CHAPTER THIRTY-ONEThey ascended the Sardy lock staircase in the glazing heat, sixteen locks in three kilometres and nowhere to stop, with the sun coming at them from that end-of-summer angle which inveigles its way under fishing umbrellas put up for shade, and the brims of hats. The two itinerant lock keepers who accompanied them looked like extras from the film Deliverance (too much leather and too many chains for Colin’s liking) but the lock keepers’ cottages had exhibitions of sculpture and pottery and – oh Tyler – watercolours to keep them diverted as they climbed up and up and up.
He was starving by the time they reached the top. “I’m famished!” he panted, hammering in a stake for them to moor to.
“What is famished?”
“Hungry.”
With that, Delphine bolted from her place on the bathr
