First Lines...

"All afternoon her cries could be heard throughout the small wooden enclosure they called Fort Mandan, winter quarters for the expedition across the river from one of the tribe's villages. Two rows of huts faced each other at an oblique angle within the stockade, and from one of these the guttural shrieks emerged with a grim regularity. In and around the other huts the men kept to their business - skinning game, cutting wood, cleaning guns - but each flinched inwardly when the next cry reached his ears." ...Across The Endless River by Thad Carhart