That party. I still don’t know what she expects to achieve. Since the day she first mentioned it, my little Anouk has been wilful and strange; making plans; suggesting dishes; inviting all comers with lavish disregard for the practicalities of seating and space.

‘Can we invite Madame Luzeron?’

‘Of course, Nanou. If you think she’ll come.’

‘And Nico?’

‘All right.’

‘And Alice, of course. And Jean-Louis and Paupaul—’

‘Nanou, these people have homes of their own – families – what makes you think—’

‘They’ll come,’ she says, as if she has arranged it personally.

‘How do you know?’

‘I just do.’

Maybe she does, I tell myself. She seems to know a great many things. And there’s something else – some secret in her eyes – a hint of something from which I am excluded.

I look into the chocolaterie. It looks warm in there, almost intimate. Candles are burning on the tables; the Advent window is lit with a rose glow. It smells of orange and clove from the pomander hanging above the door; of pine from the tree; of the mulled wine that we are serving alongside our spiced hot chocolate, and of fresh gingerbread straight out of the oven. It draws them in – three or four at a time – regulars and strangers and tourists alike. They stop at the window, catch the scent, and in they come, looking a little dazed, perhaps, at the many scents and colours and all their favourites in their little glass boxes – bitter orange cracknell; mendiants du roi; hot chilli squares; peach brandy truffle; white chocolate angel; lavender brittle – all whispering inaudibly—

Try me. Taste me. Test me.

And Zozie at the centre of it all. Even at the busiest times – laughing, smiling, teasing, giving out chocolates on the house, talking to Rosette, making everything a little brighter just because she is there . . .

It feels as if I’m watching myself; the Vianne I was in another life.

But who am I now? I lurk behind the kitchen door, unable somehow to look away. A memory of another time; a man standing in a similar doorway, peering suspiciously inside. Reynaud’s face; his hungry eyes; the hateful, haunted look of a man half disgusted by what he sees – but who must look in, nevertheless.

Could this be what I have become? Another version of the Black Man? Another Reynaud, tormented by pleasure, unable to bear the joy of others, crushed beneath his envy and guilt?

Absurd. How could I be envious of Zozie?

Worse still, how is it that I am afraid?

At four-thirty Anouk blows in from the misty streets, a light in her eyes and a telltale glimmer at her heels that might be Pantoufle, if he existed. She greets Zozie with an exuberant hug. Rosette joins in. They spin her round, shouting bam-bam-bam! It becomes a game, a kind of wild dance that ends with the three of them collapsing, laughing and breathless, on to the furry pink armchairs.