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Charlotte thanked Lisa and hung up. She let out a sigh, then smiled and flicked a strand of hair out of her eyes. It felt good to be doing something positive. Grandma’s death had left a void, but if she could fill it by being around people that needed her, it would help to ease the pain of her passing.

Soon after, she headed for home. The roads had been cleared of snow, but it was still slow-going, and she got home later than she would have liked. Harry was delighted to see her, and she took the dog for a quick walk around Sycamore Park in the snow. While not surprisingly he hadn’t been quite his usual self since Grandma’s passing, there was something about snow that seemed to bring the craziness out in dogs, and Harry was no exception, making circles in the snow, chasing flurries blown from the leafless trees and kicking the stuff all over Charlotte’s coat.

She took him home, gave him some food, then headed back out. The cold had really kicked in, and it was fully dark as she walked the snowy streets back to Sycamore Park. The streetlights were on, but many were laden with snow, their glow dimmed, obscured. Even so, the blanket of white across the gentle knoll at the park’s centre, and the glittering ice that covered half of the duck pond gave it a magical feel.

The plaza outside the theatre had been cleared. Charlotte walked to the centre, looking around for James Steamblack, but aside from an elderly dog walker near the closed Oak Leaf Café, she was alone.

She checked her watch. Ten minutes early. Would the magician even show up, or was this another one of his tricks? She had been feeling nervous all day, and had played out the scenario of standing him up a dozen times over. It didn’t feel right to be going on a date the day after Grandma’s wake, but at the same time it would cheer her up, and she knew without a shadow of a doubt that Grandma would not only have encouraged her, but actually applauded her. Life was for living, Grandma always said. You could be boring when you were dead.

An owl hooted, and she heard the scamper of footsteps, turning sharply as an urban fox bounded across the nearest path and up the slope of the park’s central grassy knoll, leaving a trail of prints in the snow behind it. The sky had cleared, the moon coming out, and for a moment, as the fox reached the peak of the hill, it was silhouetted against the moonlit sky. Charlotte held her breath, wondering if it would raise its head and give a dramatic howl, but instead it just poked around in the snow and then darted away over the crest of the hill. Disappointed, Charlotte turned back towards the theatre, letting out a gasp of fright at the towering figure looming over her.

Lowering a wide-brimmed hat and tipping it in her direction, James Steamblack gave a neat bow. Looking up, the moon over Charlotte’s shoulder turned his face into a ghostly visage. Narrow lips thinned in a wide, almost sinister smile, and Charlotte felt a momentary sense of horror before his features softened, and the magician who had charmed her reappeared out of the montage of late-night horror film villains he had briefly become.

‘Ah, Charlotte, my dear. For a moment you must have thought I had stood you up.’

‘Well, with this snow, I imagine the roads are troublesome,’ she managed to say, sounding breathless.

‘Maybe to the common man,’ he said. ‘However, as you know, I am a magician, and we walk along different avenues to most.’

His arms rose into the air. Charlotte, who had become aware of a low droning in the background, could only stare in astonishment as the lights of a little helicopter appeared above the roof of the theatre and slowly came down to land in the plaza in front of the theatre entrance. Charlotte knew nothing about helicopters, but it looked like one of the tiny ones that police used for checking traffic or chasing fugitives. She had never been in one before, the very thought of it made her feel sick, but James was grinning from ear to ear again as though the top half of his head might suddenly come sliding off.

‘My dear,’ he said with a grand flourish of his hands, ‘your chariot awaits.’

‘Where on earth are we going?’ she asked. ‘I thought you were taking me out for dinner.’

‘I am,’ he said. ‘In Paris.’

Two hours later, they were sitting on a private rooftop courtyard of a vintage café near the Sacré-Coeur which had a panoramic view of Paris. In the distance, the Eiffel Tower looked like a giant lighthouse, a spotlight slowly revolving over the city, flashing over them every few minutes. Two paraffin heaters and a heated parasol kept them warm. In the corner, a violinist sat on a stool, playing a mournful tune. James, who had entertained her throughout the whole journey with a variety of card tricks, clicked his fingers, making first a coin disappear, then a waiter appear through a door that led downstairs.

‘Monsieur,’ James greeted him as though they were old friends. ‘My people called ahead. I trust you will delight my guest and myself with your finest cuisine?’

‘It would be an honour for us,’ the waiter said. ‘Would you first like to sample the wine? Or could I suggest the champagne? Our specialty is the ten-year-vintage from our very own Champagne region—’

‘A bottle,’ James said, even as Charlotte put her hand up to ask for a mineral water. ‘Two crystal glasses. Chilled.’

‘As you wish, sir. A fine choice.’

‘Could I get a glass of water too?’ Charlotte asked, as the waiter turned away. Turning back, he said, ‘Of course, mademoiselle,’ then gave her a dramatic bow.

‘So, have you been here before?’ Charlotte asked, wondering if James would respond with a genuine answer, or some kind of elaborate, fanciful tale.

‘This restaurant was built on the site of an ancient Roman vineyard,’ James said, eyes twinkling. Charlotte suppressed a sigh. ‘It is said it was the first in all of France, and grew the finest grapes, so fine that the Roman Emperor himself made a trip just to taste them for himself, fresh from the vine … before drinking himself into oblivion on a number of vintages. Yes, the grapes here were the finest. A shame that with the empire’s fall, they were lost for all eternity.’

His fingers spun, and he held out a grape. Charlotte gasped. With another flick of his hand it split seamlessly in two. He lowered it to her plate.

‘Not the same, but still, the finest in Paris.’

Charlotte popped half into her mouth, and had to admit, it tasted pretty good. As she watched James congratulate himself with an inward smile, she couldn’t help but feel like everything was part of some elaborate routine. He was handsome, charming, and obviously supremely talented. But was there anything behind the façade?

‘So … what do your parents do for a living?’ she asked, picking a question from an imaginary hint sheet that Kelly would probably slip into her pocket before a date. She watched James, waiting for his reaction, but he just continued to stare at his fingers as though the answer would appear there on a slip of paper.

At last, he looked up. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘They’re both dead.’

‘Oh, that’s too bad.’

‘They were circus performers,’ he said. ‘My mother was a trapeze artist, and my father was the human cannonball. One day, as my father was fired off into the air, he reached out and took my mother’s hands as she swung from the rafters, and together they burst through the roof of the big top and were never seen again.’

‘Did they dredge the local rivers?’ Charlotte said with all seriousness, refusing to be drawn into another of his fantasies. ‘I mean, they can’t have gone that far, can they?’