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“Put plenty on,” he said. “It’ll be cold until the house heats up.”
    “Aren’t you going to work?”
    “There isn’t any,” he said. “The power’s down at the factory. There’ll be no school for you either. The road’s closed; even the gritter can’t get through.”
    Then I sat down at the table and kept very still, because something was fizzing inside me. Father was saying: “I’ve never seen anything like it. Not in October,” and it was as if he was a long way away, and everything was now new and strange: the clank of the Rayburn stove lid, the shunt of the scuttle, the wheeze and pop of the porridge. I was standing in a high place but I didn’t want to get down. I wanted to go higher. I said: “Perhaps the snow is a sign of the end! That would be exciting.”
    Father said: “The only exciting thing around here is that our breakfast is getting cold.” He put two bowls of porridge on the table, sat down, and bowed his head. He said: “Thank you for this food, which gives us strength, and thank you for this new day of life, which we intend to use wisely.”
    “And thank you for the snow,” I said under my breath, and I reached out and put my hand on his.
    Father said: “Through Jesus’s name, amen.” He moved his hand away and said: “The prayer is for concentrating.”
    “I was concentrating,” I said. I tucked my hand into my sleeve.
    “Eat up,” Father said. “I want to get down to the shops before they sell out of bread.”
    *   *   *
     
    W E PUT ON wellies and coats. We walked in the road, in the pink trail left by the gritter. It wasn’t snowing anymore; the sky was fiery and sun flashed in each of the windows. And all the things we usually saw—the dog mess and cigarette butts and chewing gum and gob—had been washed away. Cars were tucked up beneath snowy eiderdowns. There was nothing except people carrying bags or shoveling snow or blowing on their hands.
    At the top of the hill, the town spread out before us. I knew it was all there, but today you had to look hard to be sure. We passed the multistory car park and the bus station and the main street, and they, too, were deep under snow. I said: “I like this. I hope we have more.”
    Father said: “There won’t be any more.”
    “How do you know?”
    “The forecast is clear.”
    “They didn’t forecast this, did they?”
    But he wasn’t listening.
    *   *   *
     
    T HE C O-OP WAS busy. Hot air was blowing and people were pushing. “Have you ever seen anything like it?” they said. “No mention on the forecast,” and “In October too.” There were no newspapers by the tills and not many loaves of bread left. We paid for the groceries, Father took four bags and I took one, and we began walking home.
    Halfway up the hill I said: “Father, how would you know that a miracle had happened?”
    “ What? ” He was puffing, his face red.
    “How would we know if a miracle happened?”
    “A miracle?”
    “Yes.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “I think the snow might be a miracle.”
    “It’s just snow, Judith!”
    “But how do you know?”
    Father said: “Now, look, we don’t want a long discussion, OK?”
    “But how do you know that lots of things aren’t really miracles?” I said.
    I ran to keep up. “I don’t think people would believe a miracle happened even if it was right in front of them, even if someone told them. They would always think it was caused by something ordinary.”
    Father said: “Judith, where is this going?”
    I opened my mouth, then closed it again. “I can’t tell you yet,” I said. “I need more evidence first.”
    “Evidence?”
    “Yes.”
    Father stopped walking. “What did I just say?”
    “But—”
    Then Father frowned. He said: “Drop it, Judith. Just drop it, OK?”

Evidence
     
    B ETWEEN THE KITCHEN and the front room is the middle room. The middle room is Father’s room. It’s dark and smells of leather and sheepskin. There is a moth-eaten