I remember the date clearly, even now, because it was later that evening that Del’s body was found. These two events—my betrayal and her murder—have become so strongly linked in my mind that it is like one could not have existed without the other. Other than her killer, I was the last person to see Del alive. And when I last saw her, she was running from me. Running as fast as her scrawny legs with their scabby kneecaps would carry her. In those last weeks before both my fifth grade year and Del Griswold’s life ended, things at New Hope were coming to a head. Life in the tepee had been far from peaceful. Lazy Elk, it turned out, was the father of Doe’s baby, Raven. Mimi was the one to tell my mother, who—instead of tearfully, yet with quiet dignity, thanking Mimi for her honesty—immediately accused Mimi of being a meddler and rumormonger who couldn’t stand to see anyone else happy. Mimi stalked out of the tepee, with my mother shouting after her, “You don’t know anything about it!”
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