‘Was Henri Menesplier one of yours?’ he asked.

‘Henri? No. His group, Rainbow it was called, was part of the Secret Army. It was set up by Lucien Maniotte, whom I’m sure you knew. We worked with Henri at the end, when all the Resistance groups were united under the National Committee, but… Well, he wasn’t the most competent soldier, Henri, and it was too late for him to learn. What did they call it in the trenches in the last war, gun-shy? He didn’t like a shooting war, would do anything to avoid it, which may explain what happened to him. Not that he didn’t do a good job with his escape routes in the early days.’

Theo took note of these comments. ‘I didn’t come to see you about Henri, I came about your courses at the school. I wondered whether for a few months, until the summer holidays at the latest, you would be able to teach my daughter Sabine?’

Vernhes raised his eyebrows in surprise. He moistened his lower lip. ‘How old is Sabine now?’

‘Ah …’ Theo was calculating, for he had not the least idea. ‘She must be …’

‘She is approaching her fourteenth birthday,’ the schoolmaster told him.

‘Yes.’

‘And does she want to remain here to study?’

‘Yes. That is, I haven’t proposed this particular plan to her, but I have no doubt that it would work for a few months, before she goes to her next school. She might have to spend the summer on some special courses to catch up. Or repeat a year. I’m concerned not to lose too much of her education because of the war.’

‘Well, if you wish it and she agrees, I see no difficulty whatsoever. I have no other students at her level, but I shall have pleasure in preparing the course she should be following.’

Theo rose and shook hands. ‘I’ll get her to come in and agree with you when she should start. Next week, as soon as possible. Goodbye.’

‘How is Madame de Cazalle?’ Vernhes remained standing behind his desk.

‘She is well, thank you.’

‘She has recovered from her shocking experiences?’ He could tell by the sudden arrest of Cazalle’s movements that he had understood. ‘The liberation of the region and so on, I mean.’ He expected a curt reply, a swift departure. Such a man would never reveal anything more than he had just, involuntarily, shown.

Cazalle turned back and sat down again. ‘You saw what happened?’ he asked.

Vernhes reseated himself. He had stirred up more than he had anticipated, but he was stimulated by hostility and had always been a skilled tactician in meetings. He could cope.

‘Oh yes, I was there. It didn’t happen here; it was in Montfefoul on the Saturday after the town was liberated.’

The sense of arousal that had surged through him when the colonel took up his challenge increased as he recalled that Bacchanalian scene in the forest. He did not drink, so he was sober among the drunken crowds of men, between seventy and a hundred of them, who had liberated the cellars of Montfefoul. She was sober, too. She had been picked up when they were making arrests in the town, gathering in the collabos at the same time as seizing the wine, emptying the grocer’s and the butcher’s and taking anything they could lay their hands on.