoke softly, close by White Bear's ear. "They are drunk on

war."

The outcry died down. Black Hawk crossed his arms over his chest to show

that he had finished speaking. The Winnebago Prophet remained standing

and raised his arms.

"I have come to promise Black Hawk and his braves that if he goes to

Saukenuk and the long knives attack him, the warriors of Prophet's Town

will help them to fight back."

The chiefs and braves seated around the fire greeted this with much

stamping and clapping. White Bear glanced at He Who Moves Alertly, who

sat a quarter of the way around the circle from him. The face under the

buffalo headdress was as still as if carved from wood.

Flying Cloud said, "I have sent messages to all the tribes that live

near the Great River--Winnebago, Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Piankeshaw,

Chippewa. When Black Hawk raises the tomahawk, they will raise the

tomahawk too. And I have had a message from our allies of old, the

British in Canada, who say the Americans have done us a great wrong, and

we should not give up any more land to them. If American long knives

attack us, the British long knives will come to our aid. With ships,

with big guns, with rifles, powder and shot and food for us, with

hundreds of red-coat soldiers. Now is the best of times to tell the long

knives they cannot push us any further. Let all who are truly men take

to the trail of war with Black Hawk!"

White Bear sensed deadly falsehood in the words of the Winnebago

Prophet. When White Bear was in New York City he had heard many times

that the enmity between Americans and British was a thing of the past.

White Bear did not believe that the British up there in Canada had any

intention of getting into a war between whites and Indians in Illinois.

But how could he prove that what Flying Cloud said was untrue?

With a cry of "Ei! Ei!" Wolf Paw shook his rifle over his head. He

snapped it to his shoulder and fired it with a deafening boom and a red

flash and a big cloud of white smoke.

_Someday he may wish he had not wasted that powder._

As White Bear and Redbird sat silently, braves all around them were up

and shrieking, waving rifles and tomahawks, thrusting out arms and legs

in the movements of a war dance. Owl Carver and some of the chiefs

slapped the palms of their hands against the taut, painted deerskin of

their drumheads.

A few other men did not join the shouts of approval, among them the

round-faced He Who Moves Alertly.

White Bear sat with his fists clenched in his lap, wondering whether

anyone would notice that the youngest of the three shamans among them

was not shouting for war. He felt Redbird's hand grip his arm tightly,

helping him to feel stronger.

Only to Redbird had White Bear told all of his vision. She shared his

fear that if the British Band followed Black Hawk to war they would be

destroyed, and she had insisted on sitting with him at the council fire.

White Bear knew it was not the custom for a wife to sit with her husband

at a council, but she had argued and pleaded until he had given in and

brought her with him.

Her presence beside him both comforted him and made him uneasy. Owl

Carver, when he came to the fire, had stared at his daughter, frowned

and looked away. Wolf Paw had eyed them and smiled scornfully.

As the tumult inspired by the Winnebago Prophet quieted down, He Who

Moves Alertly looked around the circle of chiefs and braves, his eyes

pausing at anyone who had not joined the outcry for war. His gaze met

White Bear's for an instant, and he nodded almost imperceptibly. White

Bear had an eerie feeling that He Who Moves Alertly knew what was in his

mind.

The chief who favored the long knives stood up.

A sullen muttering spread through the men around the council fire. Most

of those who agreed with He Who Moves Alertly had stayed away from this

council. White Bear felt admiration for anyone who could look so

confident, standing before a crowd in which so many were against him.

"War is loud, and peace is quiet," He Who Moves Alertly began. "But

peace keeps us alive. The real way to defeat the long knives is to stay

alive."

His voice was deep and pleasant, and he smiled as if every man there

were his friend.

"When is it right for a brave to go to war? When he must avenge himself

on those who have done wrong to him. Black Hawk says we should fight

the pale eyes because they have stolen land from us. But I have seen the

papers with the marks of our chiefs on them. Seven different times Sauk

and Fox chiefs have made their marks on papers agreeing to give up all

claim to the land east of the Great River. The long knives say our

chiefs were paid in gold for the land."

