After Copper River where Henry Meloux is barely mentioned - we get a book that is all Henry - including his backstory. We begin with Henry in the hospital with a heart ailment. Cork O’Connor visits - and Henry tells him he must find his son. A son Henry has never seen, and one he fathered over 70 years ago. He tells Cork the story of how he first became a guide, taking people into the Minnesota wilderness for hunting, fishing, or other explorations. On an early trip, the group includes a young Cuban woman named Maria. While Henry’s uncle and the men of the party leave each day, Henry stays behind to fish and maintain the camp. His friendship with Maria grows and soon they are lovers. They meet a French widower who lives alone in the woods, and shows Henry his stash of deer pelts and gold. The men in Maria’s group are looking for gold. They discover that Henry and Maria have been sleeping together, the party leaves, but days later one man returns, Leonard Wellington, looking for Maurice’s cabin. He brings a man with him who he introduces to Meloux as “an experienced guide”. When Henry refuses to disclose the location of Maurice’s cabin - even with a bullet wound in his thigh - Wellington and the guide take off. Henry frees himself from the tree Wellington tied him to - and although he is in great pain from the bullet wound, he takes off to warn Maurice. He arrives too late. Death, carnage, Wellington leaves without the gold, Henry helps Maurice die, and then tries to find his way to a nearby village. With winter coming, and no supplies, Henry struggles. He has a vision, he is found by someone from the village. He lives with them for seven years, learning the ways of the Ojibwe Mide. 
After seven years, he returns to Tamarack County, where he is enamored with the young woman who will become Cork O’Connor’s grandmother. Henry is destined to a life alone. 
Henry has a watch that Maria gave him. Armed with that watch, and the names of Wellington and Maria, Cork begins his search. He finds the man who is Henry’s son - a recluse who is retired from his job as the head of Northern Minnesota Mining company and lives on an island in Thunder Bay, Canada. Cork tries to meet with him - is refused - but then an attempt is made on Henry’s life. Why?
Cork, Henry and Wally Schanno travel to Canada to find Henry’s son - and learn why the attempt on his life. 
Along the way - Krueger pontificates about firearms and using them in a manner that involves respect, not maliciousness. And, daughter Jenny is talking of skipping college and moving to Paris with her boyfriend to become a writer. Until she ends up pregnant. Interesting sub plot - that could have made a strong social statement about abortion, but instead focused on the decisions that teenagers and their parents have to make when faced with an unplanned pregnancy.