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Back The Lollipop Shoes
Chapters (96)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Book
  3. The Lollipop Shoes
  4. Dedication
  5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  6. PART ONE
  7. 1
  8. 2
  9. 3
  10. 4
  11. 5
  12. PART TWO
  13. 1
  14. 2
  15. 3
  16. 4
  17. 5
  18. 6
  19. 7
  20. 8
  21. PART THREE
  22. 1
  23. 2
  24. 3
  25. 4
  26. 5
  27. 6
  28. PART FOUR
  29. 1
  30. 2
  31. 3
  32. 4
  33. 5
  34. 6
  35. 7
  36. 8
  37. 9
  38. PART FIVE
  39. 1
  40. 2
  41. 3
  42. 4
  43. 5
  44. 6
  45. 7
  46. 8
  47. 9
  48. 10
  49. 11
  50. 12
  51. PART SIX
  52. 1
  53. 2
  54. 3
  55. 4
  56. 5
  57. 6
  58. 7
  59. 8
  60. 9
  61. 10
  62. 11
  63. 12
  64. PART SEVEN
  65. 1
  66. 2
  67. 3
  68. 4
  69. 5
  70. 6
  71. 7
  72. 8
  73. 9
  74. PART EIGHT
  75. 1
  76. 2
  77. 3
  78. 4
  79. 5
  80. 6
  81. 7
  82. 8
  83. 9
  84. 10
  85. 11
  86. 12
  87. 13
  88. 14
  89. 15
  90. 16
  91. 17
  92. 18
  93. 19
  94. Epilogue
  95. About the Author
  96. Also by Joanne Harris

I still haven’t seen Zozie’s fancy dress. I guess it’s something fabulous, but she hasn’t told me what it is. So after watching the snow for nearly an hour, I got impatient and went to her room to see what she was doing.

But when I went in, I got a surprise. It wasn’t Zozie’s room any more. The sari-curtains had been taken down; the Chinese dressing-gown was gone from the back of the door, the ornaments from the lampshade. Even her shoes had vanished from the top of the mantelpiece, and that’s when it really sank in, I think.

Seeing them gone.

Her fabulous shoes.

There was a suitcase on the bed, a small one, leather, that looked as if it had seen a lot of travelling. Zozie was just closing it up, and she looked at me when I came in, and I knew what she’d say without even having to ask.

‘Oh, sweetheart,’ she said. ‘I was going to tell you. Really I was. But I didn’t want to spoil your party for you—’

I couldn’t believe it. ‘You’re going tonight?’

‘I’d have to go some time,’ she said reasonably. ‘And after tonight it won’t matter so much.’

‘Why not?’

She shrugged. ‘Didn’t you call the Changing Wind? Don’t you want to be a family, you and Roux and Yanne and Rosette?’

‘That doesn’t mean you have to leave!’

She threw a stray shoe into the case. ‘You know that’s not the way it works. There’s a payoff, Nanou. There has to be.’

‘But you’re family too!’

She shook her head. ‘It wouldn’t work. Not with Yanne. She disapproves of me too much. And maybe she’s right to disapprove. Things don’t go as smoothly when I’m around.’

‘But that’s not fair! Where will you go?’

Zozie looked up from her packing and smiled.

‘Wherever the wind takes me,’ she said.

6

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Monday, 24th December
Christmas Eve. 7.00 p.m.

JEAN-LOUP’S MOTHER PHONED just now to say that her son has fallen ill rather suddenly, and won’t be coming after all. Anouk is naturally disappointed, and slightly worried about her friend, but the excitement of the party is too much to keep her down for long.

In her red cape and hood she looks more than ever like a Christmas bauble, skipping from here to there in a frenzy of activity. ‘Are they here yet?’ she repeats, although the invitations said seven-thirty and the church bell has barely rung the hour. ‘Can you see anyone outside?’

In fact the snow is so dense now that I can barely see the street-lamp across the square, but Anouk keeps pressing her face to the window, making a ghost of herself on the glass.

‘Zozie!’ she calls. ‘Are you ready yet?’

There comes a muffled reply from Zozie, who has been upstairs for the past two hours.