As his benign gaze swept the assembly, he said, "It is right for a brave

to go to war when he is strong enough to make war. He does not go

because he wants to be killed, because he wants to leave his women and

children unprotected. He knows he may die, but he does not look for

death."

He Who Moves Alertly was no longer smiling. He touched his fingertips to

his eyes, then raised his arms to the sky. "May Earthmaker strike me

blind if I do not speak the truth.

"We are not strong enough to make war on the long knives. I have

traveled in the lands of the Americans, all the way to the eastern sea.

I have seen so many long knives that I could not count them all."

White Bear felt more and more uneasy as he listened. Black Hawk and all

the other braves of the British Band looked on He Who Moves Alertly as

an enemy. But White Bear knew that the chief in the buffalo headdress

was speaking the truth. Perhaps not about the treaties, but surely about

the vast numbers of long knives.

White Bear saw again the thousands of blue-uniformed soldiers he had

seen marching in New York on the Fourth of July a year ago, and the

other thousands he had seen in his vision, fighting and dying but still

advancing on some strange battlefield.

He Who Moves Alertly said, "Owl Carver and Black Hawk say the Potawatomi

and Winnebago will aid the British Band, and other tribes from farther

away. I say none of them will help. This quarrel over Saukenuk is not

their quarrel, and they have made their own peace with the long knives.

"The Winnebago Prophet says the British will send us guns and

ammunition, even men. I say this is foolish talk. You call yourselves

the British Band, and think the British are your great friends. Many

summers ago, yes, the British were at war with the Americans and got

Sauk and Fox and many other tribes to help them. But when that war was

over, our people gained nothing and lost much. Many tribes had to give

up land to pay for fighting on the British side. Now the British do not

care about us. The British pale eyes and the American pale eyes are at

peace.

"I say to those who will listen to me--come with me. I will lead you

deep into this Ioway country, where there will be no pale eyes farmers

to bother us. Their Great Father will show his gratitude to those who do

not fight them. He will give us money and food and help us find good

land. We will live!

"For those who follow Black Hawk, I grieve. They will not live."

He Who Moves Alertly's closing words rang. He crossed his hands over his

chest and sat down amidst a silence touched by the crackling of the

fire.

White Bear heard in his mind the rumbling voice: _The many who follow

Black Hawk across the Great River will be few when they cross back._ He

trembled inwardly.

The clouds overhead had broken up, and the rays of the sun, about to

set, fell upon many faces full of anger and contempt. But White Bear

also saw lips pursed in thought, eyes lowered.

White Bear could find little wrong with what He Who Moves Alertly said,

but he did not like the way it pointed. To admit that the long knives

could do whatever they wanted to the Sauk, to hope like little children

that if they obeyed the Great Father in Washington City he would be kind

to the Sauk and give gifts of food, clothing and shelter--was that not

merely a slower kind of death?

He Who Moves Alertly did not seem to see that if the Sauk let the whites

push them westward, there would be no end to it. Eventually the pale

eyes would take all the land there was.

_To drive a people from their home is to make them prey to hunger,

disease, enemy tribes. It is to destroy them, even if not a single shot

is fired._

_If we must die, would it not be better to avenge ourselves on the pale

eyes for their cruelty to us? Is it not better to die with pride than to

just give up our good hunting and farming lands and go meekly into the

desert?_

He felt Redbird press against him. He had a sudden, strong feeling that

they should follow He Who Moves Alertly farther into the Ioway country.

That way they would surely live. How could he, White Bear, demand or

permit that his wife and son endure the sufferings and the danger those

who followed Black Hawk would face?

But at the thought of deserting the British Band he felt an unbearable

anguish. One winter long ago he had found a trap that had been sprung.

In the trap was the rear paw and part of the leg of a raccoon, ending in

a bloody mass. The animal had chewed its own leg off to escape. He had

seen a trail of blood leading into the woods. The raccoon had limped off

to die, but to die free.

What He Who Moves Alertly offered was a trap. What Black Hawk offered

was freedom, but with it the prospect of death.

He and Redbird could pack their belongings and leave after this council

was over. White Bear was sure other families would be doing that.

