Moving upriver from Book I, Book II's focuses on childhood, continuance, and the eradication of physical barriers.

Captain Spott's beloved widow Pegah, her competent daughter Alice Spott, and a young Ruth Roberts step onto center stage, along with the boy Harry Roberts becoming fluent in Yurok.

It tells of the Roberts' arrival at Requa in 1915. Of Ruth seeking Indian friendship, her little son solace and warmth. With the horrors of World War I moving closer, there is a picnic on the sandspit in 1917. Soon Robert Spott joins the fight overseas. The Roberts take an upriver boat-trip. Ruth's second race comes when an aged Indian life is at stake and White law questioned.

Fryer tells more about herself and the sacredness of wildflowers; of dried foods, redwood canoes, netting, the last Fish Dam in 1913, and Wayback.

Looking back to 1828: The appearance of the first North American Whites (Jedediah Smith and his fur trappers) on their way into Oregon and big trouble. The Rekwoi Indians hide nearby, helped out by coastal fog and loss of the Smith journals, while south of the Russian River presidios, missions, towns, and enslaved Indians dot the Alta California coast.