I know he didn’t expect that. I’m not so sure I did, either. “Ah well…” He paused, perhaps waiting for me to apologize for my conduct outside the tent. I had nothing to say, and I saw the affront in his eyes. He got up to leave, then sat down again and waved away the surgeon, who wisely did not budge. I had an ally there.

He leaned forward and I leaned back. “Miss Everett, I hate to remind you of any…any abuse… you suffered during your captivity…” He looked down at his boots. “If you have any name or names to mention, we will see that the guilty parties are punished.”

I stared at him and spoke louder than I intended, because he winced and glanced around.

“Not one of The People laid a hand on me.”

“Come come, Miss Everett,” he said, his face as red as his nose now, all pretense of kindness gone. “You needn’t fear these savages now! We know something happened, because General Howard came across …um…a bloody petticoat at one of the Nez Perce campsites. It had been partially burned – I suppose to discard evidence.”

I knew Hawk had carried that petticoat and my riding skirt toward a campfire. I also knew that the morning was misty and we were in a hurry, as usual. Damn! I wanted to tell Colonel Miles that was mainly the wrangler’s blood, but the words wouldn’t come. I could tell by the colonel’s expression that he was certain I had been raped twenty-four hours a day with time off for meals. It seemed to me that Nelson Miles had also read too many of those lurid novels about frontier heroines and the Fate Worse Than Death. I knew as I watched him that no amount of truth could change the mind of a man already convinced. Time for other tactics.

I shrugged. “I cut myself shaving.”

Right then, sitting there more alone than ever before in my life, I knew the name of my wyakim. I had known it all along, but after a summer with the Nez Perce, I knew.

I was Elizabeth Ann Everett. She was me and I was she and it was more than enough to help me find my new way.

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-four

“Cut yourself…” The colonel had been leaning forward like a priest in a confessional. When I said that, his head snapped back and his eyes narrowed. I narrowed my eyes and stared right back at him, enjoying a tiny victory when he looked away first. I had a feeling that my life was going to be tiny victories from now on, maybe so small that only I knew.

He slapped his gauntlets on his knee and rose, maybe thinking to intimidate me by standing up. I stood up, too, knowing I was a lot shorter than he was, but much taller inside.