But could he turn his back on Black Hawk, who had just spoken for him at

his marriage, on Owl Carver, the father of his wife? On Sun Woman, who

he was sure would stay with the British Band? On the people who had been

part of his life as far back as he could remember?

Staying meant facing the long knives' guns. It meant starvation. It

meant pain. Those who whooped for Black Hawk tonight did not see that.

Or maybe they did see it but still embraced it. To see it clearly and

accept it, not only for himself but for Redbird and Eagle Feather, hurt

like biting off one of his own limbs. But he would not abandon his

people. He had run away from his last fight over land. He would not run

away from this one.

Owl Carver, holding up his owl-headed medicine stick with its red

feathers, stood before the council fire. "He Who Moves Alertly thinks he

is the only one who knows the Americans. But one of our own British Band

has been to the big towns in the East. And he is a shaman to whom the

Turtle has given special visions. I ask White Bear to tell us what he

has seen."

At the sound of his name, White Bear felt a coldness spread upward from

the base of his spine. He saw the look of earnest invitation on Owl

Carver's face, he saw Black Hawk's expectancy. He would as soon spit at

these two men he respected so much as disappoint them deeply. But now he

must.

Redbird's fingers dug into his arm. Her slanting eyes were wide.

"Speak truly," she whispered.

Slowly he stood up. It hurt to pull his arm from Redbird's grip, as if

he was stripping his own skin from his arm. His eyes momentarily met

those of He Who Moves Alertly, who stared at him intently.

As Owl Carver had, he raised the medicine stick he had cut for himself

after his first vision, decorated with a single string of red and white

beads. He held it up uncertainly. He hoped his shaman's adornments, the

paint, the earrings, necklaces and bracelets, would impress them.

He was prepared in another way, as well. He had never spoken before the

leaders of his band; but at St. George's School each boy was required to

give a short speech to the members of his class once a week and a longer

one before the whole school twice a year. Those speeches had to be

written and memorized, and now White Bear must speak as the spirit moved

him. But he knew how to stand, how to project his voice, how to measure

his words. In his heart he thanked Mr. Winans for teaching him all that.

"The big American towns in the East are bigger than the biggest towns

ever built by any red men," he began. "In those villages the pale eyes

swarm like bees in a honey tree.

"Every summer the Americans have a great feast to celebrate the day they

told the Great Father of the British that they would no longer be his

children. One summer in a big town called New York I saw long knives

walk in long lines to honor this big day. Each man had a new rifle.

Eight at a time walked side by side, and it would take half a day to go

from one end of their line to the other. Then came more long knives on

horseback, as many as a herd of buffalo. And after them horses pulled

big thunder guns on wheels that shoot iron balls the size of a man's

head.

"The long knives were led by their Great Father, Sharp Knife, who was

visiting New York. He is very thin, with a cruel face and white hair. He

sits straight on his horse and wears a long knife at his belt.

"After all those long knives had walked through the town they came to an

open field, where they fired off all their thunder guns. The noise made

the earth tremble."

Allowing his legs and hands to shake also, as they demanded to do, White

Bear paused and let his gaze travel over the faces in the big circle

around the fire.

The red glow of the setting sun fell on the faintly smiling He Who Moves

Alertly. Black Hawk's back was to the sun, his face in shadow. Redbird

looked up at White Bear, eyes bright and full of love. Others might hate

what he said, but he was glad that Redbird heard how well and truly he

spoke.

Angry words hissed and sputtered like the burning logs. White Bear saw

Wolf Paw poke Little Crow, one of the leading braves, who was seated

beside him, and speak to him with muted voice but urgent gestures. The

brave got up and left the fire.

Owl Carver, seated beside Black Hawk, lifted his head. White Bear saw

bewilderment on his teacher's face, and shrank within himself at the

sight.

Owl Carver said, "White Bear is both pale eyes and Sauk. So far he

speaks to us only with the pale eyes half of his head. Let White Bear

tell us what vision the Turtle has given him."

White Bear felt a small surge of hope. What he had seen as a traveler

among the pale eyes might not discourage the British Band from making

war, but his vision might move them more.

