The old man shifted uncomfortably at the agony in his voice. “It is hard; mind you, I don’t deny that it is hard. But facts are facts, and weaker peoples always go to the wall…Now, as to the rest of your mission. If we don’t retire as you request, you’re supposed to ask for the return of your hostage. Sounds reasonable to me. You ought to get something out of it. However, I can’t for the life of me remember a hostage. Do we have a hostage from you people?”

His head hanging, his body exhausted, Jerry muttered in misery, “Yes. All the Indian nations on our borders have hostages. As earnests of our good will and peaceful intentions.”

Bright Book Jacket snapped his fingers. “That girl. Sarah Cameron—Canton—what’s-her-name.”

Jerry looked up. “Calvin?” he asked. “Could it be Calvin? Sarah Calvin? The Daughter of the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court?”

“Sarah Calvin. That’s the one. Been with us for five, six years. You remember, chief? The girl your son’s been playing around with?”

Three Hydrogen Bombs looked amazed. “Is she the hostage? I thought she was some paleface female he had imported from his plantations in southern Ohio. Well, well, well. Makes Much Radiation is just a chip off the old block, no doubt about it.” He became suddenly serious. “But that girl will never go back. She rather goes for Indian loving. Goes for it all the way. And she has the idea that my son will eventually marry her. Or some such.”

He looked Jerry Franklin over. “Tell you what, my boy. Why don’t you wait outside while we talk this over? And take the saber. Take it back with you. My son doesn’t seem to want it.”

Jerry wearily picked up the saber and trudged out of the wigwam.

Dully, uninterestedly, he noticed the band of Sioux warriors around Sam Rutherford and his horses. Then the group parted for a moment, and he saw Sam with a bottle in his hand. Tequila! The damned fool had let the Indians give him tequila—he was drunk as a pig.