_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."