"The Turtle showed me Black Hawk talking to Sharp Knife," he said,

pointing to the war chief, who lifted his feather-crowned head at the

sound of his name. "They were in the house of the Great Father of the

Americans in the village called Washington City."

He heard amazed murmurings all around him. Encouraged, he went on.

"Then I saw great numbers of long knives running toward me over a field.

They were shooting and being shot at. I saw many of them hit, and they

fell and died, but they kept coming on. I saw a tall, thin man with a

beard, a sad man whom I have never seen before, mourning over the fallen

long knives."

The sun had gone down. Now he could see the dark listening faces only by

the yellow glow of the fire.

Owl Carver said, "White Bear's vision brings us hope. He sees our own

Black Hawk meeting with Sharp Knife in Sharp Knife's house. Black Hawk

will go to Sharp Knife's very house to lay down peace terms to the

Americans."

_That is not what it means!_ White Bear thought, shocked.

Owl Carver went on. "White Bear saw long knives dying. White Bear's

vision foretells victory for the British Band."

From all around the campfire he heard grunts of approval at Owl Carver's

words. White Bear's heart felt lost and sinking, like a stone thrown

into the Great River.

"Listen!" he cried. "Owl Carver is my father in spirit, but he did not

see this vision or feel its sadness. I did. I stood there before the

Turtle, and I know that what he showed me was a warning. If the British

Band takes to the path of war, Black Hawk will be Sharp Knife's

prisoner."

Shouts of protest erupted around him. He saw Little Crow come back to

the fire with a bundle of bright red and blue cloth in his hands.

White Bear spoke on over the outcry. "Listen! When I saw the long knives

dying, more and more of them came forward, and their numbers were

endless. They were not fighting our warriors. They were fighting other

long knives. The vision said that there would be many, many long knives

in summers and winters to come, so many that they would fight each

other."

Owl Carver said in a voice just loud enough for White Bear to hear, "Say

no more. You do great harm."

"I must say more. You have asked me to speak. Now I must tell what I

know. You must listen. The Turtle also spoke to me. He said, 'The many

who follow Black Hawk across the Great River will be few when they cross

back.'"

After a moment's hesitation Owl Carver lifted his hands. "They will be

few because we will win back our land on the other side and stay there."

Before White Bear could answer, Black Hawk stood up, his face in the

firelight a mask of wrath. White Bear trembled.

"Black Hawk will never be Sharp Knife's prisoner!" the war chief roared.

"Black Hawk will die first."

Someone else was standing up before the fire. A woman.

Redbird.

White Bear felt himself trapped in a nightmare. Had his wife gone mad?

She could not speak to a council of chiefs and braves. His heart beating

furiously, he reached out to silence her. But she was already speaking.

"You are fools if you do not listen to White Bear," she cried. "He is

gifted with the power of prophecy." She turned to Owl Carver. "My

father, you know that the whole tribe crosses the river from east to

west every year for the winter hunt. If the Turtle says few will cross

back over the Great River, he means the rest of us will be dead."

Her words were greeted not with anger but with shouts of scornful

laughter. White Bear knew that the chiefs and braves did not care what

she said; they were merely amused that a woman dared try to speak to

them at all. He burned with shame for himself and Redbird.

Beyond the circle of firelight he saw the shadows of men and women

standing in the twilight. Word of the dispute at the council fire must

be spreading through the camp and drawing more people to hear, perhaps

to speak their own minds, as was their right. He glimpsed Sun Woman

hurrying toward him, picking her way through the seated men.

Wolf Paw strode toward White Bear, holding in his hands the bundle of

red and blue cloth Little Crow had brought him. He glared at Redbird.

"It is bad medicine for women to speak to the council."

Redbird stepped in front of White Bear to face Wolf Paw. "A medicine

woman tells you: the words of White Bear are _good_ medicine."

"How can White Bear tell the British Band what to do when he cannot make

his wife behave as a woman should?" Wolf Paw said. "Sit down, Redbird."

And he pushed her aside.

Rage shot White Bear forward like an arrow from a bow, arms outstretched

to grapple with Wolf Paw. He lifted his medicine stick as if to strike

at the red-crested brave.

