Over by the fire the Cossack had finished his stew and, by the look of it, the jug of vodka too. He was staring into the flames, brooding and cross. He had taken off his long coat and I could see the curved knife, hanging now from a leather loop attached to the coat’s belt.

‘Is she dead?’ I whispered.

Pyotr shrugged.

I tried to get a better view through the window by rising up on my tip-toes. It was a distance of about twenty feet from the threshold of the kitchen, where I was standing with Pyotr, over to the far wall of the front of the inn where the window was – a small, frost-feathered window with eight thick panes of glass just to the left of the solid front door. To our right, another twenty feet or so away, sat the Cossack, on one of the benches by the fire. Very softly, I took a step out of the kitchen into the room. There. I could see her more easily now. Although it was late, the light was good, the moon shone and the snow was bright, and as I looked, as I craned my neck again to see over the lintel of the window, I thought I saw the heap of rags move.

‘Pyotr,’ I whispered and nodded towards the window.

This time there was no mistake. The bundle shifted and we saw her face, long and pale like an almond and wrapped tightly round in a dark fringed shawl. Just for a moment, she looked towards the inn; then turned away again and sat like before, motionless and staring straight ahead at some distant point in the snow.

Pyotr was shaking his head and looking uncomfortable. He hated getting involved in the lives of others and had started tying on his hat again.

‘Don’t go, Pyotr,’ I said. ‘Please.’

He looked back over at the Cossack, at the knife hanging from his coat. Pyotr shook his head again and took off his hat. I wondered if there was something he wasn’t telling me – if he understood these people better than I did and just didn’t want to say. You could never quite tell with Pyotr. It was almost impossible to tell what he was thinking at any given moment; what he did or didn’t know.

‘Do you think he’s kidnapped her?’ I whispered.

Pyotr shrugged like before. ‘Possible.’

I pictured the huge angry Cossack grabbing the woman by the hair while she was walking down the street and forcing her onto his sledge then bringing her here to my little way-side inn against her wishes. I wondered if he was some sort of mercenary – if he had stolen her to order perhaps, and planned to take her in the morning to a secret destination where he would be paid for her delivery. I wondered —

Pyotr nudged me with his elbow. I jumped.