Smile, says Gideon Gunn. You ain`t going to your doom. Fourteen-year-old Livy Pelton isn`t so sure. Her aunt and uncle drowned on the journey west, and now she and her eleven-year-old cousin are orphans, bought by this seemingly dim and hideously smelly man at a Pauper`s Auction on New York`s western frontier. Worse still, Gideon expects Livy to go to a Seneca town and teach the Indians how to spin. Livy has been brought up to believe there`s nothing more dangerous than an Indian, but Gideon is determined to send her--alone. This page-turning adventure cackles with action and is full of exceptional historical detail and richly developed characters. It is also an astonishingly beautiful love story.