A car honked its horn, and she turned to see a midnight-blue Austin 10 pull up to the curb. Daldry got out to open the passenger door for Alice.
“You have a car?” she asked, surprised.
“I stole it.”
Alice’s eyes grew wide.
“Of course I have a car. Do you take me for a thief?”
“Well, excuse my astonishment, but you are now officially the only person I know who owns a car.”
“I bought it used. It’s no Rolls, as you’ll note once you’ve experienced the suspension, but it gets me from point A to point B quite effectively. I always put her somewhere in my intersections. It’s a sort of ritual. She’s in all of my paintings.”
“You’ll have to show me your paintings one of these days,” Alice said, getting in.
Daldry muttered something unintelligible under his breath as he closed the door. He got in the driver’s side, and with the gears making a grinding sound, the car lurched into motion.
“I don’t mean to pry, but might I know where we’re going?”
“To Brighton, of course.”
“Brighton? What on earth for?”
“To go visit that fortune-teller and ask her a few of the questions you ought to have asked her yesterday.”
“But that’s crazy!”
“We’ll be there in an hour and a half, two hours if there’s ice on the roads. I don’t see anything crazy about it. We’ll be home by dusk, and if by any chance we get held up, the chrome things you see on either side of the bonnet are headlights. Nothing perilous is lying in wait for us.”
“This is all very generous of you, Mr. Daldry, but would you be so kind as to stop poking fun at me?”
“I promise to make an effort, Miss Pendelbury, but please don’t expect the impossible.”
They left London by way of Lambeth and drove to Croydon, where Daldry asked Alice to take the road map out of the glove box and find Brighton Road, somewhere to the south. Alice told him to turn right before telling him to turn around because she had been holding the map upside down. After a few more wrong turns, a passerby put them on the correct route.
At Redhill, Daldry stopped to fill the tank and check the tire pressure. Alice preferred to stay in the relative warmth of the car with the map open on her lap.
After Crawley, Daldry had to drive more slowly. The countryside was white with snow, and the windscreen began to fog up. A few times the Austin skidded on sharp turns in the road. An hour later, they were so cold that it became impossible keep up a conversation. Daldry had turned the heat up as far as it would go, but the little heater was powerless against the icy wind that blew under the bonnet and into the car. They stopped at an inn called the Eight Bells and warmed themselves up at a table near the fireplace. After one last cup of boiling hot tea, they set off again.
Nearly four hours after they had left London, Daldry announced that Brighton wasn’t much farther. When they finally got there, the carnival was already beginning to close for the evening and the long pier was nearly deserted. The last few merrymakers were heading home to celebrate Christmas.
“All right then,” said Daldry as he got out of the car. “Where is this fortune-teller I’ve heard so much about?”
“I doubt she waited for us,” said Alice, blowing on her hands and stamping her feet in an attempt to warm up.
“Don’t be pessimistic. Come along.”
They went to the pier ticket window. It was closed.
“Perfect,” he said. “Free entrance.”
When they saw the caravan, Alice was overcome by a wave of anxiety. She hesitated. Daldry could sense her unease.
“That fortune-teller is just a human being, a woman like you and me. Well, like you, I should say. There’s no reason for you to be worried. We’re going to do what it takes to break the spell.”
“You’re poking fun again.”
“I was just trying to make you smile. Why don’t you go and hear what the old bat has to say, and we’ll laugh about it on the way home. By the time we’re back in London, you’ll be so tired you’ll sleep like a baby no matter what she says. Go on, be brave. I’ll wait for you here; I won’t move an inch.”
“Thank you. And I’m sorry for acting like a child.”
“Yes, well . . . get on with it. It would be better if we didn’t have to drive home in the pitch-black—I should have mentioned that only one headlight is properly functioning.”
Alice approached the caravan. Its shutters were pulled shut, but a light was on inside. She knocked on the door. The fortune-teller seemed astonished to see her again.
“What are you doing here? Is something wrong?”
Alice shook her head.
“You don’t look well. You’re pale,” continued the old woman.
“I’m a bit cold.”
“Well, come in and warm yourself by the stove,” she said.
Alice stepped into the little room and noticed the now-familiar vanilla-note perfume. It was stronger near the stove. She sat on a little bench, and the fortune-teller came and sat at her side, taking Alice’s hands in hers.
“So you came back to see me.”
“I happened to be passing by, and I saw the light.”
“Well, welcome back.”
“Who are you?” asked Alice.
“Oh, just a fortune-teller, but the locals have respect for me, you know. Some people even come a long way for me to tell them about their future. But yesterday I could see in your eyes that you thought I was nothing but a crazy old woman. I suppose if you’re back it’s because you’ve changed your mind. What do you want to know?”
“The man who walked behind me while we were talking yesterday. Why do I have to meet six other people before I’ll meet him again?”
“I’m sorry, my darling, but I don’t have answers to everything. I just told you what came to me. I can’t just make things up. I never do. I don’t like lies.”
“Neither do I,” said Alice.
“But you didn’t just happen to be passing by my caravan just now, did you?”
Alice admitted as much with a shake of her head.
“Yesterday, you knew my name. I never told you my name,” Alice said.
“And you? How are you able to name the ingredients of a perfume?”
“I don’t know—it’s a gift. I’m a nose.”
“And I’m a fortune-teller. We’re both talented women in our own domains.”
“I came back because somebody pushed me to do so. It’s true that what you said yesterday has been bothering me. I didn’t sleep a wink last night because of it.”
“I understand. I might have felt the same in your position.”
“Tell me the truth. Did you really see all of the things you told me yesterday?”
“The truth? God help us. The truth isn’t engraved in stone, you know. Your future depends on your choices, on your will. It belongs to you.”
“So your predictions are just stories?”
“They’re possibilities, not certainties. You decide.”
“Decide what?”
“Everything. Whether or not to ask me to reveal what I see. But knowledge has its consequences.”
“Well, first of all, I’d like to know if you’re sincere.”
“Did I ask to be paid yesterday or today? You’re the one who came back. But you seem so worried, so tormented, that it’s probably better if we leave it there. Go home, Alice. If it reassures you, know that nothing grave menaces your future.”
Alice studied the fortune-teller in silence. She wasn’t intimidated anymore. To the contrary, her company had become agreeable, her gravelly voice soothing. Alice hadn’t come all this way to leave without knowing something more, and the idea of defying the old woman didn’t appeal to her. She straightened her back and held out her hands.
“You’re right. Tell me what you see. It’s up to me to decide what I want to believe or not.”
“Are you certain?”
“Every Sunday, my mother dragged me to Mass. In the winter, it was dreadfully cold in the church. I spent hours on end praying to a god that I never saw and who never spared any of us, so I think that I can spend a few minutes listening to what you have to say.”
“I’m sorry your parents didn’t make it through the war.”