Hands gripped his arms. He struggled, blind with fury, flailing his arms

and kicking. Wolf Paw, his teeth bared, wrenched the medicine stick from

White Bear's hand.

"Do not harm the medicine stick!" shouted Owl Carver.

Without looking at the old shaman, Wolf Paw handed him White Bear's

medicine stick. Two big warriors held White Bear as Wolf Paw approached

him, stretching his lips in a grin.

"A woman speaks for peace with the pale eyes," Wolf Paw said, "because

peace is women's way. I once saw Redbird going to White Bear when he was

on his vision quest. Maybe he gets his visions from her."

More and more men were on their feet, and they roared with laughter at

Wolf Paw's gibe.

Sun Woman had made her way into the inner ring around the fire and now

held Redbird.

"Come away, daughter," she said in a strong but soothing voice. "This

does not help White Bear."

"Look!" shouted Wolf Paw. "Now he has both his wife and his mother at

the council fire."

He shook out the red and blue cloth. It was a woman's dress.

"He speaks like a woman," Wolf Paw said. "He says what women tell him to

say. Women speak for him. Let him dress like a woman. A pale eyes

woman."

Wolf Paw flung the dress over White Bear's head, and the two men who

held him pulled it down around him. White Bear felt wrapped in

hopelessness as the cloth covered his head.

And he had wanted to be a prophet for the Sauk.

_The truer his words, the less they hear him._

He struggled halfheartedly. He no longer cared what they did to him. His

own failure and the sure destruction of his people chained him so that

he could barely move. The warriors pulled the dress straight down over

his arms, pinioning them to his sides. As his head emerged through the

collar, laughter battered at him. Teeth gleamed in the firelight.

He saw Sun Woman holding Redbird. Tears squeezed through his wife's

tightly shut eyelids. The face of his mother was heavy with woe.

Too despairing to resist, he let Wolf Paw and his men push and drag him

away from the council fire and run him through the camp. He was blind to

the laughing faces around him, deaf to the mocking cries.

But he saw one sight that all but killed him--looking up at him from

somewhere in the crowd, the hurt, bewildered eyes of his son, Eagle

Feather.

13

The Volunteers

Nicole and Frank had walked halfway across the main room of the trading

post blockhouse when Nicole heard Raoul's voice thundering from the

stone-walled counting office in the far corner.

"You and the boys will stay at Victoire!"

Nicole touched Frank's arm, and they stopped and drew back a little,

standing beside the long black barrel of the six-pounder naval cannon

Raoul had set up in the blockhouse. It would be best not to intrude on

Raoul when he was in the midst of a quarrel.

"But none of them French people there like me," a woman answered, high,

nasal, with a Missouri twang. "It's downright lonesome." Nicole

recognized Clarissa Greenglove's voice.

"I'm going to be gone and your father's coming with me. Where the hell

else would you stay?"

"With my Aunt Melinda in St. Louis. That'd be a perfect place. You could

send me down on the _Victory_.'"

"Of course I could." Raoul's voice was creamy with sarcasm. "And then do

you know what would happen? Half those men who are out in the courtyard

now volunteering for my militia company would quit. Because if I send

you and Phil and Andy away, it means _their_ families aren't safe. And

so they'd insist on staying home to protect them."

His voice rose to a shout. "Do you understand now, goddamn it? Then get

the hell out of here."

A moment later Clarissa scurried out past the iron-reinforced door of

Raoul's counting room. The two small boys she'd borne to Raoul ran

beside her floor-length calico skirt. She'd gotten to be

round-shouldered, Nicole saw.

Clarissa nodded. "Mister, Miz Hopkins."

"Morning, Clarissa," said Nicole. To call her by her first name felt not

quite respectful, but to call her "Miss Greenglove," especially with her

two sons right there with her, seemed cruel.

Clarissa gave Nicole a woebegone look that seemed to be asking for

something--Nicole wasn't quite sure what. Then she ducked her head, and

her bonnet hid her eyes.

Phil, the five-year-old, looked up at Nicole. He had very light blond

hair, almost silver, and large eyes that seemed set deep in his pale,

thin face. A little ghost.

