Chapter 7 Summary

As the summer passes, Ruth sees similarities between their early years with their distant, distracted mother and the Sylvie's hands-off care. One Saturday, Ruth and Lucille bring fishing poles and gear and walk up the shore to an inlet where they catch and roast many small fish to eat with the huckleberries growing wild there. They end up spending the night there and coming back cold and wet and exhausted the next morning. Sylvie is waiting for them with quilts she has warmed behind the stove. She wraps them up in the quilts and feeds them cups of Brimstone tea made from condensed milk, hot water, and sugar. Lucille asks if Sylvie knows where they were all night and Sylvie laughs. Ruth falls asleep sitting in the kitchen.

When Ruth wakes up, Lucille is getting ready to go downtown to the drugstore to...