The Winter Ghosts - By Kate Mosse Page 0,45

well as a pair of heavy men’s gloves.

‘Please thank Monsieur Galy for the loan,’ I said. ‘They’re a perfect fit.’

‘They are not my husband’s,’ she said quietly. I saw a look pass between the Breillac boys and their father, but nobody said anything, so I threaded my fingers into the soft fur lining without further comment and thought no more about it.

Guillaume acted as interpreter, because although my French was adequate, it did not stretch to such technicalities as torque tube or running board. With a mixture of hand gestures and his blunt translation, we established where the car might be and what I considered the extent of the damage.

We set off shortly after ten-fifteen under a blue sky, unbroken by clouds. As we crossed the place de l’Église, I felt my heart expand with the beauty of it; the same old world, but seen through new eyes. A white winter sun hung low in the sky and it was bright but cold.

Monsieur Breillac put his hand on Guillaume’s arm and spoke rapidly in patois. I waited until he translated. His father suggested we should climb up through the woods rather than risk the charreton. A two-person cart pulled by a donkey, he explained in response to my raised eyebrows. His father said the road would be iced over and it would be slow and treacherous going. Whereas the woodland paths, protected by the trees, would be more secure underfoot. If I had the stamina for it, that was.

Having been so wretchedly ill, you might wonder at my arrogance. Or stupidity, I suppose. Indeed, I wonder at it myself, even now. Looking back, though, I can only say that I knew I had the strength I needed. The fever had passed through me, leaving in its place a kind of nervous energy and a sense of purpose I’d been lacking for some time.

I readily agreed to Breillac’s proposal. And I was excited, too. Sitting beside the dewpond, Fabrissa had invited me to come and find her. And it was in these mountains that I had first heard her voice.

There had been no fresh snow overnight so, despite a hard frost, the going was not too bad. We walked at a fair pace and soon arrived at the bridge which I had crossed two days previously. As we tramped over it, the Billy Goats Gruff and I, the frozen water below glinted in the December morning like the surface of a looking-glass. Reeds and brown rushes stuck up through the ice like a line of tin soldiers, as if caught at the precise moment the winter took hold.

We walked across the drab fields, the brown furrows crusted with snow, and were soon on the outskirts of the woods where the trees sparkled with frost.

I pointed out the path by which I had descended and, in single file, we began to climb. It was steep, yet it seemed less taxing than previously. Breillac and his sons were easy company, and the sun and the lack of wind lifted my spirits. I kept my ears peeled for Fabrissa’s voice, but today there was no suggestion of figures in the mist or watchers in the hills.

I held off asking the Breillacs if they knew of Fabrissa because I did not want my hopes dashed. The longer I delayed the question, the longer I kept the possibility alive that they could tell me where to find her.

So on we went. I remember a bird singing high up in the barren branches of a tree. A hen blackbird, maybe a robin, oddly English sounds to hear in a French country wood, prompting the absurd thought that Fabrissa and I might, some day, walk hand in hand on the Sussex Downs. My plans were castles in the air, of course, dreams, imaginings of silver days we might spend in one another’s company. The countless dusks watching the sun sinking down into the earth. The nights in one another’s arms. And I smiled as I remembered her clever grey eyes and the pale turn of her chin and the drape of her hair across her shoulders. My heart ached to see her again.

‘I wonder, Guillaume, if you might know a girl by the name of Fabrissa?’

He thought for a moment, then shook his head.

‘What about Pierre? Perhaps your father. Could you ask?’ He turned around and I, keeping my tone light, carried on chattering, shoring up my defences against disappointment. ‘We were introduced at the fête, a couple