I stepped forward and Marie-Claude held out her hand. I took it.

“Mademoiselle Collison,” she said, ‘it seems a long time since we knew each other. And you have been through a terrible ordeal. The Baron has been telling me of it. “

I said: “We are fortunate to have come through it alive.”

“And this is your son?” She was looking at Kendal and I could not guess what she was thinking.

“Yes, my son Kendal,” I said.

Kendal came forward and took her hand. He kissed it in the French manner.

“Charming,” she said, then she turned to me: “The siege must have been terrifying.”

“We will go into the dining-room,” said the Baron.

She hesitated.

“The boy … should he eat with William?”

“Not today,” said the Baron.

“We will see later.”

“There is another woman …” began the Princesse.

“I gather she is still sleeping. Something can be sent to her r. om when she wakes.” He spoke authoritatively, and his voice was distinctly cool when he addressed her. Knowing him now, I thought, quite well, and also knowing a little of her, I tried to picture what their life together was like. I imagined that normally they saw very little of each other.

Kendal had gone to the Baron and was smiling at him, and I noticed how the Baron’s face softened as he looked at him.

“I like your castle,” said Kendal.

“I want to see all of it.”

“You shall,” the Baron promised.

“When?”

“Some time.”

The Princesse led the way into the small dining-room where I had eaten before, so it was familiar to me. The Baron sat at one end of the table, the Princesse at the other. Kendal and I were opposite each other, and as it was a large table we seemed very far apart.

There was soup first. It seemed easier to eat and the most satisfactory food, for after almost four months of deprivation one had to adjust oneself to eating normally. There was an impulse to overeat at the sight of so much delicious food and we all knew even Kendal that we had to restrain that impulse.

The Princesse said: “You must tell me all about your terrible ordeal.

We knew that the Baron was in Paris, of course, and we thought we might never see him again. “

“It must have been a shock when I turned up,” said the Baron coldly.

The corners other mouth lifted nervously and she smiled as though he was joking. She said: “We waited every day for news. We did not know what would become of us all. These fearful Germans …”

“The French will admit defeat,” said the Baron.

“There’ll be treaties, unpleasant consequences for us, and then I suppose the French will begin rebuilding.”

“The Baron does not consider himself to be French,” said the Princesse to me.

“He dissociates himself from their defeat.”

“It was mistaken tactics from the first. Folly which resulted in the only possible outcome.”

Kendal said: “Are there dungeons?”

“Yes,” the Baron told him.

“I will show them to you.”

“Is anybody in them?” asked Kendal in a low voice.

“I don’t think so. We’ll have a look tomorrow.”

I said: “It’s very good of you, Princesse, to be so hospitable.”

“We are honoured, Mademoiselle Collison.” She stressed the Mademoiselle . “The great artist to stay under our roof!

Remember “Men can make kings but only God can make an artist.”

Mademoiselle told me that on our first meeting. Do you remember, Mademoiselle? “

There was something defiant about her, I detected. She was frightened of him. She hadn’t changed very much from the girl who had come to my bedroom on that very first night and pretended to be a maid.

“I remember very well,” I said, ‘and I repeat, it is very good of you to have me and my son here. “

She spread her hands.

“It is natural that you should come here. You have been with my husband. , . suffered with him … acted as nurse to him, I hear .. and now you have escaped with him. You must try this fish. It was caught only this afternoon and is very lightly cooked without sauces as after your ordeal you will have to eat very carefully at first, it has been explained to me.”

“Thank you. You are indeed very good. You understand that the Baron has very kindly offered us the Loge until I can get back to Paris.

“I know. It has to be made ready as it has not been used for a long time. For a few days you must stay here. I hear your studio in Paris was a great success … before the siege.”

“I had many clients.”

“It is a long time since we last met. Six years … or more. My little William must be about the same age as your boy.”

“Yes, I dare say.”

The Baron had said little. He was watching us intently.

He talked mostly to Kendal, who wanted to know if they would defend the castle if the Germans came here.

“To the last man,” the Baron told him.

“Are there battlements?”

“There are indeed.”

“Shall we pour boiling oil down on the invaders when they use their battering rams?”

