Kate took it automatically. With a final wave, George folded up and latched the window. The engine roared to life, the prop rotated and a minute later they were airborne.

Kate looked down to find that the object she was holding was a small wooden trophy, a fake brass five-pointed star on top and a thin fake brass plate affixed to the front. She held it up in the dimming evening light to squint at the words.

FIRST PRIZE

for Best Entry in

the Open Invitational All Alaska

Independence Day Parade

Cordova, Alaska

The four old women and Johnny were still seated around the fire, which had been recently built up. Berries and gear mending had been abandoned for Monopoly, the board unfolded on a large round of sawed-off tree stump, and from the pile of money and property accumulating in front of Johnny, not to mention the smug look on his face, it seemed that he was winning. He rolled the dice, cruised on up to North Carolina, which he owned, and trained the forward guns of his battleship on the Short Line, which he didn't.

Edna hopped one-footed around Go, landed her shoe on Baltic, collected two hundred dollars and handed it over to Johnny with a sigh. He owned Baltic, too, and she was staying at his hotel. She sighed again and mortgaged Boardwalk to pay off the rest of the rent.

Auntie Vi looked up at Kate and Jack's entrance into the clearing and said instantly, "Ayapu, you two, you better go back in the woods and finish what you started."

"That's nothing," Johnny told her, "you ought to see them in town." He rolled his eyes. "Mush," he added in his best Grumpy imitation. "Yuck."

Jack put one hand to the side of his son's head and shoved. Johnny collapsed in a heap of sand, giggling. Mutt bounded forward and attacked and they roughhoused around the yard until they very nearly dumped the Monopoly board. When it tottered, Kate distinctly saw Edna reach out and with a slight nudge of one stubby forefinger give it a slight assist. The pieces went everywhere. Johnny leapt up with a cry of anguish and began scrambling after them.

Kate raised an eyebrow at Edna. Edna, all round-eyed innocence, blinked back.

"Tea, Katya?" Auntie Joy said, holding out a mug. Kate traded it for Auntie Joy's trophy, reading out the inscription in fine round tones, adding an embroidered version of George's description of the winning entry. Edna and Balasha laughed heartily.

"So that's why you flew into town on the Fourth," Kate said, and at Auntie Joy's puzzled look added, "I saw you in George's Cub. I wondered."

There was a brief pause, and then Auntie Joy exchanged a look with Auntie Vi that Kate couldn't read. "Yes, I go to be in parade," Auntie Joy said placidly, bending over the berry bucket once more. But she'd left it a little too long, and Auntie Vi looked a little too impassive, and Kate wondered what they were up to. They were grown women, they could get up to anything they wanted to, but still, she wondered.