Chapter 20When the buffalo came later than usual that next year, Cut suffered a long gash in his hip during the hunt. As Badger was elsewhere treating injuries, the task of repairing his manly thigh, a bittersweet chore, fell to me. Tonight he would flank his wife with more caution than abandon.
As talk turned to the coming winter move, Otter announced he was not going with the band this year. Secretly, I was relieved. I had considered wintering at Yawktown, but it was not something I desired.
We accompanied the caravan a few leagues south so Otter could check on the Conestoga’s green new drover. Lone Eagle rode beside me for a distance, chatting about his hope of becoming a father, giving me another clue to our failure. Swallow, his new wife, had missed her menses, which he took as a su
