Like Wolf Paw, she had changed so much that for a moment Nancy wasn't sure this _was_ Redbird. She was as thin as a fence rail, and those colorful things Nancy remembered her wearing, the feathers and beads, the dyed quills, the painted figures on her dress, all were gone. She clutched a coarse brown blanket around her shoulders. Her head was bare. Water dripped from the fringe of hair across her forehead and poured from her braids. She wore, not the doeskin clothing Nancy remembered, but a torn gray cotton dress that was too big for her and dirty around the bottom edge. Looking down, Nancy saw that Redbird's feet were bare, her toes sinking into the mud. Nancy felt warm tears mingling with the cold rain on her face as she saw Redbird smiling at her. "Redbird, I am glad to see my sister," Nancy said in their special language. "Where is your wickiup?" Redbird spoke to Wolf Paw in Sauk words too low and rapid for Nancy to follow. He grunted assent and trudged through the mud toward a distant tent. Watching him, Nancy felt pity at his rounded shoulders and old man's shuffle. Redbird beckoned Nancy to follow her to the tent she'd come from. "Where you going, ma'am?" the sergeant called. "I'll be all right," Nancy called over her shoulder, raising her voice over the drumming of the rain. "This is the woman I came to find." She could see the young soldier shaking his head. Why would a young white woman go into the filthy, disease-ridden tents of these Indians? _May the Lord open his eyes and heart._ At first the inside of the tent seemed black as a moonless night to Nancy, and the smell of damp, unwashed bodies made her stomach churn. She took Redbird's hand and held it for reassurance. Not too tightly; the bones felt delicate. Redbird explained that they had no dry wood for a fire. The long knives had promised to bring them some, but they hadn't yet. The air was as chill in the tent as it was outside, and Nancy heard women and children coughing. They sat in silence for a time, Sauk fashion. Nancy's eyes adjusted to the dim light filtering through the canvas till she could see Redbird's face. She saw Eagle Feather looking at her out of the shadows with huge blue eyes, a little skeleton whose covering of skin looked like stretched brown leather. Hurting inside, she greeted him with a pat on the arm. If only she could do for him what she had done for Woodrow. Now she could see four other women and two little girls huddled together near the rear. Nancy broke the silence. "Redbird, White Bear needs you." Wincing in pain, Redbird narrowed her slanting eyes. She asked what had happened to White Bear. Redbird, Nancy learned, had heard no news of Auguste since the day he left Black Hawk's camp to take Woodrow and Nancy back to the whites. Auguste had told Nancy that he had tried to get word to Redbird; now she silently damned the soldiers for not bothering to pass the messages on. No doubt they thought it not worth the trouble.