Bram’s ferry is a hull on a rope, a mile south of the bridge, west bank to east.

He counts. “People. Packs. One horse if the horse has manners. Not three horses and a sermon. Overload is how we visit the Lynne the wrong way.”

The rope is the cleverness: the current helps if you angle, the rope keeps you from becoming a legend downriver. You haul, or you sit, or you refuse.

East bank: the Painted Staff, the ridge-mouth, Thatcham somewhere in a list.

West behind you: a village that still needs a cutwater if you have not shored it.

The rope is greased and honest. Bram’s hull is scarred by other people’s overloads. A mile south of the bridge feels like exile until you see how the current eases in this bend. Ferries live where bridges are proud or wounded.

West-bank ferry-post is iron-stained wood. East-post matches. The rope between is a drawn itinerary of one mile south of the stitch of the bridge.