“I was getting on a vaporetto at Rialto,” she began, “and the strings were frayed on my bag of shopping, and the onion I’d bought fell out and was rolling around the deck. It was about to go into the canal, and you stopped it with your foot and picked it up and wiped it off with your handkerchief. And you gave it back and said something funny . . .”

“How about, ‘Here’s an onion you don’t have to cry over’?”

“Yes! Oh, that’s perfect. We started talking, and when I got off you alighted, too, and we kept talking as we walked, and then we were at the front door of . . . where would I have been living?”

“Not at the hospital, since it isn’t anywhere near Rialto. Hmm. What about one of the university residences in San Tomà? Or maybe those are just for men. A boardinghouse for female students?”

“Yes. Yes, that would work.”

Now Niccolò took up the thread of the story. “I asked if you might agree to meet for a walk the next day, and even though you didn’t know the least thing about me, you agreed.”

“We went for a walk every day until you had to leave.”

“But I wrote to you—”

“And you came to see me every time you were in the city—”

“And I asked you to marry me in the summer, the last time I was there, and even though it meant giving up your studies you agreed. We were married the day before yesterday.”

“And now you’re bringing me home to your family,” she finished.

“Yes.”

“I think they’ll remember the onion. Good night, Nico—sorry. I meant to say Niccolò.”

“Nico will do. You’re family now.”

THEY WERE AWAKE at dawn.

“I’m sorry we don’t have anything for breakfast, but we’ll be home in a few hours. Do you mind walking for a while? Bello is feeling the damp this morning.”

“I don’t mind, no.” Walking had to be better than another day spent on that horrible cart, and if she was walking she wouldn’t have to dwell on how tired and anxious and sad she was.

They walked and walked, the sun climbing ever higher in the brightening sky. The road rose slowly, steadily, the flat plains giving way to soft, low hills and the distant, stony spine of the mountains beyond.

She’d forced herself not to ask the question before, but now she gave in. “How far do we have to go?”