“You’ve got to be valiant,” says Dodge.

“Valiant?” says Nate.

“Yeah, like brave on steroids,” says Dodge.

“I know what valiant means,” says Nate. “I was just wondering what new hell you’re planning.”

Dodge grabs him in a head squeeze. “Oh, you know me too well, Master Crow!” Then he steps toward the edge of the cliff and points to the waves slapping far below. “This,” he says grandly.

They’d been tromping uphill through the bush to the top of the jumping cliff on the east side of Picnic Island. You could climb up the cliff face maybe twenty or thirty feet from below, but you couldn’t scale all the way, not without climbing gear. But they’d found their way in, for the first time, from the picnic spot on the other side of the island. Dodge chuckles. “Bet you don’t have the cojones to jump it.”

“You’re right. And if I did, I’d lose my cojones doing it.”

“Told you.”

“I’m not going to jump from here because I’m not suicidal,” says Nate. He stares down the cliff face, his hands on his hips. “It must be around —”

Dodge cuts him off. “We’re not measuring this in yards or feet — and don’t give me any of your metric shit, either. This is stories high, Nathaniel; I’d say six, maybe seven. Seven stories.”

Nate looks again; his own guess would be closer to five, but that’s not what scares him off. The cliff rises from the water at an angle of maybe eighty degrees. He knows the water is plenty deep, even right at the foot of the cliff, but with a slope like this . . . “Man, you’d need to jump out something like three or four yards just to clear the rock face.”

“You got it,” says Dodge. He looks mesmerized. His expression kind of scares Nate. Then his friend turns his gaze away from the water below. “So we need to make a runway,” he says.

They spend a good whack of the afternoon doing just that. Clearing bush in their bathing suits and tees, Nate in his Walmart aqua socks, Dodge in his Speedo Surfwalkers. There is a breeze out near the cliff head strong enough to keep the blackflies at bay, but as they move inland, the flies close around them, getting in their hair and eyes.

Nate knows better than to try to convince Dodge not to do it. So what you do when your best friend is about to try something drastically stupid is make sure the “runway” is clear and long. And you calculate in the back of your head the whole time just how long it will take you to make your way back down, zigzagging through the trees to the boat at the picnic place; get the Evinrude cranked up; and then speed around to the other side of the island to rescue that best friend, who will have hit the stone face of the cliff before making it to the water, maybe gotten himself a concussion and drowned in the meantime.

The runway needs to be straight and, preferably, not uphill. And because of the trees and some intractable undergrowth, they end up with a path that actually runs almost parallel to the cliff for about twenty yards before doglegging right toward the edge for the last ten yards or so. In his mind’s eye, Nate imagines a high jumper’s approach to the crossbar — coming at it slant.

Nate measures out the stretch directly after the dogleg: five or six good long strides. He stops at the brink, feels a little dizzy looking down. He drinks some water from his bottle. Over to the left, below is a rocky outcrop perfect for mooring the boat when they come out here to jump. It’s the same place they stand to operate the Seeker. They’ve done it all along, daring each other to climb higher and higher but until today only as high as they could make it clawing their way up. If he gives it any thought, Nate can remember seeing Dodge stare up the cliff to the summit more than once. The only surprise is how long it has taken him to think about coming at the cliff from the land side.

They return the next day, set out early with a machete (Dodge) and loppers (Nate), plus an ax and a Swede saw. They are dressed for the bush when they first get there, but as the sun rises, they strip back to the bare essentials, blackflies be damned!

They’d made their way by instinct to the cliff head, finding the path of least resistance, a zigzag path, as it turns out. The island is rocky, with scarcely a rind of soil and clearer of underbrush than the mainland, so by the end of their second day they’d cleared a pretty good pathway from the shoreline on the west side. And now there is this runway to clear, as smooth and free of roots and snags as it can be, so that one crazy-ass best friend can charge toward his doom. That’s what’s supposed to be the crowning achievement of this second day of grooming. Nate has one other idea to stop Dodge. But he’ll have to play it just right.

“Okay, I’ve enjoyed about as much of this as I can stand,” says Dodge, wiping his sweaty face with his forearm. He’s covered with dirt and little dots of blood where the vegetation fought back or the blackflies feasted. His ponytail has come undone and his hair is across his eyes and full of twigs. He pulls it tight, replaces the rubber band. “Prepare for liftoff,” he says.

It’s the perfect segue.

“Hey, wait,” says Nate. “Speaking of liftoff, how about we get the quadcopter and film the momentous event. Dodge Hoebeek throws himself off the Empire State!”

You only have to appeal to his vanity to get Dodge’s attention.

“Good plan, Numbster,” said Dodge, nodding. “Let’s do it.”

Then he walks to the edge of the precipice. “I’ll be back,” he says in a bad Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation. As they make their way down the track they’ve cleared, back to the low side of the island, Nate grins to himself at how easy it has been to escape calamity. At least for now. It’s too late to come back today.

