By Geraldine Brooks
It was only when Lexington walked right into a barrow that someone had carelessly left in the midst of the paddock that Jarret began to suspect the truth. He pulled a kerchief from his pocket and flapped it. The horse leaped sideways and Jarret felt a rush of relief. But when he tried the same test on the other side, the horse made no response at all.
One eye was failing. There had been signs: a manner of tilting his head to favor the better eye, the way he dropped his muzzle to probe the ground, especially where surfaces changed suddenly from dark to light. The horse had been resourceful. In the familiar surrounds of Metairie, he’d made his own mental maps and compensated even as his world began to darken.
A blind horse has other acute senses: smell and hearing and the delicate sense of touch in the fine hairs of his face. He can travel well through his known world using these. But away from his familiar home, there was fear.
Harry had always told Jarret that Boston went blind because of a savage beating. He’d been sure that the blindness wouldn’t be passed down to his foals. But now Jarret wondered if his father had been mistaken. Perhaps Boston’s blindness was hereditary. He…
