A suffocating dejectedness pressed on them. Ned found it hard to look at any part of the orchard without wanting to lie down or shout. He was still tired from his struggles on the river the previous day. Moisture had crawled through his boots. It all left him ragged and weary, so when he heard a sputtering growl, it took him a while to realise that it was an engine. His father was collecting apples from the far end of the orchard, and hadn’t reacted. Ned put down his bucket and moved towards the sound.

He soon found its source: a truck, reversing down the lowest paddock, backing a trailer to the river. It was crunching over scrub, flattening bracken, snapping saplings. Ned began running. It wasn’t meant to happen like this. As he ran he saw Maggie, riding the mare. She must have seen the truck, but she was galloping away from it, towards the house. Ned hoped she would go inside and stay there.

When he reached the shoreline the gentleman had manoeuvred his vehicle against the boatshed at an uneven angle. He had removed his jacket, lowered the trailer, and was in the process of shoving the boat onto it. He had the bow up, but couldn’t seem to shift it any further. He put his back to the stern, bent his legs. A hoarse panting blew out of his mouth. As he began to heave, Ned reached him.

‘Sir…’

He stumbled around, let the boat slip. ‘Young West! In the nick of time.’ His face was red and wet, his shirt drenched around the neck and armpits. A thick smell lifted from him: a sharp fume, obscuring the play of Huon pine in the air.

‘Where’s Harry?’

‘Who? Oh.’ The gentleman rubbed a sleeve at his forehead. ‘Useless bastard. Don’t need him, anyway, do we?’

He resumed his position at the stern and gestured for Ned to join him. Ned saw the splintered marks the gentleman had already gouged into the woodwork. Saw the shake in his legs, the fog in his eyes.

The man’s face was all capillaries and sweat. He gestured at Ned. ‘Come on, come on.’

Ned was about to move forward, or he wasn’t—he didn’t know; he felt sick—when he heard footsteps. He turned and saw his father marching over the flattened ferns. The old man strode past Ned, straight to the trailer. The gentleman only noticed him when he was a few feet away. He straightened. Fiddled at his shirt. Offered a hand.

‘Ah, the father. What a…’

Then he was on the ground, on his back, William West standing over him, tall and grim. His fury everywhere.

‘Thirty seconds to explain yourself.’

The gentleman wheezed. The wind had been knocked out of him. He squinted, scrabbled, tried to speak. Couldn’t get anything out.

‘It’s his, Dad. I sold it to him.’