A valiant effort.

The door opened. The cowbell was gone. So were the chairs. Nate was washing up the cooking oil on the floor. It was Bird.

Calvin.

“A mop,” he said, nodding. “That’s more your speed, kid.”

“Yeah, well . . .” But Nate didn’t want to explain about how you kept the place tidy for next time. Camp was always about next time.

“I’m going to need the keys to the shed and the Polaris,” said Calvin.

“You know about that, too?”

Calvin smiled. “You know I do. That extra lock throw you off, kid?”

Nate went back to mopping.

“I make it my business to know everything that goes on down here.”

Up here, thought Nate. The Northend. But he wasn’t about to argue. He looked again at Calvin Crow a moment and then placed the rag end of the mop in the wringer, pushed the handle, and listened to the dirty water drain into the bucket. When it was done, he soaked the mop again and commenced washing the floor.

“I ast you a question, boy. D’ju hear me?”

“You know my name,” said Nate without looking up.

“What would that be, Dodge?”

“My real name. You knew it all along.”

Calvin sighed impatiently, then leaned against the wall by the door. “Well, you sure as hell ain’t that half-wit Hoebeek boy.”

“Shut up!”

“Whoa! Easy, now.”

“He was my best friend, okay. It’s not his fault his father was a fricking lunatic. Dodge would have —”

“Enough!” said Calvin, slicing his hand through the air. “This ain’t the time for discussion. The quicker I’m outa here with those hotheads, the better it’s gonna be for both of us,” said Calvin. “You get that, right?”

Reluctantly, Nate nodded, but the anger raged in him, beating in his head, constricting his throat.

“So whyn’t you just give me the damn keys.”

Nate stopped again and looked at this man who didn’t resemble his father one bit right now. Nate had sure never seen a look of hostility like this on his father’s face. And the gleam in the man’s eyes was dulled to something dangerous.

“Why’d you never visit?” Nate said.

“Ask your father.”

Nate looked away. Shook his head. “You got to admit this is a pretty screwed-up way of meeting for the first time.”

Calvin had given him as much time as he was going to. He stood up tall again. “This ain’t no jeezly family reunion. The keys. Pronto!”

Nate dared to stand up tall as well. Taller than his grandfather. He shook his head.

“You’re Burl’s son, all right,” said Cal. “Had to knock his head a few times against the wall to get a little respect out of the boy.”

“Respect? You call it respect? You almost killed him. The fire that burned down the old camp — if it weren’t for him, you’d have been dead.”

Calvin laughed. “Oo-ee! I bet you’ve had an earful of stories about mean old Calvin Crow. Let me tell you —”

“No!” said Nate.

“What’d you say?”

“No,” said Nate. “I didn’t hear a million stories about you. Just the one. And only when I’d bugged my father over and over. He told me about you burning down the Maestro’s place. That’s where he got the burn marks on his arms. ‘That’s all you need to know about your grandfather,’ he told me. And so I never asked again.”

Calvin nodded, his lips puckered out as if giving this some thought. Then he walked over to Nate and stood across the bucket of dirty water from him and leaned forward. “Without the keys to the shed, I’m going to have to hacksaw that Yale lock off. That’s going to take way too much time, and I’m still going to need the keys to the friggin’ Polaris. So, here’s the deal. It would be just as easy — actually, way easier — to take the hacksaw to you. Maybe just a finger, maybe a whole hand, dependin’ on how pigheaded you wanna be. So I repeat: the keys. Now!”

There was no point in arguing. Nate had seen nothing in the man’s eyes to suggest he’d stop short of sawing off his grandson’s hand to get what he wanted. He got him the keys.

“Good lad,” said Calvin. He headed toward the door but stopped before opening it. “I brought back your snowshoes,” he said without turning. “There’s food in the fridge over at the other camp. Not that the fridge is on or nothin’; it’s cold enough in that sunporch. I know you’re gonna want to clean up all nice and pretty after your messy visitors. Might as well enjoy some good grub while you’re at it.”

Nate swallowed. His instinct was to thank him, despite everything. He fought down that instinct. Calvin turned his way. Nate nodded, stone-faced. Calvin turned again to go, but still he hesitated. Then he turned one more time and the black anger was gone from his face. “I meant what I said back there when the boys was over here. Once I get paid for this business, I’m outa here — out of everyone’s hair. Headin’ west.” He looked around the camp. “Shoulda done it years ago.

“But you can tell your father somethin’ for me, okay?”

“What’s that?”

“You tell him I always knowed he’d make it — make something out of himself. Knowed it all along. So I’m not gonna apologize for ‘sharing’ some of what’s his. I never had the chances he did. No, sir. What I done . . . let’s just call it spreading the wealth. Okay? You got all that?”

It took a moment for Nate to respond. There was too much to digest in what the man said. He nodded anyway. Then the door opened and closed, and Calvin Crow was gone.