The Governess wakes up in the middle of the night to find her boat drifting downstream. She's afraid she's run into a "water spirit" , but the Governess doesn't know what to do, so she cooks up some food for her. She asks if her parents would be worried about her absence, and she assures them that she hasn't seen them for a few days. She also tells her story: her mom died ten years ago, and the only thing she has left is the apricot tree, which is her family's main source of income. In the village, everyone holds an apricot kernel