BooksBarbecue
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

He kicked a stone. ‘Not everyone knows what it’s like,’ he said.

I was curious. ‘So what is it like?’

‘Dying?’ He shrugged. ‘Well, there’s this corridor of light. And you see all your dead friends and relatives waiting for you. And they’re all smiling. And at the end of the corridor there’s a bright light, really bright and – holy, I guess, and it talks to you, and it says you have to go back to your life now, but not to worry, because you’ll be back one day and go into the light with all your friends and . . .’ He stopped. ‘Well, that’s what my mum thinks, anyway. That’s what I told her I saw.’

I looked at him. ‘What did you see?’

‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Nothing at all.’

There was a silence, as Jean-Loup looked through his viewfinder at the avenues of the cemetery with all their dead. Ping went the camera as he pressed the switch.

‘Wouldn’t it be a joke,’ he said, ‘if all of this was for nothing?’ Ping. ‘What if there’s no heaven after all?’ Ping. ‘What if all those people are just rotting?’

His voice had got quite loud by then, and some birds that had been perching on one of the tombs went off in a sudden clap of wings.

‘They tell you they know it all,’ he said. ‘But they don’t. They lie. They always lie.’

‘Not always,’ I said. ‘Maman doesn’t lie.’

He looked at me in a funny way, as if he were much, much older than me, with a wisdom born of years of pain and disappointment.

‘She will,’ he said. ‘They always do.’

2

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Tuesday, 20th November

ANOUK BROUGHT IN her new friend today. Jean-Loup Rimbault; a nice-looking boy a little older than she is, with an old-fashioned politeness that sets him apart. Today he came over directly from school – he lives on the other side of the Butte – and instead of going out straight away, sat in the shop for half an hour, talking to Anouk over biscuits and mocha.

It’s good to see Anouk with a friend, although the pang it causes me is no less strong for being irrational. Pages of a lost book. Anouk at thirteen, the silent voice whispers; Anouk at sixteen, like a kite on the wind . . . Anouk at twenty, thirty and more—

‘A chocolate, Jean-Loup? On the house.’