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it filled with the sound of childish voices, women calling. Right now all she could hear was the lowing of a flock of sheep a couple of fields over, the swish of a single car down on a road below. It was likely quieter now than it would’ve been a century before. Pure country, as far as she could see. She crossed the paved road and then followed anunpaved lane until it petered out in the midst of three old houses. The houses all looked abandoned, although in different eras. One was no more than a roofless stone shell, while the others showed more recent use. Maura leaned against a wire fence to greet the sheep in the field. The ones closest to her looked blankly at her for a few moments, then returned to cropping the grass beneath their feet.
    She heard the sound of a car coming up the hill, and made her way back just as Mick parked and got out. “She’s gone to sleep, has she?” he called out as Maura approached.
    “How’d you guess? I forgot to thank her for fixing things with Ellen, and for sending you to get me.”
    “She’s glad for the company. I come by as much as I can, but it can be lonely here. The old families are gone. I’ve got her a telly, and she’s on the phone”—he waved at a satellite dish on the far side of the building that Maura hadn’t noticed—“but she’s never got in the habit of using them. She prefers the old ways.”
    “She did ask if I could come back and see her again, but I don’t want to impose on you—is there any other way to get here?”
    He quirked an eyebrow at her. “So she didn’t mention…No mind. She’s seen to that. Follow me.” Mick led her around the back of the cottage, and Maura saw there was a small shed there, far newer than the cottage itself. He pulled open the double doors to reveal a small but highly polished car. “She wanted you to have the use of this, while you’re here.”
    She turned to gape at him. “What? She wants to lend me a car? I can’t take that.”
    “And why not? It’s not new. In fact, it was my grandfather’s, not that he used it much, and he’s been gone some twenty years. Can you manage a stick manual transmission?”
    “Uh, I guess.” In fact Maura hadn’t driven much at all in her life. In Boston it was simply too expensive to own and insure a car, and besides, there had always been buses or the T. She had a license, but mainly as an ID—she’d cadged the bare minimum of lessons from the older brother of a friend, and once she’d passed the test she hadn’t had much opportunity or need to drive anywhere. And here she’d have to drive on the left, with a stick shift, for God’s sake. This was not a good idea. Was it?
    “You’ll do fine. The keys are in it, and I made sure it still runs and filled the tank. And that way you can visit when you like. But like I said, she tires easily.”
    Like I can’t tell when she’s tired?
she thought. “Uh, could you at least back it out of the shed for me?”
    He gave her a critical look, then wordlessly climbed into the car, started the engine, and swung the car out of the shed, pulling to a stop only inches from his own car. “There you go. Can you find your way back?” Without waiting for an answer, he said, “Down the hill, turn right at the T, then follow the road. It’s easy.” He handed her the keys, then turned and got into his own car.
    “Thanks!” Maura called out to his retreated back. He raised a backward hand and pulled out onto the lane, leaving Maura standing in the small courtyard with the keys in her hand.
    Things were happening much too fast. It had been kind of Mrs. Nolan to set her up with a place to stay at Ellen’s,but to hand her a car? Not even knowing whether she could drive it?
Could
she drive it? Well, she’d better find out, since Mick had disappeared and left her stranded out here in the middle of nowhere, and she wasn’t even sure how to find her way back to Leap, despite his directions. This Irish “welcome” business was a mixed