Finding the young Angelique on their doorstep one Christmas Eve, the pious Hubert couple decide to bring her up as their own. As the girl grows up in the vicinity of the town's towering cathedral and learns her parents' trade of embroidery, she becomes increasingly fascinated by the lives of the saints, fuelled by her reading of the Golden Legend and other mystical Christian writings. One day love, in the shape of Felicien HautecA ur, enters the dream world she has constructed around herself, bringing about upheaval and distress. With a foreword by Tim Parks