There is no way to stop it. As Charlie fights to get them out of the way of a large boulder, one oar snaps and next they know they are in a spin. The back of the boat hits another boulder, loosens a plank, the water rushing in thick and fast. Fortunately, the current has pushed them close to the grassy bank. Without discussing it with Charlie, Livia leaps, sinks to her knees in icy river and mud, takes hold of the prow and pulls it towards solid ground. They have to work fast. Thomas cannot move and the water is rising in the bottom of the boat. As they struggle with his deadweight, the entire side of the boat breaks open in a cloud of rot. They pull him through it, onto the bank, press anxious fingers into his pulse. Downriver, the water accelerates and cascades down a five-foot drop. Upriver, the sun has begun to dip. They may have put three or four miles between themselves and their pursuers.

If they are, in fact, being pursued.

A sound rouses her out of her thought. It is instantly familiar: cloth flapping in a breeze. Livia jumps up, rounds a row of bushes dense enough to be called a hedge. Behind them, she finds a washing line, shirts and sheets rising and falling with the breeze. Half the line is empty: a farmer is collecting clothes in her thick arms. The woman sees her the same moment; walks towards her with a leisurely roll, then catches sight of Thomas and Charlie.

“Three of yous!” she shouts from afar. “Wet like newborn lambs. But where’s your boat?”

Livia walks to intercept her. “Is there a village here? A doctor?”

“A league that way.” She gestures. And adds, with a habitual weariness: “My husband, the old blockhead. Says he likes to live apart. So we do, God bless us.”

The next instant she catches sight of Thomas’s face. Much of the poultice has washed away. Blood colours the collar of his shirt. The woman’s cheerfulness vanishes in an instant. All at once her manner is very brisk.

“Is he alive? Then we better carry him inside.” Without waiting for an answer the woman shoves the laundry into Livia’s hands, then lifts up Thomas’s head and shoulders.

“Well, jump to it, lad,” she barks at Charlie. “Take his feet.”

Her cottage is not twenty yards away, but pressed into the side of a hillock in such a manner as to be almost invisible. Inside, a fire is burning in the stove. Kitchen and living room are one, the ceiling low and rutted with beams. They bed Thomas on the kitchen table. The woman fetches a bucket of water and some clean rags.