and therefore they were obliged to honor severe restrictions.

They were not to recognize friends once they were in their attire, nor

were they to dance incorrectly or to tamper with the sacred costume or

clothing once it had been left within a secret cache. To disobey any of

the restrictions could bring calamity down upon the dancer or his family

or tribe. To disobey could bring about sickness, madness, even death.

"We are a people of ritual," he told her.

"We celebrate the Holiness Rite and the Ceremonial Relay. For the

Holiness Rite the shaman must go through arduous procedures, imitating

the bear and the snake, and curing the people of the powerful bear and

snake sicknesses.

The Ceremonial Relay tells us of our food supply--game and the harvest

of nature. Runners symbolize the sun and the animals, and the moon and

the plants. If the sun runners win, game will be in plenty for us. If

the moon runners win, then we will feast on the harvest of the plants."

"You live a good life here," Tess said.

"I live a good life, yes, but I fear the day when white men come to take

it from me."

"But surely, here" -- "They will come, the white men will come. War will

tear apart the mountains, and blood will stain the rivers. It is

inevitable.

But when the time comes, I will remember you, and Slater, and I will

know that all whites are not the same. Yes, it is good here. Now. And

you, I think that you are at She smiled at him.

"I do not believe it, but yes, I am at peace here."

Nalte stared at the fire that burned in the center of the village.

"You might have been happy had you stayed," he said quietly.

"And maybe not. Our women are the gatherers. The first green vegetables

are the yucca, and the women collect them. Then they must collect the me

seal stalks and roast them and grind them into paste. We eat the mescal

as paste, and as the cakes you have been given with your meals. It is a

hard life."

"A ranch is a hard life. And so is a newspaper," Tess said softly.

She looked at him quickly.

"A newspaper" -- "I know what a newspaper is. I lived in a town for many

years when I was a child. I was captured with a war party and taken in

by a minister's wife. I learned a lot about your society. A newspaper is

a powerful weapon."

"It isn't a weapon at all," Tess protested. "More powerful than a gun.

Be careful with it," Nalte warned her. Then he asked her if she was

Jamie's wife. She flushed as she told him that she was not.

"But you are his woman," Nalte told her.

"It--it isn't the same thing," she said.

The Indian was lowering his head, smiling, and she remembered belatedly

that he had chosen to let her go because of Jamie.

"When an Apache marries, he goes to his wife's family. If she lives in a

distant territory, then the man leaves and joins her family. Within it

he may rise to be the leader, then he may become the leader of many

families, and ultimately a great chief. But always, when it is possible,

he joins his wife's family. He works for his wife's parents and elders,

and he is known by them as 'he who carries burdens for me."

He speaks for her, and the man and the woman exchange gifts. A separate

dwelling is made for the couple. She is his wife.

"But I tell you, Sun-Colored Woman, that it is the same among the Apache

and the whites. When a man loves a woman, when he claims her for his

own, when he is willing to give his life and his pride and his honor for

her, that is when she is truly his wife, in his eyes and in the eyes of

the 249 great spirits, be they our gods or the one great God of the

whites." He touched her cheek almost tenderly, then left her. She

thought about his words for a long time to come, and she wondered if

Jamie did love her. Did he love her enough to stay with her, or would he

tire of her, as he had tired of Eliza?

She had made love with him always of her own volition. She had wanted

him as she had never known want before.

But sometimes she wished that she had never given in to the temptation,

for she felt that she had tasted forbidden fruit.

She had found it very sweet, but she would perish when she could taste

it no longer. ~ Nights were theirs. She never spoke, but came to him

with her skin warmed by the fire, her body bathed by the stream, her

hair soft and fragrant from the sun. She lay down be- side him, and she

loved him, and she tried not to think of the future.

On the fourth night of Little Flower's puberty rite, when the maiden had

become a woman, Jamie was silent, holding her gently, staying

motionless.

Tess knew that he didn't sleep, and she shifted against him, asking him

what was wrong.

"We're free to go home tomorrow," she whispered to him.

"Yes, or the next day," be said absently.

"Nalte has been involved with his sister and us. He may be busy with

tribal business tomorrow."

"what difference will a day make?"

He shook his head, still staring toward the top of the tepee and the

poles that seemed to reach toward the stars.

"A

day will not make a difference. Nothing will a make a difference.

That's the point. When we go home, Tess, von Heusen is still going to be

there. And we still haven't any proof of what he is doing."

"But--but Jeremiah and David kidnapped me--and they left you for dead!"

Tess protested.

"Jeremiah and David are dead. They can't be brought to trial, and they

can't be forced to testify against von Heusen.

We're right back where we started. And I know you. You'll head right

back to that newspaper office of yours."

"Jamie, I have to!"

"You don't have to!" he told her savagely. "Jamie" -- "We're going back,

Tess, and we're going to fight yon Heusen. But we have to do it by my

rules."

