away all constraint. To the Devil with trying to reason with
Raoul. He rushed at Raoul and swung his arm with all his strength,
bringing his palm against Raoul's mouth.

Though open-handed, it was a blow that would have knocked many a man
down. Raoul only staggered back half a step.

But a trickle of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth.

"You still fight like a Frenchman, Pierre," said Raoul with a grin,
wiping his mouth. "Slapping a man. Think you're still a count or
something? Fight like an American."

He lunged at Pierre. Pierre barely saw, out of the corner of his eye,
the fist coming at him. A cannon went off at the side of his head.

He was on the floor, flat on his back.

Nicole screamed, "No! No, Auguste!"

Pierre rolled his aching head to one side to see Auguste standing over
him, his hand on the deerhorn hilt of the knife that hung at his belt,
the knife Pierre had left for him when he was a baby. Nicole held his
arm with both hands.

"Want to fight with knives?" Raoul said. He slid his own huge hunting
knife out and held it upright, the point glittering in the candlelight.

"Come on, redskin!" Raoul shouted, but even as he spoke he charged at
Auguste, as Auguste struggled to break free from Nicole. Raoul's knife
flashed and Pierre heard a cry of pain, and Nicole was between Auguste
and Raoul, and Auguste had his hand to his face and blood was running
through his fingers.

Raoul stepped away from Auguste and wiped his knife on a white
tablecloth.

"What have you done?" Pierre shouted.

"I was kind," Raoul said with a white-toothed grin.

Pierre rushed to Auguste. Blood flowed from a long cut that ran straight
down Auguste's cheek from just below his eye to the corner of his mouth.
The front of Auguste's tan buckskin shirt was stained red.

"If he'd pulled that knife, I would have taken his eye," Raoul said
softly. "I just left a mark on him. So he won't forget me."

"Let go of me, Father," Auguste said in Sauk, in a level, terrible
voice. "I have to kill him."

"No!" said Pierre, holding Auguste tighter.

_You're a brave boy, but I'm afraid it's you that would be killed, my
son._

Blood pounded in Pierre's head. He wanted to take Auguste's knife--the
knife he'd given Auguste long ago--and drive it into Raoul's chest.

_If I were like Raoul, I would do just that. Or try to._

"Raoul, for this I will never forgive you."

"Forgive me?" Raoul shouted. "Can I forgive you for bringin