One night in July 1810, Timothy overheard his stepmother nagging his "Timothy is it? That brat! Either he goes or I'm off like a redshank. Is it the lad or me?"
And Timothy knew, of course, what the answer must be. Lying there in the loft, he made up his mind. He'd run off by himself, the very next day, even though it meant leaving the only life he'd ever known, leaving his father and Brandy his dog and Jane Kearney, his closest friend. But where could he go?
There was only one possible the Foyleside farm, a hundred miles away, where his dead mother had been born. She had described that warm and welcoming place over and over. He had only a scribbled map to guide him; he didn't know if his mother's kin still lived there, if they would welcome him, or even if the farm still stood. But he set out anyway, on the long journey across Ireland, with the first of his pursuers already on his heels.
