Ariane would not let her go. ‘Someone might still be alive. We’ve got to go on until we find them all.’

Even when they left, in the dark, when they could no longer see, when they had hauled seven bodies through the undergrowth to the side of the road, closing their eyes, arranging their limbs, they could not be sure that there were not more maquisards, alive or dead, lying in the forest.

At the gates Florence stopped Ariane. ‘Don’t tell Mum yet. She’ll only worry about Dad and Roger. It looks as if they got away. So let’s not tell her until we know he’s all right.’

They all went to bed early and Ariane waited in the dark, making no attempt to read. She heard the return of the Germans late at night, and listened to their voices and engines as they worked in the field, loading their lorries. She stood at the window of the tower room watching the headlights of the trucks riding up the track, away from Bonnemort. The Occupation was over.

The silence lengthened, stretched thinner and thinner. Theo broke it.

‘It’s very curious,’ he said. ‘They left without their commanding officer.’ He paused, to see if Ariane had anything to contribute. ‘The only way to account for such an action is that he had ordered them to leave without him, saying he would rejoin them, or that he had gone ahead and they were to join him. But we know he was not ahead of them. When they left, he was still here, possibly already dead.’

Ariane made no comment.

‘How was he going to leave?’ Theo went on, thinking aloud. ‘Ah, the Hispano-Suiza. He was going to take that, wasn’t he?’

‘Yes.’

Theo waited, letting the silence run. Finally, he asked his question. ‘Did you kill him?’

‘No.’

Her voice was sharp in its denial, but it came too quickly. She had expected the question and had rehearsed her monosyllabic answer.

Then she added, ‘But I wish I had.’

Chapter Thirty-four

Florence was crossing the courtyard when Suzie came out, wrapped in coat, hat and gloves.

‘Where’re you off to?’ she called.

‘I’m going … out on my bike,’ Suzie replied, as if she had only just decided.

Florence was already striding away from her. ‘Don’t be late,’ she said.

Her own bicycle had flat tyres, Suzie discovered, but Sabine’s was serviceable. She wiped the seat and wheeled it into the yard. She had no plan, although she had a purpose.

The colonel’s words to them the previous day had been an enormous relief. He had confirmed that her instincts had been right: Madame Ariane was not a traitor. He had put things right. He was also going to find her parents for her. There were limits, however, to what he could or would do. She had tried to explain the story of Vernhes and the major to him, but he had not understood its significance. He did not see that it explained what had happened to Sabine. She had said sadly to Sabine when he had left them to their jigsaw, ‘He didn’t understand, did he?’ She had done her best. It was like holding the piece you needed and simply not seeing which way to turn it to make it fit.