She stood shyly under the friendly scrutiny of the farmer with the handlebar moustache who wore a tweed jacket and peaked cap. He touched his cap in greeting and nodded to her.
'My wife and I and our son and neighbours are going to Port Haven to do purchase some things we need, and we need someone to look after my son's wife and the neighbourhood children while we are away. It pays,' he added with a humorous caricature of an imploring look. 'We'll even throw in meals.'
'Yes, I'll come,' Kara said, her face breaking into a smile, glad for the change from her routine.
'Well, hop aboard then,' Pietro said as Guiseppe helped her up into the wagon. Without further ado he clucked to his horses, and Kara waved excitedly back at Guiseppe as they climbed the hill.
They turned to the right, following a wide grassy swath that parted the forest as they moved ahead. Kara groaned aloud as she realised that this was the road she'd never found on the day of her mishap with the bicycle.
'Forget something?' Pietro asked her.
'No,' she rejoined in a pained voice. 'It's just that I was looking for this darned road the other day, and here it is! I should have been looking for wheel ruts.'
'Wheel ruts don't always mean a road on this island,' he told her. 'Some of the roads just don't get used enough, while some of the hilly ones get flattened out by erosion or cross solid rock. Can't always rely too much on your eyes in this place.'
The grassy road curved its descent to the left down a hillside, then dead-ended at another that crossed their path. Pietro turned the wagon sharply right and up a steep hill that curved away to the left, and they soon plunged into deep forest, where in the semidarkness the air was made suddenly moist and cool. Presently the air began to become warmer and drier, the grade to descend once more, though less steeply this time. A well-used narrow lane then appeared on the left, and he turned onto this, went on for a piece, and so it went for some time until Kara was quite lost. But eventually Pietro took one last turn and said, 'This is my driveway. And there, up that slope overlooking the road, is my house.'
Kara was greeted by a dozen children ranging in age from a few toddlers to an eleven-year-old. In the midst of them stood a happy-looking young woman Kara's age holding a baby. To one side waited several wagons and the children's parents, ready to depart for Port Haven.