"Oh, but I must be getting on now, thanks awfully," she said. "I was only going to push the bike to the top of the hill, and that's not far, is it?... Please don't keep on about it, Mr.? Mr.?"

"My name is Reuben. You should call me Reuben."

"Well, all right, Mr. Reuben," Peter went on. "It was your little girl who was so brave. She hung on by herself and all I did was jump for his head when I saw him coming. I couldn't really help it 'cos I couldn't very well get out of the way... and besides," she added inconsequently, "I love horses and he was so frightened. It was that tank, I suppose?"

He nodded. "Yes. But you will ride up the hill with us." So Peter picked up her bicycle, and Reuben lifted it into the caravan and closed the door. Then he showed her how to climb up to the driving seat and waited until she was seated there in state before he took the horse's head and started up the hill.

"Won't your little girl come up here too?" Peter called, feeling a little ridiculous and rather enthroned. He shook his head and spoke a few words to the child, who glanced back at Peter with a slow, shy smile, and then trotted off ahead of them up the hill.

Peter's knee was painful and she felt sick. She leaned back and closed her eyes as Reuben looked over his shoulder and said gently:

"Ride at ease, little chi. The romni will clean the knee. See; she comes to meet us."

Peter opened her eyes. At the top of the hill, where the trees thinned out and the sunshine spilled in a golden flood across the road, the gipsy woman came running. Then Reuben began to talk again, and from far away Peter realized that he was telling her how the caravan had been turned at the top of the hill and that Fenella - so that was the child's name - had been left alone on the driving seat while he went to find wood and his wife went on into the quarry to see what other Romanies were camping there.