Utah native Jim Ray is the only child of deceased parents. When he comes home from war in April 1966, he also finds himself the only heir of a distant and dying cousin in Wyoming. On paper, the inheritance includes almost four hundred acres in the Balford Valley and a water source known as Honey Spring. But Jim soon learns that he has inherited much besides cropland and swamp pasture. The spring, it turns out, is more than a geographic divide between neighbors. Thanks to the vicissitudes of fortune, the history of that divide is a history of friendship soured by grief and loss, envy and ambition, accusation and suspicion. Moving into a community polarized by the rift, Jim realizes that he has survived one kind of war only to become entangled in another. He can perpetuate the fight, or, because of his growing feelings for a girl from the other side, he can make the first moves toward forgiving and healing. Finally he must decide his place in the history of Honey Spring.