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lady, she says she's, uh—"
    "Tell General Custer his niece, Dominique DuBois, is alive and well." Taking a step toward the threshold, she added, "Be sure to tell him I am standing here freezing in these filthy buckskins, too."
    Her manner, added to the family resemblance and name, startled the servant to action. She curtsied and backed down the hallway, "Yes, ma'am. Right away, ma'am. Come on in."
    Dominique turned to her escort and managed a wan smile. "Thank you for seeing me to my uncle's home. That will be all, Private."
    "Ah, yes, Miss Custer, ah, yes," he stammered as he slowly made his way back down the stairs. "Please be sure to remember me to the general—that's Lieutenant Macky. I'd appreciate it."
    "Yes, of course. And my name is the same as my father's—DuBois." Dominique waved to the lieutenant, then spun around and waltzed through the front door. As she looked around the parlor, she heard approaching footsteps. The staircase creaked, then Elizabeth Bacon Custer burst through the arched entrance to the room.
    "Oh, my stars," she cried, her small hands cupping her girlish features. "It's true. You really are alive and well."
    “Aunt Libbie, am I glad to see you.'' The women closed the short distance separating them and threw themselves into each other's arms.
    "Oh, you poor thing," Libbie went on, her relief sending a flood of tears to her throat. "Autie is going to be so happy to see you. I've sent one of the servants after him." Libbie stepped back and scrutinized her husband's niece. She pulled her fingers through Dominique's tangle of frizzy curls and asked, "How did you ever survive a dunking in that treacherous river? Where have you been? And where did you get those awful clothes?"
    "It's a long incredible story," Dominique said with a sigh, "but one that I cannot begin to tell until I'm clean and warm again."
    "Of course, dear." Libbie turned toward the kitchen. "Mary?" she called out. "You and some of the help draw a hot tub for my niece. Scoot along now and be quick about it. The poor girl's near to freezing."
    Two black girls scrambled out of the kitchen carrying large copper kettles, and the third, Mary, motioned for Dominique to follow her up the gracefully curved stairway.
    But Dominique hesitated a moment and turned back to her aunt. "My goodness, are all these servants yours?"
    Libbie grinned, enormously proud of her husband's insistence on keeping her in style, no matter what other hardships she might have to bear. "Yes, dear. Mary and her sisters go just about everywhere with the general and me. I don't know what we'd do without them."
    Dominique raised her brows, nodding slowly as she made a fast perusal of the elegant home. Perhaps, she thought, her sparkling smile back in full bloom, this little trip would turn out to be the adventure she'd dreamed it would be.
     
    Later, after a deliciously hot bath scented with her favorite perfume, lilac, Dominique sat huddled in front of a roaring fire in the luxurious living room of her uncle's home. Her hair had been washed, dried, and rolled into an attractive coil pinned to the back of her head. She was dressed in one of Libbie's warm flannel nightgowns and a voluminous robe.
    Now snuggled beneath two quilts made by the officers' wives, she tested a bit of barley soup from a steaming bowl. "Umm, that's wonderful. Thanks."
    Libbie, her brow still creased with worry, said, "I wish we had some chicken to put in it, but we're at the end of our winter supplies." Dismissing the cook and self- appointed mistress of the servants, Libbie waved into the air, "That will be all, Mary. Tell your sisters I appreciate their efforts in warming my niece."
    " Yes'm ." The round woman began backing out of the room, muttering, "If y'all be needin ' anything else, just you holler."
    "We will." Libbie waited until the cook was out of sight before she turned to her niece, her blue-gray eyes bright with fear. "Mary says you're covered with welts and bruises. What's