The Mas Caussade farm was arranged as three sides of a rectangle around a central cobbled yard. One side was formed by the farmhouse itself and the other two by the thatched stables and long sleepy barns where the hens liked to annoy the farm cat dozing in the straw. All around, as far as the eye could see, lay the wide-open pastureland owned by my father, green and glossy, except where the bright emerald carpet of glasswort had adopted its scarlet summer colours, soaking up the sun. The constantly high level of the underlying water-table made the plant-life rich and vibrant. A thousand different greens tumbled over each other and shimmered with papery butterflies and gaudy tree frogs.

I never tired of this landscape. It stirred things in me that got lost and trampled in the city’s daily hustle and bustle, but which I could feel coming alive again. Squeezing their way into my heart once more.

With a roar, a fighter aircraft streaked low overhead, shattering the peace as I skewed my car to a halt in front of the bull-yard and raced to the house, but someone was there before me. Outside the front door stood a car, its chrome gleaming in the bright sunlight, its black wings bulbous and glossy. My heart tripped over itself. We all knew who used black Citroën Traction Avants.

The police.

*

I knocked. I could have lifted the latch and walked in, but I didn’t. I knocked. I heard one of the dogs barking in the yard at the back – it sounded like old Lyonette – and I felt childhood memories brush against me, making my skin prickle, like walking into cobwebs.

The door swung open and my father filled the doorway. It was hard not to reach out a hand to him, but I kept it tight at my side. He was not that kind of father. Aristide Caussade was not a tall man but he was built of solid muscle like his bulls. His hair and beard had turned white years ago but his bushy eyebrows and his deep-set eyes were still as dark as old oak.

‘Hello, Papa.’

He nodded and his stern gaze fixed on my cheek. He showed no flicker of emotion. ‘Come in, Eloïse.’

As he moved back to allow me entry, I didn’t let the moment slip by, and before he could stride away down the hallway and vanish into one of the rooms, I seized his arm. It was like seizing a tree trunk. He looked at me, surprised.

‘Is he here, Papa, is he? Tell me quickly. Is he alive? Have you heard from him? How is he? Where is he? I’ve been sick with not knowing or hearing.’

‘André is alive, if that’s what you mean.’