Bobby’s family ran an old-fashioned farm. They had worried about going out of business but with the renewed interest in animal-welfare and natural products, they were becoming very popular again with customers flocking to their farm shop.

Like any farm-kid Bobby helped out as much as he could after school and at weekends. He loved it and knew his future lay in the business eventually so he spent more time learning about farming than he did on his homework.

Grandfather always took him down to the bus-stop at the end of the lane to catch the school bus, and one December morning as the boy was waiting for the old man to wrap up warm, he looked at the almanac pinned to the kitchen wall.

“Gramps, what’s Winter Solstice?” Bobby stuck his finger on the date.

As they trudged down the lane, their breath like smoke from their lips, Grandfather told him, enjoying passing down knowledge he had received from his own father.

“Very special, that. Used to be more important than Christmas. In fact,” he looked around superstitiously, “Some people say that it still is. Say the church nicked it off the old religions. But never mind. It’s the day the seasons change. The earth stands still for a couple of days before the days start to get longer. That was why it was celebrated with feasting n such. Sun comes back, we can grow things again, see?”

Bobby did see. He was a bright child and the importance of the Winter Solstice started to simmer in his fertile mind. Juxtaposing all the Christmas traditions with what his grandfather had told him he was making his own equations, and liked them a lot. As he was feeding the animals, all brought indoors for the winter, a thought struck him. He scratched one of the pigs behind the ears just where they like it, and asked “Is it Solstice that you can speak then? Not Christmas Eve? I bet it is.” The pig didn’t answer, just closed her eyes in delight at the scratching.

There was nothing special happening on the Solstice at home, apart from the shop being busier than ever, and his mum baking as if expecting an army, so Bobby did his homework, washed up and went to bed, He didn’t really. He waited until eleven-thirty and got dressed warmly, sneaked downstairs and let himself out into the barn, where he hid on top of the piles of straw-bales, burrowing down a little so he could see down to the floor.