Hal and Rachel returned some time later.
“…taught her to make fire,” said Hal.
Rachel smiled shyly, shuffled her feet a bit, and leaned into Hal. Ham noticed that they were holding hands. He looked at Martin, who shrugged as if to say “you never know, do you?”
“Will you teach me how to make water bags and carve walking sticks and…?” Rachel asked, so quietly that it might have been the breeze blowing through the gaps in the walls.
Ham looked at Hal. Hal cocked his head left, then right. When his head came back to center, Hal said “…stay and teach?”
Ham was stunned to silence. He hadn’t thought about Hal staying. Well, really, he hadn’t thought much about Hal going or staying or what Hal’s role in his journey was. So he thought about it.
He realized that Hal had his own journey. While Ham didn’t know what that journey was, he did realize that Hal had come with him because Ham had appeared at the right time for Hal.
Ham said “Of course, Hal, if that’s what you want.”
Rachel hunched her right shoulder, then her left, beaming all the time. Hal cocked his head left, then right, then center and smiled at Rachel.
“Maybe I can stay in this house.”
“I don’t see why not,” Rachel smiled.
And the decision was made.
Rachel left them for the night, and Ham and Hal and Martin sat in what was to be Hal’s home.
“Are you sure?” Ham asked Hal.
“Why are you asking him that?” asked Martin. “Don’t you think he can make up his own mind?”
“Well, sure. I just didn’t really know why Hal came with me, where he wanted to go, or what he was going to do. Now that he’s said he’s not coming along, I kind of know that I liked having him along. But if he wants to stay in Wait with Rachel, and teach the folks here the things he’s learned so far, I guess that’s fine with me!”
Martin, with a sparkle in his eye, cocked his head left, cocked his head right, brought his head back to the center, shrugged his right shoulder, shrugged his left shoulder, and said “Well, now, I guess you’ll just have to do with a strange old man like me!”
Ham, for no reason that he could figure out, found this unbearably funny and started laughing for the second time that day. He laughed and howled and groaned and laughed some more. He fell out of his chair, and rolled on the floor, howling with laughter the whole time.
When he was done, he lifted himself back into the chair, took a deep breath, and said “then that’s the way it will be.”
They sat by the fire for a time, sharing a word and a thought now and then. When the fire had settled down for the night, so did the three companions.
