“We’d work together. But yes, I’d make the final investment decisions.” Gérard gazed at him calmly. “People are going to sacrifice their lives, Marc. This would be your sacrifice. You may dislike the idea, but it wouldn’t kill you. And I want to preserve the business for the next generation.”

“I’ll give you my answer tomorrow,” Marc told him.

He was at his aunt Éloïse’s apartment within the hour. She wasn’t surprised to see him.

“I assume that Gérard has spoken to you,” she remarked.

“You’ll support me when I refuse, won’t you?” he said.

“Not at all,” she answered firmly. She smiled. “I love you, Marc, but you are selfish. And we’re at war. You must accept at once.”

Chapter nineteen

•  1917  •

Father Xavier had been buried in Rome a month ago, in May, and Roland was glad that they’d never meet again. For he had no wish to tell the priest he thought that God was dead.

He’d seen too much in the last three years.

As for the terrible mission he must undertake now, Roland de Cygne felt only disgust and shame. But he would do his duty. What else was he to do?

Swiftness and secrecy were paramount. People in Paris had no idea what had happened. The British were largely in the dark. As for the Germans in the opposite trenches, not a hint of it must ever reach them.

Not the faintest whisper on the wind.

When they paused to rest the horses, he took out a cigarette and lit it. Before putting the lighter back in his pocket, he gazed at it thoughtfully.

It was nearly three years since he’d been given that lighter. On the eve of the battle of the Marne.

How proud of themselves his regiment of cuirassiers had been. They’d made one concession to the modern world. Realizing that their shining metal breastplates might attract enemy fire, they had covered them with cloth. And there they were, entering Europe’s first mechanized war as if it were still the age of Napoléon.

He’d come upon one of his troopers fashioning the lighter out of the shell casing of a rifle bullet. Duras was the trooper’s name, a genial young fellow, good with his hands. The lighter fuel went in the shell casing, then the wick and a small flint striker were fitted on the top. A simple mechanism, but sturdy and reliable.

“Do you often make these, Duras?” he’d asked.

“Oui, mon colonel.”

He’d just been promoted to lieutenant-colonel the week before, he remembered, and he’d still been getting used to the appellation.

“Would you make one for me?”

“I will give you this one, mon colonel,” Duras had replied, “as soon as it is finished.” And a short time later he had brought it to him and shown him, neatly incised on the side of the casing, his initials: R de C.

“What shall I pay you?” he’d asked.

“A bottle of champagne when the war is over?” the young fellow suggested.