‘You look as though you still have something left,’ Theo said. A flock of guinea fowl ran towards them, gabbling in their hope of grain.

‘They make new ones of their own accord, thank God. It’s natural.’

‘Are any of Henri’s group around?’ he asked as they walked back.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Anybody who was with him during that last attack?’

She shrugged. ‘Many of the young ones have now joined up, like Roger and Claude. They’re not here any more, they’re in the army.’ She paused. ‘You could talk to the Russian, I suppose, Mr Nikola at Pechagrier. I don’t take to him myself, but he helped Henri with the boys, drilling them and all that. He was like Henri’s lieutenant. He might have been there.’ She took back the basket that he been permitted to carry to the kitchen door. ‘Florence went out with the dog,’ she said. ‘If she had luck, we’ll have an omelette with truffles tonight.’

He walked from the farmyard to the front of the house, then took the path down to the lake. There he stood watching the water reflecting the late afternoon light in its mirror-smooth surface. He took out a cigarette, a precious Camel from a packet given to him by an American colleague. Between Madame Maniotte’s Ariane, trading favours with the Germans, and Micheline’s, starting an escapeline for persecuted communists and Jews in the earliest days of the Occupation, there was a world of difference. Incredibly, when he tested them against his memory of her, he could believe both of them.

Soon after he had first met her, Ariane had invited him to Normandy where her father had an estate. In accepting he had assumed it was a shooting party. The house was enormous; there was room for dozens, but no other guests appeared; even her father was absent. They went out together with their guns, and she proved to be a good companion, a tireless walker and an excellent shot. She concentrated so intently on the day’s sport, was so lacking in coquetry, that her manner contradicted the evidence that she had arranged everything to be alone with him. All along the initiative was hers: the lunch with the Socialist member of Parliament, now this day’s shooting. However, he came to understand that her concentration was characteristic; in the evening the focus of her attention swung back to him. After dinner they sat together in the vast hall, lit only the log fire, and talked easily, as if they had been friends for years. From one moment to the next he intended to act, but the camaraderie between them held him back.

When the last log rolled forward on the bed of glowing ash, she was still taking the lead. She rose and pushed the log back into position with her shoe, remained standing looking down at the dying fire. In the silence the wood cracked and she said, ‘Kiss me.’ She walked into his arms and when he kissed her gently, feeling the softness of her upper lip between his, she reached up to take his head in both her hands. Very slowly her tongue ran along the edge of his lower lip where it was rimmed with a day’s growth of beard. It was impossible to forget the astonishing erotic power of her eagerness and her kisses. When they drew apart, she took his hand and said, ‘Let’s make love now.’