Intent on her darning, she asked, "Are you bound for the city?" Curlicues of smoke shrouded his head. "Not at present. Do you live here alone?"
"Yes. My husband died last autumn."
He made no reply to this. Stella snipped the woollen thread and inspected the patch. "He's lying in the cellar. The ground froze before he could be buried."
Logs collapsed in the fireplace with a cascade of sparks which were sucked up the dark chimney.
"Are you travelling on business?"
"Of a sort." He began to rock gently in the chair. "It must be hard to be here alone."
Stella rose, laying the skirt over the back of a chair. "The inn has been empty all winter. My only concern has been to keep myself fed and warm." As if to emphasise this she knelt and added more logs to the fire. But it was not entirely true. She had been lonely.
The logs quickly took fire. She saw his image reflected in the curved brass of the coal scuttle.
"You'll be needing more wood," he said.
"I'll be hoping for a delivery of coal as soon as the road is clear."
"Ah."
As she rose from the hearth, so did he from his chair.
"Well, goodnight," he said.
When she heard his door close, she crept upstairs and entered her own room. She knelt at a spy-hole which she and her husband had discovered soon after taking over the inn; the previous owner had evidently been something of a voyeur. She herself wanted to be sure that this man who called himself Simon was just that: a man. She had been chastened by her encounter with Marguerite.
When he finally began to undress, she had already imagined that he might reveal a body covered with scales or strange growths. But there was nothing: just a leanly muscular frame, with a line of dark hair running down the centre of his belly to the denser hair at his groin. He withdrew a book from his satchel, got into bed and began to read by candlelight. She waited. He was facing her and once, when he looked up from his reading and stared in her direction, she had the uncanny impression that he knew she was there. But the spy-hole was well concealed and he could not have been aware of her scrutiny. Soon afterwards he snuffed out the candle and all was dark.
When Stella rose the next morning she found that she had neglected to lock her bedroom door. Simon had already risen and she saw him dragging a fallen birch trunk from a nearby copse into the back yard. She watched him from the window as he went to the woodshed and returned with an axe before stripping down to his undershirt.
The axe flashed in the wintry sunlight and the blade bit into the wood. He worked steadily and methodically, tossing the logs into a pile against the wall. Stella went downstairs and took the crow outside. It immediately began to emit its harsh kraaa sounds. Normally she imagined that the bird was soliciting guests when it crowed, but on this occasion the cries seemed less welcoming than admonitory.
The fire was already ablaze in the hearth. She put on water to heat for his bath. When he came inside she asked him if he wanted the water brought to his room.
"As you wish," he said.
She put the bath in front of the fire instead, not wanting him to risk a chill. Then she took her husband's accounts ledger and retired to the vestibule.
A short while later she heard him calling her. She went to him.
"A towel," he said.
"Forgive me."
She fetched one from the laundry cupboard and held it out for him. He wrapped it around his waist and climbed the stairs to his room. That evening she also took a bath, adding dried lavender to the water. She was about to take his dinner up to his room when he appeared.
"Have you eaten yourself?" he asked.
She shook her head.
"Then join me."
She set the table beside the fire and produced a bottle of wine from the supply which Thomas had always kept in their room.
"A toast," she said, "to the new season." He drank, and then they ate. Afterwards he sat down in the rocking chair and lit his pipe.
"How did your husband die?" he asked.
"A wasting disease, according to the village doctor." She paused. "More wine?"
He accepted a glass. She had been tempted to tell him about Marguerite but caution had prevailed. She drained her own glass and filled it up again. Outside, water was dripping from the eaves of the building. She had to bring the crow inside each evening, but the thaw was well advanced now and soon he would be able to spend the night beneath the moon. She drank more wine, studying her taciturn visitor and wondering whether he had a family. Something told her he came from the city, though whether he was travelling to or from there, she could not say.
The bottle was empty, and she fetched another from her room, telling him that it had always been their habit to share a bottle or two with their first guests of the season. He accepted another glass, but when that was empty would take no more.
She fell to talking of the villagers, telling him of their fears of the city and the strange stories they told of its inhabitants. She was hoping it would provoke some revealing comment from him, but he said nothing, puffing on his pipe and staring calmly at her as she spoke. The wine had gone to her head, and her whole body felt warm. She undid a button at the neck of her shirt.
"Do you have a wife?" she asked.
"I spend much time travelling."
He seemed content that this was answer enough; she did not prompt him.
"When did you marry?" he asked.
"Three years ago."
"What brought you to this place?"
"My husband received an inheritance on our marriage and wanted to start a new life in a new place."
Again he made no comment. She set her empty wine glass aside. "Tell me, should I credit the stories which the villagers tell of the city?"
"It would be better to go there and form your own conclusions."
"But are there such creatures as they speak of?"
"The only creatures I know are humans and animals."
"But some have--special gifts?"
"Most surely. There are few anywhere who do not."
The candle on the table guttered and went out, leaving them in the blood-orange light of the fire. Simon rose and tapped his pipe against the chimney, then bade her goodnight.
Stella sat staring into the fire, watching the flames devour the wood he had chopped for her. Eventually she rose and climbed the stairs. His room was in darkness, and when she knelt at the spy-hole, nothing could be seen.