He spent several minutes enjoying Nell's body next to his. When he left the bed, she awoke briefly but returned to sleep at his urging. The dugout was cool and musty in the early morning dawn. Collier found the coffee and started a fire in the iron stove. He remembered the great pride Ellen Fox placed in the stove. As meager a house as it was, it had always been spotlessly clean and a source of pride for her. Collier had to fight his feelings of hatred and the desire for revenge. He had been with General Winfield Hancock the year before and knew the toll of death and destruction that the whites had inflected upon the Indians in that campaign. Collier felt that the bitter memories of Hancock's raids were still with the Cheyenne. "An eye for an eye," he mumbled as he watched the fire in the stove. He remembered Annie's birth. He had stopped for a visit only to find John Fox working feverishly to prepare for the delivery. He read the birthing book to Fox as the two big, bearded men with hands more suited to shovels, fumbled with the tiny new lady.
