The enemy hadn’t particularly fought well, and, further, now that he thought about it, he still wasn’t sure the man had been a Bolo. Would the prospect of ravishing three begrimed, stout, trout-catching loaves of bread in dun-colored kerchiefs and workboots motivate anyone to attack the monastery? He had been lied to, strung along with promises of discussions of cheese, poisoned with something that tasted like sunsets, and handed a broken rifle; if he was going to die, he might as well have more of that strange liqueur.

A wrenching sound of metal dragging past metal, from not so far away—the door to the tower opening. Hugo stepped toward the top of the staircase.

“Bonsoir,” Aarne called, his voice echoing upward along the spiral of the cochlea. “Comment allez-vous?”

“Oh, comme ci, comme ça.”

35

At the center of a crowd, here was Hannah Chaplin’s face, smiling inexhaustibly, at nothing really.

There were, Chaplin thought, four ways of fading in. You could open the lens diaphragm, but that’s never a complete fade. A better way was using a dissolving shutter, and Rollie had an easy finger with the graduated arc lever, a smooth and even way to fade in. He wanted to talk to Rollie, who was still in the balloon. He wanted to think more about the other two methods of fading, they worked equally well fading in or fading out, but he could not remember when he had last breathed.

He saw an audience.

The banger-shaped balloon high in the air was slowly descending, courtesy of the Air Service doughboys who were pulling on the ropes, and Rollie was peering down to the ground to see what all the fuss was about. The newest hair and makeup girls were huddled together, getting it all explained to them by the property master. The English-horn player was looking with confusion to Albert Austin, who was saying, “It’s his mother. His mother!”

Chaplin knew to hug her—that was obvious. She was shorter than he remembered. Her hair touched his nose. She smelled dusty, as if she had been stored in a locker. The dress was new; it still had a hem pin from the store. Her arms patted his sides quickly.

“Are those marigolds?” she asked. She wasn’t looking at him.

“Sorry?”

“Marigolds.”

He didn’t understand. Already, he thought.

“Careful with your big feet, son,” she said, causing a delighted cry through the crowd, and people repeated what she’d said. He felt as if he were running behind a carriage that was racing downhill. She was looking at the crowd with confusion. Why were they laughing?—then pleasure— they were laughing! Then she was hiking her skirt and hunching down by the lacy border of flowers just outside the bungalows. “And that must be mignonette. I’ve heard about that, haven’t I?” She was looking up with delight. “Real mignonette.”