‘Well, he won’t come round to the chocolaterie,’ I said, feeling cross and a bit weepy, and especially cross that I’d told Roux. ‘Says he doesn’t feel comfortable.’

Actually, that’s not all he said. But the rest of it was so stupid, and so wrong that I couldn’t bear to say it again. I mean, I really like Jean-Loup. But Zozie’s my best friend – apart from Roux and Maman, of course – and it bothers me that he’s so unfair.

‘He doesn’t like Zozie?’ said Roux.

I shrugged. ‘He doesn’t know her really,’ I said. ‘It’s because of that time she snapped at him. She’s not at all uptight usually. She just hates having her picture taken.’

But it wasn’t just that. He showed me today: two dozen pictures he’d printed off from his computer and taken that day in the chocolaterie; pictures of the Advent house; of Maman and me; of Rosette; and lastly, four pictures of Zozie, all of them taken at funny angles, as if he were trying to catch her in secret—

‘That’s not fair. She told you to stop.’

Jean-Loup looked stubborn. ‘Look at them, though.’

I looked at them. They were terrible. All of them blurred and looking nothing like her at all – just a pale oval for a face and a mouth that twisted like barbed wire – and in all of them, the same printing flaw: a darkish smudge around her head, with a yellow circle surrounding it—

‘You must have messed the prints up,’ I said.

He shook his head. ‘That’s just how they came out.’

‘Well, it must have been the light, or something.’

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘Or something else.’

I looked at him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You know,’ he said. ‘Ghost-lights.’

Oh, boy. Ghost-lights. I guess Jean-Loup’s been wanting to see his weird phenomena for such a long time that he’s totally flipped out this time. I mean, Zozie, of all people. How wrong can you be?

Roux was watching me with that carved-angel look. ‘Tell me about Zozie,’ he said. ‘You sound like you’re pretty good friends.’

So I told him about the funeral, and the lollipop shoes, and Hallowe’en, and the way Zozie had suddenly blown into our lives like something from a fairytale, and made everything fabulous—

‘Your mother looks tired.’

I thought – you can talk. He looked exhausted; his face even paler than usual, and his hair in desperate need of a wash. I wondered if he was getting enough to eat, and whether I ought to have brought some food.

‘Well, it’s a busy time for us. With Christmas, and everything—’

Hang on a minute, I thought to myself.

‘Have you been spying on us?’ I said.

Roux shrugged. ‘I’ve been around.’

‘Doing what?’

He shrugged again. ‘Call me curious.’

‘Is that why you stayed? Because you were curious?’