Chapter 20The winter of ‘91–92 was not as bitter as previous ones, making me wonder if what I privately termed the Little Ice Age was at an end. Each of the past several years seemed to have outdone one another in striving to be colder than the previous. Perhaps our people on the reservations had fared a little better this season. The last messenger pigeon from Winter Bird indicated the settlement at Rivers Bend was in troubling—but not dire—straits. Alas, there would be no more messages from that quarter until someone made the trek to Pine Ridge to return the four trained birds.
Communication with the Mead was also at an end until pigeons could be exchanged. Only birds from Andre’s place and Fort Yanube remained. Following the death of little Gabe, Gideon and I had trained and exchanged
