Suddenly there came a scratching at the door. Shh-shh. Then a low hooting sound, like that of a baby owl. “Perette!”

The moon was up; the light from the ventilation slats was silver. In its reflected glow I saw the hatch open a crack, saw Perette’s luminous eyes through its mouth.

“Perette!” Relief suffused me so that I felt almost weak, stumbling in my haste to reach her. “Did you bring the keys?”

The wild girl shook her head. I moved closer to the hatch, close enough to be able to touch her fingers through the opening. Her skin was ghostly in the moonlight.

“No?” I forced myself to be calm, even through my disappointment. “Perette, where are they?” I spoke as slowly as I could. “Where are the keys, Perette?”

She shrugged. A speaking gesture of the shoulders, a movement of the right hand to indicate width, a round face: Antoine.

“Antoine?” I said eagerly. “You say Antoine has them?”

She nodded.

“Listen, Perette.” I spoke slowly and clearly. “I need to get out of here. I need you-to bring me-the keys. Can you do that?”

She gave me her blank look. Desperate now, my voice rising in spite of myself, I pleaded. “Perette! You have to help me! Remember what I said-remember Fleur-” I was gabbling now in my desperation to reach her. “We have to warn the bishop-”

At my reference to the bishop she cocked her head abruptly to one side and hooted. I stared at her. “The bishop?” I questioned. “Did you know he was coming? Did Père Colombin mention his visit?”

Again, the hooting sound. Perette grinned.

“Did he tell you what-” It was the wrong question. I rephrased it as simply as I could. “Are you playing another game tomorrow? A trick?” My excitement was clenching my fists, fingernails scoring my palms, knuckles cracking. “A trick to play on the bishop?”

The wild girl gave her eerie laughter.

“What, Perette? What trick? What trick?”

But she was already half turning in sudden disinterest, her attention caught by some other thought, some shadow, some sound, her head ticking to one side, then to the other as if to some unheard rhythm. One hand came up slowly to close the hatch.

Click.

“Perette, please! Come back!”

But she was gone, without a sound, not even a cry, not even a farewell. I laid my head on my knees and I wept.

I must have slept again, for when I awoke the moonlight had faded to a greenish blur. My head was pounding and my limbs were stiff with cold, and there was a draft at the level of my ankles, which made me shiver. I stretched out first my arms, then my legs, chafing my frozen fingers to restore the circulation, and I was so preoccupied with this that for a moment I did not realize the significance of that draft, which had not been there before.

Then I saw. The door was open a crack, allowing dim light to penetrate into the cell. Perette was standing in the doorway, a hand to her mouth. I sprang to my feet.

She gestured urgently at her mouth, to indicate silence. She showed me the key in her hand, slapped her thigh, then mimed Antoine’s lumbering gait. I applauded her soundlessly. “Good girl,” I whispered, moving toward the door, but instead of allowing me to pass, Perette motioned me frantically to let her through. Slipping past me, she pushed the door shut behind her and squatted on the floor.

“No, Perette-” I tried to explain. “We have to go-now-before they find the keys are gone.”

The wild girl shook her head. Holding the keys in one hand, she performed a series of rapid movements with the other. Then, seeing that I did not understand, she repeated them more slowly and with barely concealed impatience.

A stern countenance, a sign of the cross. Père Colombin.

A bigger sign of the cross. A quick, amusing mime of horse riding, one hand holding a miter that threatened to be blown off by the wind. The bishop.

“Yes. The bishop. Père Colombin. What then?”

She clenched her fists and hooted in frustration.

A fat woman, rolling as she walked. Antoine. Père Colombin again. Then a mime of Soeur Marguerite, twitching and dancing. Then a complicated mime, as if repeatedly touching something hot. Then a gesture I did not understand, arms outstretched as if in readiness to fly.

Perette repeated it with greater insistence. Still I did not understand.

“What, Perette?”

The flying gesture again. Then a silent grimace, miming the torments of hell beneath the fluttering movements. Then, once again, the “hot” gesture as Perette sniffed the air and wrinkled her nose, as if at a stench.

Almost I began to understand. “Fire, Perette?” I asked her hesitantly but with growing comprehension. Perette beamed at me, showing me her clenched fists. “He’s going to light another fire?”

Perette shook her head and pointed at herself. Then she motioned at the roof, a circular gesture that encompassed the abbey, herself, everyone in it. Then the flying gesture again. Then she took out the pendant of Christina Mirabilis from her garment and showed me, insistently, the miraculous virgin, ringed with fire.

I stared at her, beginning at last to understand.

She smiled.

You see now why I cannot leave.

LeMerle’s plan was more vicious, more implacable than anything I could have imagined-even of him. With the help of gestures, hootings, mimes, and scratchings in the dirt, Perette explained it, occasionally laughing, occasionally losing interest like the innocent she was, distracted by a piece of mica shining against the granite, or the cry of a night bird beyond the walls. She was wholly innocent, my sweet Perette, my wise fool, quite unaware of the sinister implications of the favor LeMerle had asked of her.

That had been his only mistake. He had underestimated my Perette, believing her to be under his control. But the wild girl is no one’s creature, not even mine. She is like some birds, which can be trained but not tamed; let the glove slip, for even an instant, and she will bite.

For now, at least, I have her attention. I may lose it at any time; but she is my only weapon now as I try to devise a plan of my own. I do not know whether my wit is a match for the Blackbird. What I do know is that I must try. For myself, for Fleur. For Clémente and Marguerite. For all those he has damaged and deceived and crippled and mocked. For all those to whom he has fed the pieces of his bitter heart and poisoned thereby.

This may mean my death. I have faced that. If I succeed it may certainly mean his, and I have faced that too.

Perette has locked me back in the cell. Anything else is simply too dangerous. I hope Fleur will understand if my plan goes awry-and I hope Perette remembers her part. I hope-I hope. Everything seems to be built upon those two words, those two fragile syllables like the cry of some forlorn seabird: I-hope.

Birds are singing outside. In the far distance, though not as loud as last night, I hear the sounds of the surf on the island’s western shore. Somewhere in the breakers, the statue of Marie-de-la-mer rolls endlessly against the fine sand, polishing, dwindling, scoured by the shoreline into slow oblivion. Never have I been so conscious of time-of that which remains to us, of its passing, its tides.

Some minutes ago someone tried the door and, finding it locked, went away. I shiver to think what might have happened if Perette had left it unlocked. My breakfast, a piece of bread and a cup of water, was pushed through the hatchway, the trap slamming shut as soon as I collected it, as if I were infected with the plague. The water smelt sharp, as if someone had fouled it, and though I am thirsty, I did not drink. The next hour will tell whether or not my hopes are founded.