Howard thinks back on his own father, a preacher who spent much of his time at his desk writing sermons. The sermons are boring and frequently unpopular, but as his father deteriorates with illness, both mentally and physically, they become nearly nonsensical. After one such sermon in which his father says that the devil is not wholly bad, the townspeople complain. As his illness worsens, Howard and his mother watch him slowly recede from the world.

One morning, Howard watches his mother dress his father in the living room and struggles at the sight of his frailty and helplessness. Soon after, a carriage arrives and his mother helps his father in before climbing in herself. The next morning, when Howard asks why his father is absent for breakfast, his mother tells him that he is gone. After his disappearance, Howard dreams of his father and hopes to find him in the forest, among the trees. He goes to Tagg Pond in an effort to discover his father, and as he walks, he imagines finding physical pieces of his father in the natural world around him, in corn on their stalks and in the wood of a tree.

At Tagg Pond, he wades into the water and sits on a rock.