The Memory Palace. Gill Alderman

will survive it, more than half nivasha as she is,’ the dwarf said.

      ‘She is the daughter of the reeve at Espmoss.’

      ‘But who was his mother? And who is her mother?’

      ‘Why does she journey?’

      ‘Ours not to ask, Master; nor to reason why.’ As he talked, Erchon busied himself in tidying our temporary caravanserai, and trod upon the ashes of the fire. He heard the rumble before I did, and the jingle of harness.

      ‘Hark!’

      ‘Into the trees!’

      ‘Too late, Brother Wolf. There is the caravan-master and he has seen us. Smile as they pass and pray they will soon overtake my lady.’

      We stood aside to watch the procession of gypsies pass.

      ‘Look, gypsies!’ Alice exclaimed.

      ‘I can’t. Tell me.’

      ‘You can see the ripe corn. They are camped on the edge of the field. The chrome on their vans glitters in the sunlight and they have a lorry – two – and a car; there’s some washing on a line – gone now. Out of sight. What a pity gypsies gave up horses and painted vans.’

      ‘I knew one who lived in a vardo black as coal, and every line and carved curlicue upon it was picked out in gold and red – and a great hairy-heeled mare pulled it.’

      ‘Dominic’s mother?’

      She must have guessed it.

      ‘How do you know?’

      ‘I read your letter when you went for a pee.’

      It was the sort of thing Helen herself would have done; that this Alice had pried in his guilt did not make him angry, but irrationally fearful. She was cheeky and unpredictable, that was all, he reasoned, the child of a broken home; and he had left the letter and the postcard on the dashboard.

      ‘Why did Dominic send you the picture of a horse?’ Alice continued.

      ‘Thought you’d read my books.’

      ‘Not all. I suppose there is a horse like that in one of them.’

      ‘Right! The Ima, who live in the Plains of Malthassa, herd horses – we were talking about them earlier, when we passed the sign that said “J-J Rousseau”. The best ones belong to the Imandi, their leader, and the best one of all is the Red Horse.’

      ‘What colour was Helen’s horse? I can’t remember.’

      Again he was disturbed. He was sure he had not revealed Helen’s name; and Dominic had not written it down. He had not told her what colour the horse was either: he was certain of that.

      ‘I didn’t tell you,’ he said. ‘She was brown and white – skewbald, or “coloured” in gypsy parlance. They prize pied animals highly.’

      ‘Half and half, like good and evil; neither one thing or another, like me,’ Alice said and then, before he could respond to this new slant upon her puzzling character, reached forward and reinforced his unsettled mood with a fresh CD.

      ‘You don’t have to do that each time,’ he said. ‘Put in a stack.’

      ‘I want this one.’

      Clapton again; and the album was called Backtrackin’ – what he was at, to drive half way down France on this fool’s errand; doubly a fool for picking up this precocious waif? Well, it wasn’t so far to Auxerre, where he would drop her. She would easily find another lift there, or a room if she intended to stay overnight. He listened to the music and felt the morass of nostalgia stir and individual memories rise up like wraiths.

      They had reached Burgundy and were passing a sign to Sens. The landscape was rich and rolling: you could see how lords and princes had prospered here, he thought, and built their chateaux forts and later on, when there was a kind of peace, their tree-embowered, swan-encircled chateaux set like still islands in a motionless sea, so formal were the pleasure gardens. As if to echo these thoughts, a brown road sign with a formalized chateau, turreted and neat, came into view and, beyond it, the edge of the forest which covered the hills on either side of the road. Other signs warned of deer, though a high deer fence marched with the margins of the wood.

      ‘They used to hunt all the time here,’ he said. ‘In the Middle Ages. In fact, Saint Thibaud loved the hunt so much that in his church, ahead of us in Joigny, he is shown on horseback, off to the chase with his dog. And Archbishop Sanglier was of course known only as “The Boar”. I wonder, was he a thickset, muscular man, a grasping priest who loved the riches which gave him the freedom to hunt? – the riches of Mother Church. There is a famous Treasury in the abbey at Sens.’

      ‘Wasn’t it in Sens,’ the girl said, ‘that Abélard was condemned?’

      How could she know that – a history lesson at school?

      ‘Not for loving Héloise,’ he said, ‘but for an intellectual sin: for refusing to set limits to the activity of human reason.’

      ‘Reason? Peter Abélard?’

      ‘He was a great churchman as well as a lover. A formidable intellect! Though, it is remarkable that he did not lose his reason after he was set upon.’

      ‘Thinking was all he had left,’ she said. ‘Thinking of Héloise and praying.’

      ‘Excuse me – but you’ve studied the period in class?’

      ‘Oh, no. They don’t tell us young wenches about castration. ‘Taint a fit subject for a liddle gal.’

      Phoebe spoke like this sometimes, putting on the accents of a yokel.

      ‘Oh, ah,’ he replied in kind, looked full at her and caught her watching him. He knew then he had won that joust – this time she had not fooled him into a delusion – and continued casually,

      ‘Burgundy is famous for happier things as well.’

      ‘I bet you wouldn’t say that if you lived in the Middle Ages!’

      ‘I don’t suppose I would. But look, here’s another reminder of hunting: a service station called L’Aire de la Biche – the Hind’s Place. Would you like a coffee?’

      ‘Please!’

      They sat opposite each other at the table. She drank her black coffee and eagerly devoured a large slice of gâteau. This is the first time she has eaten today, he thought and asked her ‘Would you like a proper meal?’

      ‘Later?’ she said, the question mark riding high in her voice.

      A woman was watching them with unconcealed curiosity; he had seen several men glance and he leaned back and looked at the girl as if to confirm that he saw what the others saw. She had the kind of beauty many men divorced good wives to gain, that unknown and conjectured many who would envy him, escorting her – if that was the correct term for his role in this surreal interlude.

      ‘Later?’ she had said. Although an interval of time had passed, he decided to reply.

      ‘OK. Later on.’

      He saw the shape of her clearly now, both intellectual and physical, and in that moment knew that he would try to seduce her, though his conscience would attempt to save them from this pleasurable and questionable conclusion. Sandy was well into her thirties; this girl was little more than a child. He calculated. Thirty-two years separated them, at least.; but he wouldn’t be the first – there was that Stone. OK. And several Country singers. He opened the sun-roof when they were back in the car and again drove fast, breaking the speed limit. He knew, without looking, that Alice was smiling with pleasure, heard her laugh as she held down her slip-streaming hair. It was about fifty miles to Auxerre. Soon the town rose up in the hills on their right-hand side and ‘There’s the cathedral,’ Alice said.

      He remembered Saint Edward’s,