She was never quite certain about children, thinking of them—when she thought about them at all—as coming somewhere between animals and people. She understood babies. You put milk in one end and kept the other end as clean as possible. Adults were even easier, because they did the feeding and cleaning themselves. But in between was a world of experience that she had never really enquired about. As far as she was aware, you just tried to stop them catching anything fatal and hoped that it would all turn out all right.

Granny, in fact, was at a loss, but she knew she had to do something.

“Didda nasty wolfie fwiten us, den?” she hazarded.

For quite the wrong reasons, this seemed to work. From the depths of the ball a muffled voice said: “I am eight, you know.”

“People who are eight don’t curl up in the middle of the snow,” said Granny, feeling her way through the intricacies of adult-child conversation.

The ball didn’t answer.

“I’ve probably got some milk and biscuits at home,” Granny ventured.

There was no perceptible effect.

“Eskarina Smith, if you don’t behave this minute I will give you such a smack!”

Esk poked her head out cautiously.

“There’s no need to be like that,” she said.

When Smith reached the cottage Granny had just arrived, leading Esk by the hand. The boys peered around from behind him.

“Um,” said Smith, not quite aware of how to begin a conversation with someone who was supposed to be dead. “They, um, told me you were—ill.” He turned and glared at his sons.

“I was just having a rest and I must have dozed off. I sleeps very sound.”

“Yes,” said Smith, uncertainly. “Well. All’s well, then. What’s up with Esk? ”

“She took a bit of a fright,” said Granny, squeezing the girl’s hand. “Shadows and whatnot. She needs a good warm. I was going to put her in my bed, she’s a bit mazed, if that’s all right with you.”