It was late in the afternoon. Coppery sunlight was slanting across the waves and splashing up against the smooth trunks of the palms around the lake.

Ssshh-k! Ssshh-k! Ssshh-k!

Andrew stopped planing, wiped his dripping forehead, and looked up at his father, who stood just outside the shed, deep in conversation with the grizzled old merchant captain. “It was what he wanted,” Jacob was saying. “I would have followed that man anywhere. Anywhere! But he wouldn’t let me. Ordered me to go back home, back to my family —to the people of Gadara —to tell everyone what he’d done for me. As if I could keep my mouth shut!”

“Good for him,” drawled the captain. “We need you here, Jacob. Anybody with the power to give you back to us, whether god or man . . . well, I’m on his side, that’s all.” He paused to spit in the sand.

“As for those pigs,” he added, raising an eyebrow and lowering his voice, “good riddance to ’em! You should’ve had a whiff of my hold after I hauled that one load up to Gergesa. Phew-eee!” The two men broke into loud guffaws. Andrew leaned against the workbench and grinned. It was good to hear his father laugh again.

“Whatcha doin’?” said Lyra, running up, jumping through the air, and landing on her knees in the sand. The old gray goat trudged along after her, stopping every so often to chew stray tufts of beach grass. In the little cart behind him rode a brand-new doll —a wooden doll. Andrew smiled, remembering what fun it had been to watch his father carve it. He had sat with his father under the billowing awning outside the door to their house on a warm summer evening.

“I’m building a new boat,” proclaimed Andrew in answer to his sister’s question. “Father’s helping me this time, so it’s going to be even better than the first one. I’ve learned from my mistakes.”

“That’s good!” said Lyra. Then, as if remembering something far more important than Andrew and his boat, she jumped up. She tossed her hair over her shoulder, and trotted off to join a group of children who were playing along the shore.

“Off to a great start,” said Stephen, ducking in under the awning and giving Andrew a wink. “Think you’ll be doing any solo trips in this one?”

Andrew grinned. “No. I don’t think I’ll ever do anything alone again!”

“Everything’s ready!” It was his mother calling. She stood a short distance up the beach, between the boat shed and the shining cliffs. She had spread a leather tarp on the sand beside a small wood fire and set out reed baskets of bread and fish. “Supper on the beach tonight!”

“Hurray!” shouted Andrew, dropping his tools on the workbench and running to help his mother with the picnic. “Come on, Lyra! Supper on the beach!”

But Lyra couldn’t hear him. She was too busy dancing and singing with the other boys and girls on the shore. Andrew could hear their song drifting up from the water’s edge, mingling with the evening cries of the birds and the music of the lapping waves:

Jacob and Jesus down by the shore,

Jacob’s not crazy anymore!

“Andrew,” said Helena, filling a wooden bowl with grapes and pomegranates and glancing up at the men, “your father seems a little . . . preoccupied. Do you think you could convince him to join us for supper?”

Andrew picked up a loaf of the hot bread, sniffed it, and smiled. “That shouldn’t take a miracle!” he said.