"Nancy," he said, trying to keep his voice calm and pleasant, "come with me and let us talk."
They left the wickiup and she walked through the camp with her eyes on the ground, too frightened, he supposed, to look about her. People stared, but White Bear wore a forbidding look, and they kept their distance.
She had on a doeskin dress that Sun Woman had given her, and she had done up her two blond braids the way she always had. He felt a little catch in his throat as he looked at her and remembered those not-accidental meetings on the prairie near Victoire.
Every so often as they walked along she twisted her shoulders inside the soft leather and rubbed her arms uncomfortably. They passed a group of warriors who had felled a big oak tree and were burning and scraping its inside to make a dugout. The men stopped work to watch her go by.
Seeing the way they looked at her, White Bear thought, Yes, she must marry me. He hoped he could persuade her that it would be the only way for her to be safe.
He led her to the western edge of the high ground on which the band had made their camp. They stopped when the earth underfoot turned soft and wet. Before them lay an expanse of reeds that vanished into morning mist.
"Did you talk to Black Hawk?" she asked, her voice trembling. "Can I get away from here?"
White Bear remembered Sun Woman's admonition to be kind to Nancy at every moment. He tried to think how best to tell her the bad news, how to add only the smallest possible amount of fear to her burden.
"Black Hawk is pleased that I stopped the people from hurting you yesterday," he began tentatively. "He said the white men despise Indians when they kill their prisoners."
Her lips trembled. "He's not going to let me go, is he?" she said, and sobs began to shake her body. When she was able, she turned pleadingly toward him. "Couldn't you do anything for me?"