“His life was two lives now: the life he would have and the life he would forever wonder about.”

“he loved her deeply and irrevocably. His life would be forever changed and if she weren't in his life, well, it would be meaningless".”

“All his words and actions would now be fit for his daughter’s ears and eyes. Life would be lived as if under [her] constant scrutiny. He would never do anything that might cause her pain or anxiety or embarrassment and there would be nothing, absolutely nothing in his life to be ashamed of anymore.”

“No one mocked him in his bedchamber, but he would not live his life in bed.”

“That night, as Cork lay in his bedroll, he thought about the bear they were after. He was glad Sam had changed his mind about killing the great animal, but he hoped they would at least see it. He thought about the Windigo, which was something he hoped he would not see. And he thought about his father, whom he would never see again. These were all elements of his life, and although they were separate things, they were now intertwined somehow like the roots of a tree. All his life he would remember the bear hunt with Sam Winter Moon. In some manner he didn't quite understand, the hunt had opened a way in him for the grief to begin passing through. All his life he would be grateful to his father's friend.”

“Now he knew that any memories he might cherish during the last years of his life would be only fictions from a biography he'd never lived.”