The rest of the people joined in the wailing. Redbird noticed that Wave and He Who Lights the Water cried out, too, and tears ran from their eyes. She liked them for joining the mourning. Owl Carver was sitting beside her, holding the hands of weeping Wind Bends Grass. His own features, as much of them as she could see in the twilight, were still and drawn, shrunken by sorrow. Redbird thought, the Sauk were known far and wide as a people who never shirked the demands of honor. If even one man of Black Hawk's party smoked the calumet with Wave, that would oblige Black Hawk and his remaining braves to surrender to the Winnebago and make peace. Redbird said, "Now, with so many dead, can we have peace? Will you smoke the pipe with these two men?" Owl Carver said, "If I were alone, I would smoke the pipe with them. But I will not go against Black Hawk." "We are all that is left of the band," she said. "Someone must take the calumet and smoke it." And by that odious Sauk custom, she thought, clenching her jaw, it would have to be a man. As darkness deepened, the wailing died down. Wave and He Who Lights the Water made a little fire at the edge of the lake near Redbird's lean-to. One by one the last people of Black Hawk's band drifted close to Wave's fire. The Winnebago brave stood before the fire holding the peace pipe. Twilight lingered in the sky behind him while the firelight before him illuminated his heavy features. Sitting near Eagle Feather, Redbird looked around and saw silent figures standing in the shadows as the people waited to hear what Wave had to say. Gravely he took tobacco out of a pouch at his waist and filled the bowl of the calumet. Then he touched a dry stick to his fire and carried the flame to the pipe. It flared up bright yellow over the pipe bowl as he puffed on it. Wave cleared his throat and spoke in a strong voice. "Earthmaker gave us the sacred tobacco as a means of making peace among us. No one may break a promise sealed with tobacco. Our chief, Falcon, asks me to say this to you: "Black Hawk, you have frightened the long knives greatly, brought them much sorrow, and forced them to pursue you over rivers and swamps and mountains. Black Hawk, your honor has been satisfied. Falcon offers this tobacco to you and asks that you end this war, for the sake of your women who are hungry and sick and your children who are without fathers." _Yes, let it be done. Let this war be over before all of us are dead._ Redbird's heart leaped with hope as she saw Black Hawk reach toward the pipe that Wave held out to him. He was about to take it and smoke it! But his hand, instead of grasping, only pointed at the pipe. "I will not smoke this pipe. I believe the Sauk should fight on until they cannot fight anymore." _Please, Earthmaker, let at least one man be moved to stand for peace._ Wave added more tobacco to the pipe and puffed on it again. He stood before the Winnebago Prophet.