When morning came, he would make an attempt, if she had not forgotten. Well no, Echo was incapable of forgetting anything. Everything that had ever happened to her, everything she had seen and felt and heard and smelled and tasted was all there in her mind. But it was hard to draw it out because she had no categories. You had to find a specific detail and then add that to another and then another and another until some sort of picture was suggested.
He sighed and turned to sleep and just as he was letting go, he fancied that something touched his own mind too, with just the whisper of a whisper. Then he decided he was only imagining; he lacked Echo’s quick, delicate talent.
Vern wanted to question his sister the first moment the three of them were awake, but there was no chance of that. For Echo, everything had to fall into place in a customary routine. First, Vern had to go outside and “scout,” as Moms put it — meaning that he had to find a tree and take a leak, fill a can with stream water, and look for dangers or for nothing until Moms had cleaned up Echo and brushed her hair as best she could and made her feel Echo-ish. This was one of the few times she enjoyed being touched by others, except for petting and hugging Queenie and guiding Vern’s hand during the drawing sessions.
So out he went into a gray, chilly dawn with its sky streaked here and there with scores of dropping meteorites. This time he really did look about for signs of danger because of Echo’s restlessness and his own vague feeling that something was waiting to happen. He toured the small, handy game traps he had set, but they were empty this morning. He had been seeing raccoon sign by a little streamlet that fed into the waterfall stream and was pretty sure he could capture it some soon morning before dawn. That would be glad news for the family, meat and pelt together. He did not bother to look into the fish trap set at the farther end of the waterfall pool; he had seen yesterday evening that a large brook trout was captured in the willow-withe cage and he would let it stay there to keep fresh. They already had stocked two smoked trout in the cave, one for now and one for the other meal of the day.
He let himself recall, for the most fleeting of moments, the great, lush blackberries he had gathered some forty-odd days ago, so juicy-sweet they had made Echo tremble as she crammed them into her mouth by handfuls while Moms watched her with teary eyes.
Then he turned the thought away. It might make his emotions rise to a detectable level. The Olders.
Time now to go back. Inside, he saw Echo all freshened up to the best of her mother’s ability. She was hugging Queenie and singing her wake- up song: “All night all night all night. ”
He found his length of steel — a flattened lever two feet long — and went to the ember hole, lifted off the slate covering, and dug out one of the cylinders of foil. The other he left for supper. He covered the hole over again and brought the trout to where Moms and Echo sat waiting.
Mom looked more tired than yesterday, he thought, but Echo was as happy as ever she could be. She liked the taste of the trout smoked in foil, but more than that, she liked the anticipation of eating it. She drummed her hands on her crossed legs, smiling and murmuring softly her song, “All night all night.”
“Thank you, Vern,” Moms said when he handed her the packet. “Did you sleep well?”
“Echo was hearing something,” he said. “She was almost awake.”
“I know.” Moms took the one metal knife they possessed from her belt and divided the fish. Her belt held up the britches she had stitched together with nylon fishing leader from an old, mostly rotten tent they had found in the woods. They needed to find some more fabric soon or roam around naked. Echo would not like that; she must have her many-colored robe, cloth scraps of every kind held together with pins and wire bits and paper clips and whatnot. She would squall if she had to go naked.
“There is something she wants to tell us about,” Vern said.
“The Old Ones?”
“I don’t know. Should we try to find out?”
“Maybe we should. I heard once long ago that they make parts of forests like this one into preserves and stock them with all sorts of animals that might harm us. To this particular environment, they might import grizzly bears and gray wolves and panthers. Wolves and panthers used to inhabit here.”
“I know,” Vern said. But he didn’t know and he wouldn’t inquire. I heard once long ago — this was Moms’ phrase to indicate something her husband had told her. Best never to say his name, for sorrow would rise in them and such a feeling — or any strong feeling — was so alien to the Olders that they could detect it at fairly long range.
His father had known many things: history and science and music and numbers and stars. He had known too much about the stars. He had known too much about everything. See what grief his learning had brought them. Vern turned aside these thoughts.
But Moms had remembered some of the history her husband knew. He had told her of the caves in this part of the mountains where remnants of the Cherokee nation hid out when the soldiers came to drive them away and to rape and kill and burn. Those who did not hide in the caves were herded on the Trail of Tears, to suffer and die on the brutal march westward. Vern had found signs and leavings in their own cave. A rose-colored flint knife was his special treasure.
Queenie had trotted out of the cave when they began eating the fish. She would scout the area, ranging farther than Vern had done, and then return for her own meal. It had taken a long time to reconcile her to this routine, but they needed a sentry in this hour. When Echo ate, she could concentrate on nothing else until the breakfast ritual was complete. When Queenie returned, Vern would feed the dog the smoked opossum buried in the ember hole. Now he passed to his mother and sister the can of water brought from the stream. Each drank, then both washed their hands and faces, Echo mimicking Moms’ actions closely.
Tasks awaited Vern. He needed to fashion new traps from whatever pliable materials he could find. He already had a good-sized stock; the woods were full of discarded things, trash that was treasure for the family. He also needed to pile wood to dry for burning and to fashion into rude tools to dig and scrape with. But he was concerned about what Echo might have discovered. This was a good time to try to talk to her; she was calm and good-natured after feeding.
He sat on the earth floor beside her and began slowly. “Echo?”
She shook her head and would not look at him. Sometimes she was shy about contact; sometimes she seemed only to be teasingly coy, but of course she was incapable of such an attitude.
“Echo?” He kept repeating her name until she did look at him, her bright gray eyes staring into his face, her gaze now locked to his.
“Broke dirt. Do you remember? Broke dirt. Dirt broken. Do you remember?”
Yes, she remembered. She never forgot anything. But getting her to speak of one specific subject in the past was difficult because she knew no past. Everything was immediate.
“Broke dirt,” he said again and, for a wonder, she repeated the phrase — three times in a row.
“What for, broke dirt?”
She repeated this phrase too for awhile and then interrupted the loop. “Go. Go broke dirt.”
“Where is it?”
This question would make no sense to her and he regretted asking it. Sometimes when words made no sense, she would fall into a spooky silence and sit unspeaking, unmoving, for hours.
He had found out, though, that something had spoken in her mind, or to it, saying that the three of them must travel to Broken Dirt, wherever and whatever that was. He waited and then said, “Draw?”
She nodded, solemn-faced.