"I don't" -- "That's right--you don't. You don't make a move without

someone by your side, do you understand me? Things are going to get

worse. Von Heusen may be thinking right now that you and I are gone. He

may even have had a few moments of divine pleasure, thinking that he'd

won at last. But Tess, by now he must have discovered that he can't get

his hands on that property, even if we're both believed to be dead and

gone. He's going to be furious when he finds it's willed to my

family--and he's going to be ready for a full- scale war. We've got to

pray that we're going to be ready for it."

"Can we be?" Tess whispered.

"Yes, we can," he said. But then he swung around on her, staring at her

fiercely, clutching her chin with a grip so tight that it was painful.

"But Tess, so help me God, you'll do it my way."

"Jamie" -- "You'll do it my way?"

"Fine! All right!" she snapped.

He dropped her jaw. Tears were stinging her eyes, and she quickly rolled

away from him, furious that no matter how close it seemed they became,

he still played the dictator. And left her frightened that she was

falling more and more deeply in love with a man who would wage war for

her, who would risk his life for her. And yet ride away in the end, when

it mattered the most.

He did not reach for her, and she did not come back to touch him that

night.

Her back was mid, and she drew the blanket more fully around her.

She shivered in the night. But the distance remained between them.

They spent one more day with the Apache, watching the sacred ritual when

a young boy departed with his first hunting party. The boy's first four

raids would be accompanied by ritual. This day he was instructed by the

war shaman and accepted by the adult members of the party. He was given

a drinking tube and a scratcher with lightning designs, and he was

bestowed with a war cap.

Jamie spoke to her while they stood watching. He pointed to the war cap

and told her, "It will not yet contain the spiritual power that belongs

to the men. He must complete his passage before the spirits will enter

into his cap." The men and women of the village were gathering around

the boy to throw pollen upon him as be departed with the warriors.

"It is a blessing," Jamie told her.

"And we are standing here, watching this, and these men and that boy

will go off and raid some white settlement and perhaps kill our own

kind," Tess murmured. Jamie glared at her.

"I'll thank you to keep your opinions to yourself. We're lucky to be

leaving here alive. And, Miss. Stuart, for your information, this party

is moving against the Comancheres. I don't believe you can feel too much

sympathy for that particular group."

She could not, but she didn't have a chance to tell him so. He turned

her around and propelled her toward the tepee they were sharing.

"Go in, be quiet. I'm going to ask Nalte if we might leave tomorrow."

She didn't hear, that afternoon, whether Nalte gave his permission.

She waited endlessly for Jamie to return, but he did not. When it was

dark one of the Apache women came to help her rekindle the fire and to

give her a plate of beef and yams and roe seal cakes. She ate

halfheartedly and waited, but Jamie still didn't return. Finally her

impatience brought her to the opening in the tent, and she looked out to

see Jamie and Nalte and the victorious raiding party sitting around the

central fire, laughing, talking, enjoying some newly arrived bottles of

whiskey, and apparently enjoying one another as if they were long lost

friends. In a fury she went to the fire and called Jamie's name sharply.

Every man there paused and stared at her, none of them more surprised or

annoyed than Jamie. Nalte shot him a quick glance and said something in

Apache. Jamie was quickly on his feet. He replied casually to the chief,

but two rugged strides brought him to Tess.

Before she could move or react he had butted her belly with his shoulder

and lifted her precariously. Her head dangled dangerously down his back.

She screamed out her protest, but Jamie ignored her and the Apache

laughed, enjoying the show.

Within seconds they were back in the tepee. She landed hard on one of

the blankets, desperately inhaling as he stared at her furiously. She

might have thought at first that he was drunk, but the sharp fire in his

eyes denied such a possibility. She accused him anyway before he could

yell at her.

"You're totally inebriated!"

"Inebriated--you mean drunk, don't you? I wish I were. Drunk enough to

give you what you need! And what you need is a good switch taken to your

hide."

"Oh!" She shimmied up to her knees.

"Don't you dare speak to me like that, Jamie Slater" -- "I don't think

I'm just going to speak!" he warned her, his lashes falling over his

eyes so that they were narrow and dangerous.

"I think I'm going to act" -- She was on her feet instantly, running for

the flap in the tent with a speed and agility as fleet as a doe's. But

at the flap she paused, realizing that she would be running into a group

of raucous Apaches.

She spun around, certain Jamie was almost upon her. But he was standing

back, watching her with supreme arrogance and amusement. He had known

she wouldn't run out of the tent.

She decided to take her chances with the Apache. She didn't make it.

Jamie had been still, but he came to motion in a flash. Just as she

reached for the rawhide flap, his arms swept around her calves, and she

came crashing down to the hard ground. She coughed and gagged and

struggled against his weight to turn around and face him. He straddled

her. Her sir~ple doeskin dress was wound high around her hips, and she

was naked beneath it. Jamie didn't seem to notice. He sat calmly upon

her, crossing his arms over his chest, aware that she wouldn't be going

anywhere at all.

He stared down at her.

"Undisciplined--brat!"

"Brat! I'm twenty-four years old" -- "An old maid! Maybe that's half the