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one night, without warning, he went away, leaving behind the tin you now hold.’
    The old man watches Ny as he traces with his finger along the elaborate embroidery of the cap, threads of blue and purple silk, fashioned into the leaves and branches of a golden cypress tree. He strokes the feather and holds the smooth stones against his cheek. Luc laughs out loud and says, ‘Put the cap on your head, it’s yours.’
    â€˜And,’ asks Ny, ‘the feather?’
    â€˜Yes, yours,’ smiles Luc.
    â€˜And the stones?’
    â€˜Yours also,’ laughs the man.
    A month later winter sets in and the water in the buckets at the flower stall freeze overnight. Old Man Luc warms his hands by the open fire in the brazier he has lit by the roadside. Ny squats beside him chewing on a bamboo shoot. Old Man Luc touches the lump at the back of his neck that he knows has outgrown treatment.
    â€˜Ny,’ he says, ‘I am an old man and you are a young boy.’ Ny looks up inquisitively into the kindly face of his guardian. ‘Your life is ahead of you and mine is behind me,’ says Luc, looking deep into the flames as they twist and twirl and vanish into the night air. Ny sees something altogether different in the act of combustion, the mixing: something of the energy diffused, the elements combining. ‘You are a very talented boy. Your gifts must be spread beyond an old man and a flower stall.’
    Luc glances at his young charge, who stares back, so trusting, so vital.
    â€˜Ny, you should go to school. Live with a family, be with other children.’
    Ny smiles, maybe at the idea, maybe at something he has deduced from the flames.
    â€˜You want to go to school, Ny?’
    Ny smiles and nods.
    â€˜I will arrange for it,’ says Luc, the pain shooting up his spine, hotter than the centre of the flames in the fire. ‘With my nephew and his family in the city.’
    Ny stops chewing and looks up at the old man.
    â€˜They will love you, as I have loved you.’
    Later that night, lying side by side in the little attic room, Old Man Luc, sensing the thoughts of Ny whispers.
    â€˜I look up at the stars sometimes and I think, Ny, that your mother might have had to go to where she went. To leave you behind to be found by me. So that I can send you to the care and protection of my nephew in Ho Chi Minh City. And then, who knows how wide your wings will spread, how far you will fly? Wherever she is now she will be happy that you are safe and well and will be learning. You need to go to school. I will be here at my stall and I will watch every night for her to return. I will go to the platform and tell her of your progress and she will smile and be at peace.’
    He looks into the eyes of this boy that he loves more than he can easily express. He puts his hands on the boy’s shoulders and kisses him tenderly on the forehead.
    â€˜You have had a difficult life, my dearest boy, but remember the ancient proverb I taught you. Cái khó bó cái khôn . Adversity brings wisdom.’
    And so it came to pass that some weeks later the old man and the young boy make their way to the train station, passing by the shuttered flower stall and into the bustle and flurry of the ticketing hall. Ny carries a small bag of his possessions and on his head he wears the silken hat of the wise old man who once graced these parts. There, on time, is the night train to Ho Chi Minh City. They walk along the platform to the spot where Ny’s mother had disappeared. They climb up the steps to the carriage and settle together on the hard wooden seats. Ny sits exactly where the man with the bad-luck-red-hat had jeered and scoffed at Chi. Looking out the window on to the platform, Ny takes himself back to that night and sees his mother through the hiss and steam. Her hand outstretched. Her face pleading. But in her ghostly expression, drifting in and out of the wall of smoke, he senses a