thaw eve is not a fixed date. it falls on whichever february night the lake first cracks loudly enough to be heard from the windows of the inn. somebody hears it, says so, and word goes round before midnight. by the time the message reaches the farthest cottage the eve has already begun. nobody can quite remember being told the rules — only that the rules are kept.
at midnight, the elders walk a short way out onto what is left of the ice and listen. then they come back. then the bell is rung at the inn three times, slowly, and nobody is allowed to speak in the road until they are indoors again. the oldest account, from a fisherman's diary of 1748, calls the rite the asking of the lake to let us cross again.
now there is also a meal. each household brings what is left of its winter store — half a jar of pickles, the last salt-fish, a heel of bread — and lays it out on the long table at the inn. what is uneaten is given to whoever asks. the lake usually opens properly within the next three days. nobody calls this proof.
— field note: the crack this year sounded at twenty past ten. it was, as always, mistaken for a door being shut hard.