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    "You should not laugh!" Growling Bear scolded. "We have been shoved onto land where we cannot survive on our own. If the South wins, then even that may be taken from us!"
    Taken aback by that warning. Viper's mood grew just as dark. "All right then, the choice is clear. We can join the Union Army and fight for a government which breaks all its promises and leaves us to starve, or we can wait and fight the South for the right to survive on whatever lands we choose!"
    The air thick with tension. Two Elk offered still another opinion. "With so many white men gone from Minnesota to fight the war, we could drive out the rest if we struck now! Why have we no leader with the courage to do so?"

    "This is the kind of talk we should do elsewhere," Viper warned as he rose to his feet. Like mamy men of his tribe, he was slightly over six feet in height and stood proudly. That a discussion of his travels had swifdy become a war council did not surprise him, for there was not a man among them who had any respect for the government of the United States. The chiefs had been wrong to give up their lands for promises of food and money, and he thought as his friends did that their situation had gotten so bad that not even war could make it worse.
    As he turned away he saw Hunted Stag's sister. Song of the Wren, standing nearby. She was supposed to be minding her little sister, but clearly she had been watching him instead. Like all Sioux maidens she would not approach a brave who interested her, but the boldness of her glance held an unmistakable invitation. She was a pretty girl with large brown eyes, flowing black hair, and a shapely figure, but Viper had not courted her nor any of her friends. They were all pretty and sweet, but none had ever stirred his blood to the point where he wanted to make her his wife. He gave Wren no more than a slight nod as he walked away.
    Wren was so disgusted that she had again failed to impress Viper favorably that she reached tor her sister's hand with a rude yank. The little girl gave a yelp of pain, which Wren quickly hushed. Her brother would tell her where the handsome brave had been. Since she had not seen his friends teasing him, she knew Viper had not been visiting a woman in another camp. But that thought did nothing to raise her spirits. She was a very popular girl. Many braves came to her tepee in the evenings, but that Viper was not one of them filled her with a disappointment so deep it was swiftly becoming a black rage. It was dme she took a husband, and no man but Viper would dol Dragging her whimpering sister along behind her, she returned to her family's tepee to ask her mother's advice in winning the heart of a reluctant brave.
    Though seething with discontent, the Lower Agency to which Viper had returned would have appeared to the casual observer to be a peaceful encampment of tepees nestled between bluffs of the Minnesota River Valley. Overlooking the Indian camp stood a settlement of traders' stores, quarters for the Indian agent and other

    government personnel, along with shops, bams, and several other building, including a new^ly constructed stone warehouse. While the Sioux did not consider the feelings of the whites, the traders were as anxious as they were for the Indians' gold to arrive, since they had long passed the point at which they could op)erate on credit. Therefore, the summer of 1862 found no one at the Lower Agency happy.
    Viper managed to remain home for one week before his spirit grew too restless to remain where every word spoken was a complaint. To the north lay the Upper Agency, which occupied far better lands for hunting. But he had no wish to trespass ufx^n them. No, his interest lay toward the south, and without providing an explanation of his plans, he again slipped away before dawn so none of his friends could beg to join him or follow. .
    A loner by nature, he was comfortable in his own company, but when he reached the woods outside New Ulm he knew if he