Day 2 - Scene 3

Far away up on the porch the bell rang as the gate pulled shut behind them. The unexpected sound silenced the birds, but only for a moment and soon they sang once more, as if nothing had happened.

“Handy thing that.” Rolf turned right and started walking up the road. “This way, it's not far to the crossroads."

“Is that where the village itself is?” Enar asked. He remembered coming past a crossroad last night on the cart, but couldn't recall seeing anything that looked like a village.

Hasse had yelled a greeting to someone sitting on a bench by the roadside. The person had yelled back, but they hadn't stopped and Enar hadn't thought much more about it. He'd been rather tired at the time.

“No, but the inn and the field are just around the bend from there and the cider-house is just a little further.”

“Where's the village then?” Enar asked.

“The village?” Rolf laughed, “oh, I see what you mean now. You came through Ballyroed on the way here and now you're wondering where the big gathering of burrows is?”

“Well, yes, isn't that what a village is? A group of burrows together in the same spot.”

Rolf seemed about to make some joke again but then thought better of it, realizing he was dealing with someone who'd never been outside the city. “To be fair my friend, in most places you'd be right, like in Ballyroed. They all live around that lake they got there, close together.

“Here though, there's no central place like that. I guess we could all live around the field, but that wouldn't be the same, and despite, we need space for our orchards.”

“I see,” said Enar, “the inn and the field are the central locations and then the 'village' is spread out over the nearby hills?”

“Yes. Exactly. You're not too slow for a city folk after all my friend.” Rolf laughed and slapped him on the back in that cheerful, companionable way people in cheesy old movies did, only for real.

For a while they walked in silence. The road wound its way along the forested hillside, here warmed by the mid-morning sun, there shaded by the leafs and needles of the surrounding trees. Life was good.

Rolf pointed out a rare flower growing by the side of the road and Enar asked about a tree he recognized from a park back home but hadn't seen anywhere else.

They talked about the weather. Enar complained about the rain over the city and Rolf pointed out what a beautiful day it was here on his vacation.

They talked about the children. Enar wondered at about how Eric and Linnea seemed to be doing most of the running of the household and Rolf explained it was only during the weekend.

They talked about life. Enar ranted about the new system for cataloguing observation documentation at work and Rolf retaliated by explaining, in great detail, how he'd had to help one of the sheep give birth.

“I thought you said you didn't have any sheep?”

“I don't,” Rolf replied, “they're the village's flock. We take turns looking after them – same as we take turns helping out at the inn on Restday.”

As they walked the forest around them gradually changed. The firs grew sparse and eventually disappeared. Oaks were replaced by beeches and the thorns and bushes on the ground gave way to a tall green grass that waved lazily in the breeze. The forest became open enough it was almost a meadow. Here and there big, moss covered troll's marbles nestled in the hillside.

Eventually a bend in the road took them round one of the enormous boulders and on the other side of a small ravine they could see the crossroads.

---

Continued in Day 2 - Scene 3 - Part 2.

Back to Enar's Vacation.