Nico makes a sound half-lust, half-laughter. ‘I think I just died and went to calorie heaven,’ he says, attacking a goose leg with relish. ‘You know, I haven’t tasted anything this good since my ma died. Compliments to the chef! If I wasn’t totally in love with the stick-insect here, I’d marry you just like that—’ And he waves his fork in a cheery way, almost putting out Madame Luzeron’s eye in his exuberance (she turns her face away just in time).

Vianne smiles. The punch must be taking effect by now, and she is flushed with her success. ‘Thank you,’ she says, standing up. ‘I’m so glad you’re all here tonight so I can thank you for all the help you’ve given us.’

That’s rich, I think to myself. Exactly what have they done, I ask?

‘For your custom, support, and friendship,’ she says, ‘at a time when all of us needed it.’ She smiles again, perhaps dimly aware now of the chemistries coursing freely through her veins, making her strangely talkative, strangely imprudent and almost reckless, like some much younger Vianne from some other half-forgotten life.

‘I had what you’d call an unstable childhood. It meant I never really settled down. I didn’t feel accepted anywhere I went. I always felt like an outsider. But now I’ve managed to stay here four years, and I owe it all to people like you.’

Yawn, yawn. Speech coming on.

I pour myself a glass of punch and catch my little Anouk’s eye. She’s looking a little restless, I see, perhaps because of Jean-Loup’s absence. He must be very ill, poor boy. They think it might have been something he ate. And with a delicate heart like his, anything can be dangerous. A cold, a chill, a cantrip, even—

Could it be that she feels guilty, somehow?

Please, Anouk. Perish the thought. Why should you feel responsible? As if you’re not already alert enough to every little negative. But I can see your colours, dear, and the way you’ve been looking at my little Nativity scene, with its magic circle of three standing under the light of electric stars.

Speaking of which, we’re missing one. Late as expected, but approaching fast, sneaking up the back streets of the Butte as sly as a fox around a henhouse. His place is still set at the head of the table; plates, glasses, all untouched.

Vianne thinks maybe she is a fool. Anouk herself is beginning to think that all her planning and invocations have been for nothing, that even the snow will change nothing, and that nothing is left to keep her here.