‘Go through the woods,’ Micheline urged.

‘No, we can’t ride; the road is too rough. It’s not far, we won’t be caught.’ With the shouts and waves that mark the end of a happy and successful day they left.

The girls were now given the job of cleaning the winepress. Sabine pumped the water into the bucket, which Suzie threw onto the rocky bloodstained floor, swabbing the pinkish flood out of the door and over the edge of the cliff.

Normally the processing of a pig would take several days, but the need to remove all sign of Lou Moussou’s existence demanded that they work until late that night. In the kitchen Suzie helped with the mincer, feeding in the raw meat and back fat and tamping it down while Madame de Cazalle turned the handle. At last Micheline cleared the table and served dinner. Suzie, pleading tiredness, rejected her pork chop and crept away to bed.

Sabine had understood first the meaning of what they heard. As the terrible sound of the climax died away, she slid forward on her belly towards the edge of the loft. Suzie, imitating her silence and precaution, advanced to join her. Below them the winepress was in darkness, save for lances of faint light that penetrated the cracks in the door, and in the layers of blackness she could not interpret what she saw: two forms like trees leaning away from one another, yet joined at the trunk, grafted and entwined. Then the sound began again. Not caring whether she was heard or not, Suzie turned back to the funnel, to climb back to the open air and the fight.

Part Four

Bonnemort

10–15 March 1945

Chapter Twenty-five

‘I don’t want to alarm you, Theo.’ His aunt’s voice, disembodied, was faint and crackling, a call from another world. He was already alarmed. The aunts used letters to communicate at a distance. They normally reserved the telephone for mundane local matters or dire emergency. For Aunt Odette to have put through a call to Paris already indicated that it was serious.

‘I think you should come to Bonnemort for a few days, if you could spare the time. Or Ariane. We really need Ariane. Could she not come to us for a while?’

‘Of course I’ll come if necessary. What’s the problem?’

‘Sabine has been … has had an accident.’

‘What’s happened to her?’

‘Her life isn’t in danger, but she is rather ill. I think you should come, Theo.’

‘What happened?’

There was a pause so long that he thought the line had been cut.

‘Hello, hello …’

‘… attack …’ Aunt Odette’s voice swelled to audibility and faded again.

‘Can you hear me, Aunt Odette? I’ll try to get a line this evening to tell you when I’m coming.’

He slowly replaced the receiver. Although it was deeply inconvenient, he suddenly saw an opportunity. He must persuade Ariane to come back with him.

It took considerable determination to fulfil Aunt Odette’s demand. To leave the Big Man for several days on the plea of a family emergency, to persuade Ariane to come with him, was not easy. He expected Suzie to be left behind in Paris to attend school, cared for by Pascal Wolff’s housekeeper. However, Ariane had insisted on her coming, in spite of what she had said earlier about separating the two girls. They went by rail, a journey of twelve hours with three changes. Suzie, installed in a window seat, read her book or gazed out of the window at the wintry landscapes of central France. Ariane spent long periods with her eyes closed. They arrived at Bonnemort late at night, to be welcomed by Micheline, Florence and the aunts who were waiting for them in their old sitting room, which they now reoccupied, on the first floor.