Chapter 10The fetching young Yanube warrior who had provided me with help and companionship did not get a traditional burial atop a scaffold exposed to the hot sun. I had trouble convincing Little Bear someone, perhaps his brother’s murderers, would tear it down and desecrate the corpse. When the boy eventually saw the wisdom of consigning his family to a grave, he spent half a day laboring alongside me to hack a hole in the hard, unforgiving earth in the very glen where they had died.
We placed food and water and all of their possessions in the grave to sustain them on the journey to the West. Little Bear kept only his brother’s rifle and Whisper. I suspected he was silently vowing to run down the killers with the horse and slay them with the weapon. I prayed time would purge the thirst
