Memories long buried in Stone Girl’s mind rose up to trouble her. They were the words of Never Laugh, the white woman captive taken on the same raid as she. That was when Stone Girl had been very small and not long here. Never Laugh would take her into the forest. There in a small patch of sunlight she would talk to her in the white tongue, first bringing out pale scraps of dried scalp from her dress. It was all she had left of her own little girl. The child had cried too much on the long way to the Waldhoning, she said, and Fish Spear had dashed her head against a rock. Never Laugh would stroke the pitiful shreds of pale hair and cry. Afterward she would put them away, get out her comb, and comb the Indian lice from Stone Girl’s head.

“You must remember, Mary, who you are,” she would say. “Not Stone Girl, daughter of Feast Maker and granddaughter of Machilek, but Mary Stanton, daughter of Captain Peter Stanton, assemblyman and friend of the proprietaries in Pennsylvania.”

“I am Mary,” Stone Girl would answer obediently but in her mind she would say, “I am Stone Girl, too.”

“They will try to make you a savage,” Never Laugh would go on. “They want you to be a squaw. When you are older, young men will stand in the path waiting for you when you go to the spring. Do not stop and talk but walk around them. They look harmless enough. Oh, you would never guess the Indian warrior from what he is here in the village. He furnishes deer meat for his family. He sits and smokes like the most peaceful of men. When he walks, it is slow like a king. Hardly ever does he raise his voice and when he talks it’s as if butter would not melt in his mouth. But it’s different out on a war party. Then he turns into a wolf.”

“Not my father?”

“Not Captain Stanton, your white father. Oh, a few white men in the woods run wild and do things they would never do at home. Other white men would punish them if they did. But for Indians, savagery is second nature. At home they are the kind husband and sympathetic father. On the war trail they do cruel things I do not want to speak to you about. It is best for you not to know, for you must live with Machilek, your grandfather, since your Indian father is dead, and you must never show fear. But don’t forget what I have told you.”

“I will remember,” Stone Girl would say but in her heart she did not believe such words about Feast Maker, her father, or Machilek, only about Fish Spear who had dashed Never Laugh’s child against a stone.

“They will work on you every day,” Never Laugh would warn her. “You are young and strong. Just the kind they want. An Indian likes nothing better than to get a white squaw. It makes him feel important among his fellows. The time is coming when I won’t be here to remind you. When I’m gone you must remember. Keep your white tongue alive. Talk English every day to yourself and never give up.”