In the dark beside the lake called Grief, Noah moved from the rocker to the cot, stretched across it, pulled the blanket over him, resting his head on the pillow, and he tried to push the memory of Dachau away from him.

Still, something was there. Not Dachau. Something else. A sense that he was being watched.

He closed his eyes. Thought again of the man in Dachau with an eye-rag over his face, and picturing the man made him think of Howard Reynolds, who wore an eye patch to cover a dead eye.

He liked Howard Reynolds, liked the boy with him, the boy with thick eyeglasses. His grandson, Howard had said, reaching out to run his hand over the boy’s head, and the boy—Matthew, was his name, Noah remembered suddenly—had flashed a glad smile.

“He likes fishing,” Howard had added. “Maybe before you leave, we can all go over to the Chatuge and drop a line.”

“Yes sir,” Noah had replied. “I’d like doing that.”

Outside, he could hear the lake breathing in rest. Real as a person. Soft. Slow. He wondered if the breathing was from the lake or from Arch Wheeler’s ghost. Or maybe from the ghost of Boyd Cunningham.

Whatever it was, it was not frightening.

Whatever it was, it lulled him to sleep.

Surprisingly, his sleep was a good one, a sleep earned from his day’s labor of digging and from the filling supper, and he awoke realizing he could not remember dreaming. It was a good sign, he thought. During the war, and after it, he had dreamed nightly, and the dreams had often left him spent and dazed. He had expected to dream after thinking of Dachau. Not to dream was relief. Not to dream was hope.

He made a small fire in the shack’s stove and boiled water for his coffee, but was not hungry, not after so much food at the supper prepared by Eleanor. Taking his coffee, he walked to the lake and stood at the water’s edge watching the morning light turn the water’s surface to glass, reflecting trees and mountains that surrounded it. God taking a look at himself, his mother had called it, for his mother believed God had better judgment than to take on the resemblance of man. Trees were grander, more noble. God would be a tree, if he needed to be anything at all.

The lake was a good place, as Hoke Moore had said it was. Peaceful. Hard to believe it was a place where a man had taken his life.

From the middle of the lake, he saw the water shimmer, saw a bulge, saw a ripple slide gently down the swelling.

A smile broke over his face. Mr. Fish, he thought.

Hoke Moore’s fish.

Maybe he would keep his promise to the bass and catch it and give it to Eleanor Cunningham as proof there were fish in the lake.

He squatted at the water, touched it with the palm of his free hand, could feel the vibration of life that swam deep below the surface, hidden like bees in a hollow tree. He wiggled his fingers in the water, imagined the life stirring, fish darting like meteorites across the universe of the lake.