The Price Of Honour

And he marched them down again.’

‘Madame is in good spirits,’ said a voice in English.

She froze. Slowly she reached out for a towel and held it to cover her breasts, then turned her head towards the door. The man who had come in from the rain and was standing on the doormat knocking the water from his shako was the rider she had seen earlier. He was carrying a rifle and a dead hare. Was this his home? Was she the intruder or was he? She decided to attack first.

‘Is it not the custom where you come from to knock before entering?’

‘I did. You were making so much noise you did not hear.’

‘Noise, sir?’ She dared not move for fear of disturbing the bubbles which enveloped her. ‘Some have said I have a passably good voice.’

He smiled and walked over to the stove to sniff appreciatively at the pot; it brought him round to her front. ‘Is your mistress at home?’

‘My mistress?’ she repeated, then, realising he thought she was a servant, laughed. ‘I call no one mistress.’

‘You are surely not the lady of the house?’

‘No. I have never met her.’

He laughed aloud. ‘Oh, I see. An opportunist like myself. Are you alone?’

She hesitated, but there was no point in denying it; he would soon discover the truth. ‘Yes.’

He indicated the pot with a jerk of his head. ‘That smells good.’

‘The least a gentleman would do is leave a lady to finish her toilette in privacy.’

‘But I am no gentleman.’ There was a hint of bitterness in his voice which made her look up into his face. There were tiny lines etched around his eyes which could have been laughter-lines but could equally have been caused by long hours squinting into the sun. His mouth was firm and his teeth were strong and white; a handsome man, she decided, but refreshingly unaware of it.

‘No, that much is evident,’ she said crisply, and when he made no move to go picked up the bar of soap and hurled it at him. Her aim was good and it struck him on the side of the head, bounced off his shoulder and slithered to the floor. ‘Get out!’ she yelled.

He laughed and retrieved it, weighing it in his hand as if considering whether to throw it back. ‘Out?’ he asked mildly, appraising what he could see of her — a mane of red-gold hair, which lay against freckled cheeks in wet tendrils, a long neck and sloping white shoulders which disappeared behind the towel she was holding against herself. The vision was spoiled to some extent by hardened brown hands which were obviously accustomed to work. ‘But it is pouring with rain. And besides, I am hungry. Now if you were to share the pot with me I could provide something to improve its flavour.’ He waved the hare at her.

‘Go away and leave me in peace. I do not want or need your company.’ There was nothing else at hand to throw except the towel and she was loath to let go of that, and he showed no sign of doing as she asked. With nothing in her hand to defend herself, she was obliged to change her belligerent attitude to one of reasonableness; and the idea of meat made the saliva run in her mouth. ‘Can’t you see I am in no position to do anything about the soup or the meat with you hovering over me? And this water is becoming cold and I want to dress.’

He grinned. ‘I could do with a bath too. How about sharing it with me?’

‘If you go and leave me to dress, I will cook the hare and heat up some more water for you.’

‘That sounds like a fair bargain to me.’ He paused and pointed to the door into the rest of the house. ‘Have you been through there?’

‘Yes. It is empty, nothing to steal, I am afraid.’

‘What a disappointment for you.’

She was about to say she was referring to him and that she was not a thief when she remembered the clothes she had found and intended to keep. Instead she said, ‘Go and wait in the hall if you want any dinner.’

He made an ostentatious leg and left the room. As soon as she was sure he had really gone, she scrambled out and dried herself quickly, then dressed in her own underclothes and topped them with the dressing-gown she had found. She went to the door and called to him. ‘If you want a bath, you had better empty this one and draw more water.’

She went to stir the pot and skin the hare and did not know he had come back into the room until he spoke. ‘Where is the owner of this?’

She turned towards him. He was standing just inside the door holding Philippe’s coat at arm’s length. ‘Dead,’ she said flatly, returning to her task.

‘Who was he?’

‘My husband.’

‘Your husband?’

‘Yes. Lieutenant Philippe Santerre.’

‘A Frenchman?’

‘Yes.’ She looked at him boldly. ‘Does that change your mind?’

‘About what?’

‘About sharing a meal.’

‘No, why should it?’ He began dragging the bath towards the door. She watched as he opened the door, tipped it up and emptied its contents into the yard where the soapy bubbles dispersed in the puddles already there. He brought it back and stood it on end against the wall. ‘Is there anyone in the house at all?’

‘No. Unless they are hiding in a cupboard. There is a cellar, but the door is locked, I couldn’t open it.’

‘Best be sure.’ He picked up his rifle and left her. She could hear him moving about the house, doing as she had done earlier and searching every cranny. She was stirring the pot and humming quietly to herself when she was startled by a shot. She ran into the hall, half expecting to see him lying dead at the feet of the rightful owner of the house, but there was no one about and all was quiet. A moment later he appeared clutching two bottles of wine. ‘Had to shoot the lock off,’ he said. ‘But there was no one there. They probably evacuated when they heard your people were advancing.’

‘My people?’

‘Johnny Bluecoats.’

‘They are not my people.’

‘One of them was. You said so.’

‘I am English, just as you are.’

‘Ah.’ He smiled wryly, taking the bottles into the kitchen and setting them on the table. ‘How can you be sure that I am?’

‘You are dressed in a British uniform and you speak English as well as I do.’

‘Neither of which is proof positive. No, if I were you, I would want to know a great deal more than that.’

‘Why? It is of little consequence; our paths are unlikely to cross again.’

‘Now that would be a pity,’ he said. ‘I thought my luck had changed at last.’

‘You are impertinent, sir.’

He stood squarely and gave her a cool look of appraisal from her bare feet — army boots were hardly a suitable accessory for a blue silk dressing-gown — up over her five feet seven — she had the figure of an angel, he decided — to an oval face in which the green eyes flashed at him with a confusing mixture of humour and anger. He laughed. ‘Pretending to be affronted by what was, after all, meant as a compliment, doesn’t fool me, Madame Santerre. You are no drawing-room miss and, I’ll wager, never have been. A camp follower, that’s what you are, and, it seems, not particular as to the camp. Tell me, is it true that Frenchman are more romantically inclined than Englishmen?’