"My dad's gonna fight Injuns."

"That's fine." Nicole didn't know what else to say. Clarissa, who had

taken a few steps ahead, reached back and jerked Phil's arm so hard that

he hollered.

Raoul, when they entered his office, seemed unperturbed by his argument

with Clarissa. But his eyes widened and flashed with momentary anger

when he saw Nicole. Then he grinned, teeth white under his black

mustache.

"Well, Nicole and Frank. Come to lay your hatchets to rest? Now that the

Indians are waving theirs around?"

"That's why we're here, Raoul," said Frank.

"Yeah, I've read your paragraphs in the _Visitor_," said Raoul, one side

of his mouth twisted up in a contemptuous smile. "Seems you'd just love

to give Illinois back to the Indians."

"Nothing of the kind," Frank said gruffly.

How unfair, Nicole thought. Frank had written only that if the 1804 land

agreement had been obtained through fraud, it would be better to

negotiate a new treaty with the Sauk and Fox rather than meet them with

armed force.

Raoul's tanned face reddened and his nostrils flared. "Give back

Illinois," he persisted, "just like you wanted to give Victoire to

Pierre's mongrel bastard."

Nicole saw not a trace of guilt on that broad, hard face over what he

had done to Auguste. She clenched her fists. She must try to contain her

anger.

Frank spoke. "Don't bring up Auguste now, Raoul. He's what divides us,

and we oughtn't to be divided now. We want to talk to you about

protecting Victor."

Heat lightning flickered in Raoul's eyes, shifting quickly to a derisive

gleam. "Well, that should be easy, Frank, with your attitude. You can

make a white flag out of any bedsheet."

Nicole thought, _He's just using our coming here as an opportunity to

rub our faces in the dirt_.

"Don't make this so hard for us, Raoul," she said. "We need each other."

"Really? What do I need you for?" His eyes were cold.

Many answers crowded Nicole's mind, but she thought for a moment before

speaking.

"You need the people of this town to make a success of the estate, now

you've taken it over, your orchards and farms, your shipping line, your

trading ventures. Most of the people who live in Victor work for you,

directly or indirectly. And you're leaving them unprotected."

Before Raoul could answer, Frank joined in. "From what I've seen, you

plan to march every man who knows how to shoot a rifle away from here to

fight the Indians down by the Rock River. If you take all the fighting

men away, who's going to defend Victor and Victoire?"

Raoul threw back his head and roared with laughter. "God, I can't

believe I'm hearing you right. Ever since last fall you've wished I

would disappear from the face of the earth. Now you come to me begging

for protection."

"It's not for ourselves that we're asking," said Nicole. "We just want

you to leave enough men behind to defend the women and children and

noncombatants who stay here."

Raoul's eyes narrowed and fixed on Frank. "Noncombatants like you,

Frank? You won't pick up a rifle yourself, but you want some of my men

to stay and guard you."

Frank looked back steadily. "I'm learning to shoot. Your father is

teaching me." Nicole felt a rush of love for Frank, and pride in his

willingness to learn to do something he hated, because he had to.

Raoul spread his hands. "Good for you, and good for Papa." He looked

down, and his face reddened slightly. When he looked up, his dark eyes

met Nicole's.

"How is Papa?"

Nicole checked the urge to remind him that he had nearly killed their

father, and said, "He's tolerably well. The little house Frank has been

building for him is finished. And he's able to walk. Guichard takes care

of him."

Raoul clapped his hands together. "Good, good! Then that's two riflemen

you've got right there. And I'll bet old Guichard could even shoot if it

came to that. And you'll have David Cooper, he's a veteran of 'Twelve.

He's going to keep an eye on the trading post for me, along with Burke

Russell. I'm sure there'll be a few others. As for the rest of the men,

if I didn't lead them down to the Rock River, they'd go anyway. They're

raring to hunt redskins."

Nicole recalled the line of men she had seen just now in the trading

post courtyard signing up for the Smith County volunteer militia. There

must have been over a hundred of them, some wearing coonskin caps and

fringed buckskins, others with straw hats, calico shirts and tow-linen

pantaloons, two dozen or so sporting the head kerchiefs favored by men

of French descent. They'd been in high spirits, laughing and talking

about bringing back scalps.

