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why she had not been able to foresee my father’s death and warn him. But even she had said there were things that we were not meant to know, things that could not be read or prevented. I touched her arm, her skin was like ice; I closed my eyes and fought back more painful tears, fearing the day when I would lose her too.
    At least my mother would have Aunt Yvette. Who was Aunt Augustine? My father had never mentioned her. All Uncle Gerome would tell us was that she was the sister of their father and had married a sailor, who died soon afterwards at sea. Aunt Augustine ran a boarding house, but now that she was old and arthritic she needed a maid and cook. In return I would be given food but no money. I wondered where my father’s open heart and hand had come from. All the other Fleuriers seemed to have descended from Judas: prepared to sell their relatives for thirteen pieces of silver.
    Bernard arrived a week later to drive me to Carpentras, from where I would catch a train to Marseilles. Aunt Yvette cried and kissed me. ‘Don’t worry about Olly,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll take care of him.’ I could barely bring myself to look at my cat, who was spraying on Bernard’s car tyres, let alone my mother. She was standing by the kitchen door, her mouth turned down and grief in her eyes. I squeezed my nails into my palms. I’d promised myself that, for her sake, I wouldn’t cry.
    All I had to take with me was a bundle of clothes tied in a cloth. Bernard took it from me and put it in the car. My mother stepped forward and pressed my hand. Something sharp pricked my palm. When she withdrew her fingers I saw that she had given me a locket and a few coins. I slipped them into my pocket and kissed her. We lingered in our embrace, but neither of us could bring ourselves to say anything.
    Bernard opened the car door and helped me into the passenger seat. Uncle Gerome stood in the yard watching us. His expression was severe but there was something odd about the way he was standing. His shoulders were hunched and his mouth was twisted, as if he were in pain. Was there some sort of demon inside him that made him act so spitefully? Perhaps he wished he could be a man more like my father and less like himself? The illusion was shattered when he called out, ‘Work hard, Simone. Because Aunt Augustine won’t tolerate any nonsense, and I won’t have you back here if she throws you out.’
    The station at Carpentras was a moving market. The first-and second-class passengers boarded the train in a civilised manner, but the third-class passengers squabbled over where to sit and where to put their chickens and rabbits and whatever else they planned to take with them. Noah’s Ark, I thought, stepping around a pig.
    Bernard showed the conductor my ticket. ‘She is travelling alone,’ he told him. ‘She’s never been on a train before. If I pay the difference in the fare, can you put her in a second-class carriage with some ladies?’
    The conductor nodded. ‘She’ll have to travel third class to Sorgues,’ he said. ‘But after that I can get her a seat to Marseilles in second class.’
    Why was it that Bernard thought of my comfort and safety, when my own uncle was happy to send me third class to who knew where?
    Bernard slipped the conductor some money and the man helped me up the stairs and into a seat near the front of the carriage. The train whistle sounded and the pig screeched and the chickens clucked. Bernard waved to me from the platform. ‘I’ll find a way to help you, Simone,’ he said through the open window. ‘Next time I make some extra money, I’ll send it to you.’
    A billow of soot and smoke wafted across the station. The train shunted forward. I didn’t take my eyes off Bernard until we had passed out of the station. When I sat down I remembered the locket my mother had given me. I pulled it from my pocket and flicked it open. Inside was a picture of my parents on their wedding day. I had been five years