Bishop went lame on the second morning out from the Wyre, and Orla heard it before she saw it.
She had walked behind the mule for five weeks, and his feet had made the same sound on every road: four beats, near fore, off hind, off fore, near hind, at an interval she could have set a clock by, and had, on days when there was nothing else to set one by. On the stony ground going up out of the river valley one of the four came short. Not every stride. One in six, and then one in four, and she counted it for a quarter of a mile before she said anything, because a thing counted once was a guess.
“Corin.”
“Near fore.” He had stopped already. “He’s been putting it down short since the top of the bank. I thought it was the stones.”
“It isn’t.”
“No.”…
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