Patrick’s eyebrow raised and he involuntarily looked at his wife. There was more here than met the eye. Henri was no common French lad, that was certain.

“How old are you, Henri?” Patrick asked.

“I’m almost thirteen.”

“Hell,” Patrick exclaimed in disgust, “a twelve-year-old foot soldier?”

“No, I was … I don’t know the word in English,” Henri said. “I carried about the flag. I was going to be a soldier, just as soon as I turned fourteen.”

Sophie swallowed and her grip on Patrick’s arm tightened.

Henri, who was clearly ripe for a case of puppy love, looked rather shyly at Sophie. “Would you like to meet them?” He gestured toward the beds.

Sophie replied in French, and that broke the last of Henri’s resistance. He beamed, and led her about the room, whispering the name of each of the injured boys.

Patrick watched Henri for a moment. The lad must have been three or four when the French began guillotining their nobility—and he hadn’t learned that bow from a peasant.

“How did you end up in this monastery?” Patrick asked Hankford.

Hankford looked about the room, rather pitifully. “Mum here and I are members of the Family of Love. Have you heard of it?”

Patrick nodded. Who hadn’t heard of the Family of Love? They were a Dutch religious group that had been variously accused of adultery and nudism, ever since the days of Queen Elizabeth. He looked at the plump nurse, who had finished changing the bandage and was now straightening the covers on a different cot. She certainly didn’t look like the adulterous type.

“I didn’t think the Family was still in operation,” Patrick observed carefully. No point in getting Hankford riled up, at least not until after dinner.

“Oh yes, oh yes, they are, at least in Wales,” Hankford said dispiritedly. “My grandfather became a member way back in 1731. He bought this monastery, thinking as he’d get a proper ‘family’ established here. But when he married my grandmother, she didn’t cotton to the Family of Love, and so she threw all the members out. But later my mother became a member, and so did I. Well, my grandfather’s dead now, but we’re still part of the Family. We couldn’t turn those French boys away when the boat washed up here.”

Patrick was starting to piece together the story. “Henri put the lads in a boat and it came ashore here.”

“Yup. They washed clear around the promontory and then came into the cove. As I said, we couldn’t turn them away, because they’d just be shot by the government. And the Family of Love doesn’t think much of government executions.”