I decided then I would maintain a distance as much as possible. He was a married man. I’d been down that road before and I wasn’t about to make the same mistake again. So, I wouldn’t do any more markets with him and I wouldn’t go round to see his place as he suggested. I would maintain a polite distance, stay away.

I watched him drive off. And I wouldn’t have gone near him ever again, if it hadn’t been for what happened the day after.

CHAPTER TWELVE

I called around to see Nick the morning after the fair, keen to tell him about my day. Considering the amount of money he’d made with the bonheur du jour at auction, I thought he might be disappointed with our paltry pickings, but not at all. He seemed pleased. ‘I’ve brought back the rest of the stock,’ I told him. ‘It’s in my van.’

‘No, no. You keep, Juno,’ he told me. ‘You keep it till next time.’

I wasn’t so sure there was going to be a next time. And I didn’t want to keep the boxes. I didn’t have room in my flat to store them and I couldn’t leave them in the van because I needed the space for the Tribe every morning. But I wanted to ask him a favour, so I mentally resigned myself to lugging the wretched things back home.

‘You know that nasty, ratty-looking stuffed weasel you’ve got down in the shop? It’s not likely to sell, is it?’

‘You want?’ Nick frowned at me, puzzled. ‘You want weasel?’

‘I don’t want weasel, but I would like the case.’

‘What for you want case?’ he asked suspiciously.

‘It’s just an idea I have, something I want to mess around with. I’ll pay you for it.’

He shrugged. ‘It’s yours. Take it.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes. Go, fetch,’ he said, as if I was a dog. ‘Juno,’ he called out as I started off down the stairs. ‘You take weasel. You no take case and leave me with weasel.’

‘OK!’ I called back, wondering if the council refuse collectors would take away a stuffed rodent if I left it in a bin.

The weasel was up on the top shelf in the shop, which meant climbing up a dangerously rickety wooden stepladder. Whilst I was wobbling about on the top step amongst the dust and cobwebs, I examined some other taxidermy items. The glaring owl and its case were much too big for my purposes, but there was a badly stuffed, furious little creature, which might once have been a red squirrel, baring its teeth at me. Its case was about the right size.