Frank said, "Of course you don't _want_ to think there'll be an Indian

attack on Victor while you're gone. What you want is to go down to the

Rock River country with the militia and win a great victory over the

Indians. Or something you can call a great victory."

Raoul held out his hands. "Frank, you printed Reynolds's proclamation in

your damned paper."

He pointed over his shoulder, where a copy of the Illinois governor's

call to arms, cut from the _Victor Visitor_ for April 17, 1832, was

nailed to the wall. Nicole's eyes traveled over the opening lines.

FELLOW CITIZENS

Your country requires your services. The Indians have assumed a

hostile attitude and have invaded the State in violation of the

treaty of last summer.

The British Band of Sauks and other hostile Indians, headed by Black

Hawk, are in possession of the Rock River country, to the great

terror of the frontier inhabitants. I consider the settlers on the

frontiers to be in imminent danger ...

Raoul said, "He doesn't say stay home and defend your town. He says

rendezvous at Beardstown. That is a lot closer to Black Hawk than it is

to Victor."

Frank said, "That proclamation is for towns that are in safe territory.

We're the settlers _on_ the frontier, the ones Reynolds says are in

danger. I was talking yesterday to a man from Galena, Raoul. Up there,

the volunteers have formed a militia company, but they're going to stay

right where they are, in case of Indian attack. We aren't _expected_ to

supply troops to chase Black Hawk."

Raoul shook his head. "We've got to hit Black Hawk hard and fast with

all the men we can muster. Once we do, there'll be no danger to Victor."

Frank said, "If something like what happened at Fort Dearborn happens

here at Victor, innocent people will pay for your decision. You want

that on your conscience?"

At the mention of Fort Dearborn, Raoul's face had gone expressionless.

He sat there and stared at Frank for a moment, then stood up abruptly.

"My conscience is clear," he said.

_You have no conscience_, Nicole thought. She stared sadly into the

bright blue eyes that looked so blankly at her now, and wondered where

her smiling little brother had gone, so many years ago. The smile still

came readily to his face; but now it only mocked and taunted. Did those

years of captivity with the Indians fully explain Raoul, or was he a

throwback to some robber-baron ancestor whose only law was the sword?

* * * * *

"When a man goes off to war, Miss Nancy, it means the world to him to

know he has someone to come home to."

Raoul smiled down from his chestnut stallion, Banner, at Nancy Hale in

the driver's seat of her black buggy. At nineteen, she was a woman in

full bloom. She'd probably have married a long time ago if she'd stayed

back East. There were a lot of men out here on the frontier, but few

good enough to court a woman like her.

_She'd be a fool not to take my offer seriously. It's the best one

she'll ever get._

Nancy looked first at the dusty road over the grass-covered hills

between Victoire and Victor, the morning sun beating down on it, then up

at him. The deep blue of her eyes was a marvel.

"You already have someone to come home to, Mr. de Marion. And children."

Children, yes, but the mingling of his de Marion blood with the

nondescript Greenglove line could hardly produce the children he wanted.

Nancy, on the other hand, from an old New England family that probably

went back to even better English stock, was just the sort of woman he

wanted to breed with.

"Clarissa and I have never stood up before a priest or a minister, Miss

Hale. I've just been passing my time with her until the right lady came

along."

Her gaze was cool and level. "As far as I'm concerned you're as good as

married, and you have no right to be talking to me this way."

"Necessity makes your bedfellows out here on the frontier."

"Not mine." She shook her head, blond braids swinging. He could picture

all that honey-gold hair spread out on a pillow, and he felt a pulse

beat in his throat.

Nancy went on, "You must know how wrong it is for you to speak to me

this way. Otherwise you wouldn't have ambushed me out here."

"I've waited days for a chance to speak to you in private."

Josiah Hode, Hodge Hode's boy, had ridden fast to the trading post this

morning to tell Raoul that Miss Hale was driving her buggy into town and

was traveling, for once, without her father. It was the news Raoul had

been hoping for ever since the governor's proclamation had arrived in

Victor. Knowing Miss Nancy was indignant over his treatment of the

mongrel, Raoul had delayed approaching her. Now he could delay no

longer.

