No time for tidal pool exploration or a seafood harvest today. Kate stood on the bridge of the Freya and surveyed the beach through Old Sam's binoculars. Just above the high-tide mark the rain forest closed in, pine and cedar and alder and cottonwood and birch and spruce all jostling for place. The setnet sites had been hacked out of this jungle by main force, and the cabins built there constructed either of prefab kits freighted in by barge, or of the detritus of sea and land, their split log-tarpaper-plywood designs reminding Kate of Emaa's add-on, multilevel, any-thing-goes-for-siding-including-the-sawed-off-bottoms-of-beer-bottles home in Niniltna.

The Meanys' nearest neighbor to the west was Mary Balashoff; to the east, the Flanagans. "Widow woman," Old Sam said briefly. "Got herself a couple of girl kids that are holy terrors. You can go talk to them all by yourself."

She wanted to talk to everyone all by herself, but Old Sam wasn't having any. He ignored gentle hint and loud protest alike and climbed down into the skiff like he owned it. He did, so she yielded the kicker and moved forward to sit on the thwart in the bow, feeling reduced to ballast. Mary Balashoff's site was on the west side of Amartuq Creek, Meany's on the east. It was far and away the richest creek that emptied into Alaganik Bay (Kate's ancestral elders had been no fools), and she wondered how Johnny-come-lately Meany had acquired title to the site. She asked Old Sam.

Old Sam took his time steering the skiff around a clump of seaweed. A sea otter kept a wary eye on them from the center of the clump, paws clutching a clam and a rock. "He didn't. He didn't need to."

"Why not?"

"Alaska beaches are public beaches up to the high-water mark. Setnet sites can't be personal property."

Kate knew this, but held her peace. Old Sam never passed up an opportunity to relieve her ignorance, whether or not she suffered any. He resembled Shitting Seagull in that respect. She turned her head to hide a smile.

"However," Old Sam said pontifically, "if somebody's family has been fishing the same site for a hundred years, it's their site for the next hundred, unless you want to try to move in at the point of a twelve-gauge."

Kate's gaze sharpened. "So you're telling me Meany brought a twelve-gauge?"

"Pretty much. Nate Moonin used to fish it, but he sold his cabin to the Ursins, a married couple from Anchorage." Kate remembered Lamar telling her that nearly a third of the setnetters on the Sound were neither traditional nor professional fishermen. "Teachers," Old Sam said. "Well hell, makes some kind of sense, I guess. Teachers get the summer off, so they buy a permit and move their families down for the duration." He grinned. " 'How I Spent My Summer Vacation.' "

"How'd Meany get in on the act?"