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the week, then she and her parents wouldn’t have to worry about him getting lonely, or into trouble, or worse, noticed by the neighbours.
    Finally Gargoth sighed and said, “Very well, Katherine. I’ll stay here for the week with you. I will continue to light the candles at night. Of course, I won’t be able to talk much to our kind friend here, since she doesn’t understand a word I say. Won’t she find me rather dull company?”
    Katherine looked over at Cassandra, who was in turn studying the little gargoyle with a look of rapture on her face, and smiled.
    “No, I don’t think for a second she’ll find your company dull. Just stay up here on the roof, and everything will be fine. I’ll be at soccer camp all day, but I’ll be back every night after dinner, except for the nights I have practice. Or games. Well, I guess I’ll be away most of the time, but here at bedtime… It’ll be fine.”
    “Yes, very well. You can tell her she’ll have her own gargoyle for the week. Now, let’s get back to the story. Where were we?”
    Katherine thought for a moment. “You and Philip were crossing the English Channel to France.”
    “Yes. We did cross the ocean. I won’t tell you more about that awful experience except to say it was a calm day, which was just as well, since that tiny boat creaked and shook and jolted and bucked just as though the seas were fierce. And some abominable woman had a basketful of noisy geese. Thankfully, we arrived safely in the French town of Calais.”
    Gargoth paused and took a long drink of lemonade. “The next part of our journey was very difficult. Philip walked, with me in the sack on his back, for many weeks through the fields and valleys of France. He had enough money from the sale of the horse and cart to buy food, since the apples were long gone. We slept in farmhouses and village inns, or under the open skies.
    “Eventually, we came to the tiny village we sought and began new lives, apart.
    “But soon it wasn’t so important to me to see Philip, for after a very short time, my life changed forever.”

Gargoth’s Story, 1665
    Le Village Ensemble
    Philip was weary and footsore, but he didn’t put down his sack. He carried it over his shoulder, despite his exhaustion. He had been walking all night, and it seemed like days since he had left his bed at the last small village inn. He was very tired of small villages and their crowded inns, especially since he didn’t understand anything anyone said to him. For the most part, they didn’t understand him, either.
    Just as he crested a long, steep hill, he came upon a wooden signpost which read:
    Ensemble, 2
    The village of Ensemble! He and Gargoth had found it, the place they had sought for weeks. He’d lost track of how long he and his little hidden friend had been on the road, searching for this place. The weather was turning colder, much colder, and they had left his village in England when the trees were just starting to change into their autumn colours.
    So it must have been five or six weeks. He had lost count. As he trudged slowly along the dark road, Philip heard Gargoth snoring gently in the sack and felt happy to have his friend with him. It would have been a much lonelier journey without him. Gargoth was a great storyteller and helped Philip pass the long hours of walking by making up fantastic tales about the world and the animals living in it beyond the seas. Some nights, sleeping together in the dark, he was glad to know his strange friend was nearby.
    The lane Philip was walking along took a sharp turn to the right and suddenly opened up to a tiny valley, with small houses and farms dotted here and there.
    The village!
    The sun was just about to break above the hills. He wanted to rush into the valley and embrace the first person he saw, but he restrained himself. He was almost fourteen years old, after all. He would need to act like a man, since he most certainly would be treated like one and be expected to