"I leave with the militia next Monday," he said. "That gives you three

days to think it over. I hope to carry your favorable answer with me

when I ride off to defend you from the savages."

She smiled, but the smile was without humor or warmth. "Carry this

answer with you if you wish: No." She flicked the reins, and her dappled

gray horse speeded up to a trot.

Raoul spurred his own horse to keep pace with her. "Take time to

consider."

"The answer will always be no."

White-hot anger exploded within him. His fists clenched on Banner's

reins.

"You'll end up an old maid schoolmarm!" he shouted. "You'll never know

what it is to have a man between your legs."

Her face went white. He had hurt her, and that made him feel better.

He kicked his heels hard into Banner's sides and the stallion uttered an

angry whicker and broke into a gallop, leaving Nancy Hale and her buggy

enveloped in dust.

He wished the country around here weren't so damned open. If he could

have dragged her out of that buggy and into the woods, given her a taste

of the real thing, she'd have changed her mind about him.

_Is she still pining for the mongrel?_

Well, he thought, as the gray log walls of the trading post came into

sight around a bend in the ridge road, he _would_ carry her answer to

the war. And the Indians would suffer the more for it.

* * * * *

Prophet's Town was deserted. Black Hawk and his allies had fled.

Raoul reined up Banner in the very center of the rings of dark, silent

Indian houses. Armand Perrault, Levi Pope, Hodge Hode and Otto Wegner

stopped beside him. He did not know whether he was relieved or

disappointed. His cap-and-ball pistol drawn, the hammer pulled back, he

drew angry breaths and glared about him. He felt exposed, realizing that

at any time an arrow aimed at his heart could come winging out of one of

those long loaf-shaped bark and frame Winnebago lodges.

Because of Raoul's experience in the skirmishing around Saukenuk last

year, General Henry Atkinson had commissioned him a colonel and put him

in command of the advance guard, known as the spy battalion. He enjoyed

the prestige of leading the spies, but he felt a constant tightness in

his belly.

He reached down for the canteen in the Indian blanketwork bag strapped

to his saddle, uncorked it and took a quick swallow of Old Kaintuck. It

went down hot and spread warmth from his stomach through his whole body.

He cooled his throat with water from a second canteen.

For three weeks now, slowed by heavy spring rains that swelled creeks to

nearly impassable torrents, the militia had followed Black Hawk's trail

up the Rock River. To the whites' disappointment, the Indians had

bypassed Saukenuk, doubtless aware that the militia had come out against

them. Instead, Black Hawk's band had trekked twenty-five miles upriver,

reportedly stopping at Prophet's Town. Now, they were not here either.

Raoul hated the Indian village on sight. Built on land that sloped

gently down to the south bank of the Rock River, it surrounded him,

threatened him, lay dark, sullen and sinister under a gray sky heavy

with rain. It reminded him too vividly of the redskin villages where

he'd spent those two worst years of his life.

He saw no cooking fires, no drying meat or stacks of vegetables by the

dark doorways, no poles flaunting feathers, ribbons and enemy scalps.

That characteristic odor of Indian towns, a mixture of tobacco smoke and

cooking hominy, hung in the air but was very faint. He figured the

Indians had left here days ago.

"Otto," Raoul said, "ride back to General Atkinson and report the enemy

has abandoned Prophet's Town."

Wegner gave Raoul a strenuous Prussian salute, pulled his spotted gray

horse's head around and rode off.

The two hundred men of the spy battalion were trickling in behind Raoul,

hoofs pattering on the bare earth. In their coonskin caps and dusty gray

shirts and buckskin jackets, the men didn't look like soldiers, but they

had taken the oath and were under military discipline till their term of

enlistment was up at the end of May.

The men called to one another and laughed as they gazed around at the

empty lodges. They were enjoying themselves immensely, Raoul thought.

This time of year most of them would be breaking their backs doing

spring plowing and planting. Now they could earn twenty-one cents a day

while going on something like an extended hunting trip.