So I agreed that his fish was by far the better. And I hunted up another slug so he could try for a third. And I stood close but without touching the line as he cast in again, and caught another trout, and did everything else that needed to be done except that last part with the rock.

I made him watch while I cleaned the fish and threw the guts into the river to wash downstream like big, gory worms, a feast for turtles and bottom-fish and flies, but unlikely to attract bears to the place where we fished.

“Those are the best fish anyone ever caught,” Samuel said of his two trout. “And yours is pretty nice, too.”

The three fish were identical.

“You’re right. And they will be delicious.” At which he smiled.

I wrapped the fish in oilcloth and tucked them into my pack, setting aside the glass jar I’d brought with me.

“What’s that?” Samuel asked.

The balsam inside had melted a bit with the heat of the sun on the rock, turning the tears and dew a nice shade of copper.

“Nothing.” I climbed down to the edge of the river to let a little cold water flow into the jar. Just enough for some wildness. “It’s something like tea. Nothing you’d like.”

And then I made a mud pie and wrapped it in my kerchief, for the bee sting that was sure to come.

Chapter Seventeen

When we reached it, the hive was wide-awake, which is not a great thing when a person wants honey. But I was there, and the hive was there, and I would try.

“Sit,” I said to Samuel, pointing at a log just off the path. “And don’t move.”

He gave me a look. But he sat where I pointed and watched as I buttoned my shirt to the neck.

“Aren’t you afraid of getting stung?” he asked.

“Not afraid, so much, though I hope I don’t.”

From my pocket, I took my knife and a flint spearhead I’d found when my father and I were planting potatoes. “Keep that with you,” my father had said. “It could save your life someday.” I’d thought he meant as a weapon until he showed me how to strike the flint on his shovel to make sparks. “Fire,” he had said. “Few things more valuable in this world, and you can make all you’ll ever need if you know how. That’s the secret to everything. Knowing how.”

“And you’ll teach me.” Which was as much statement as question.

“I will. But you’ll learn best by doing.”

I had thought about that. “How am I supposed to do something that will teach me how to do it if I don’t know how to do it in the first place? That’s like a circle.”