Two hours later we leave our car as far as it takes us and we climb to the top of a hill. A group of four or five people waiting in front of a little cave come to life when they see us. Bending low, we step into the cave. His head bowed as if asleep, a nine- or ten-year-old boy is holding a stick with both hands, his back up against the wall, a cap on his head, wrapped in an old jacket. This is Kamber. A little shepherd in training.

Two days ago when the storm broke out the shepherd had managed to get his flock back to the village but Kamber trailed behind him as he rounded up the last lambs. Losing sight of the flock, he had no choice but to take shelter in this little cave. And without means to keep warm he eventually froze to death.

We bring Kamber out of the cave and lay him down. I am going to have them write up my official report. And then maybe do an autopsy. I check his clothes. Find a little knife in his pocket, the kind they sell in street markets.

“If he had matches he would have made it,” says the prosecutor in a blank voice.

“At least he could have burned those twigs and sticks in there, warmed himself up.”

Suddenly I was sent back to a childhood memory in Avanos. One of those days toward the end of winter when spring was just showing her face. Five or six of us went to Kıran to hunt for Keme. That is to say, truffles: those expensive mushrooms that grace the plates in fancy restaurants. In the first months of spring and especially right after a shower they would swell out of the earth near the cemeteries.

Poking at the earth with sticks, we collected the keme and stuffed them in our sacks. There was a sudden shower and we took shelter in a cave, one of many in those parts. Shivering inside as we waited for the rain to let up, the oldest kid in the group assuredly ran his hand over the wall of the cave. A little later he pulled out from a crevice in the wall eight or nine matches and a little med kit wrapped in paper with a pinch of salt. Soon we got warm around the burning twigs and sticks and we feasted on the keme in our sacks and the keskiç my mom had given us. When the rained stopped, we wrapped the remaining matches in the paper with the pinch of salt and put them back in the crevice before we left the cave.

That day I went back to the village a little more “grown up.”