“Boiling oil and tar,” said the Baron solemnly.

The Princesse smiled at me and lifted her shoulders.

“War, war …” she said.

“Talk of war. I’m tired of war.

Mademoiselle Collison, after we have finished I will come to your room and talk to you. You need clothes. You must need many things. “

“We did leave in a great hurry,” I explained, ‘and so brought nothing with us. “

“I am sure we can help.”

“Perhaps,” I suggested, ‘there is some seamstress who could make something for us. I hope soon to be working again. I do have money.

Money was not the problem in Paris. “

“I am sure we can arrange something,” she said.

There was a little chicken after the fish. The menu had been carefully chosen. It was the first real meal I had had for months and I felt revitalized. There was a faint colour in Kendal’s cheeks. I could see he was thoroughly enjoying this adventure.

The Baron took him off after the meal and the Princesse came to my room with me.

When the door of my room shut on us, she seemed to change. She dropped the pose of chat elaine and became the young girl I had known.

“Life is odd,” she said.

“Fancy seeing you again. I’ve thought of you every time I’ve looked at the miniatures, and of course I heard about your salon in Paris. You really became well known, didn’t you? It seems such a long time ago.”

“It is.”

“Kate,” she said.

“I called you Kate, didn’t I? I liked you … from the start I liked you. You had an air of independence about you.

“Take it or leave it. If you don’t like me, employ another artist.” You have a child now. Bertrand de Mortemer’s, I suppose. Yet you didn’t marry him . even though there was a child. “

“No,” I said, “I didn’t marry him.”

“And you had a child … and you were not married!”

“That’s right.”

“You were brave.”

“I didn’t want to marry. We … er … didn’t want to marry each other.”

“So you had the child. How did you manage?”

“I was befriended, and then I had the salon and people came, and in that world it didn’t seem to matter so much as it would in a more conventional one … If you understand.”

“I do. I wish I had been in a less conventional world. Your boy is beautiful. He needs a good deal of feeding up.”

“He has been four months in a siege. We were near starvation when we came out.”

“And the Baron brought you out. My noble husband! What was he doing in ” You must ask him. “

“He never tells me anything.” She hesitated, and I think she was on the verge of a confidence, but she seemed suddenly to realize that she might be somewhat indiscreet.

“I’ll bring some clothes for you to try,” she said.

“And the seamstress?”

“That’s for later. At first let me give you something. You are taller than I and so thin … That might help … your being thin. You won’t take up so much. I’ll send one of the maids in with some things.” She looked at me wistfully.

“When I used to hear about you in that Paris salon, I envied you. I missed Paris. I hate it here… this gloomy old castle. I feel like a prisoner sometimes. I get so tired. I have to rest a lot. It is since William’s birth.”

She turned away and went to the door.

I sat down. The food was having its effect and made me feel sleepy. I lay on the bed for a while but did not sleep. Now that my mind was freed from the preoccupation with food, I began to see the situation in which I found myself more clearly.

I could not go on here. It was only a temporary respite. Even if I stayed in the Loge I should be living on the Baron’s bounty and I could not endure that for long. I must get back to Paris. But how could I get back to Paris? It would be months perhaps a year before there would be a hope for me to work there.

I kept thinking of his words: “You have to consider the boy.”

Yes, I had to consider Kendal. He must be my first responsibility. No matter what personal humiliation I suffered, as long as Kendal profited that was all I must think of. After all, the Baron was his father. It was not like taking from a stranger.

The maid came in with three dresses, and some petticoats and undergarments.

“The Princesse asked if you would try these, Madame,” she said.

I thanked her and tried on the dresses. They were not a good fit, but they would suffice until I could get something made.

I had to admit to myself that it was a great relief to get out of the clothes which I had worn for so long.

As I changed into a green velvet dress, I thought: There is nothing I can do but accept what fate has thrust upon me. I need rest as well as food; my mind needs adjusting. One does not go through the ordeal of losing a great friend, one’s father, and four months of starvation with death threatening at every turn without needing some adjustment.

Until this was made I must shelve other problems.

Kendal and I remained for a week in the castle while the Loge was prepared for us. The Baron had decreed that after our ordeal we needed to rest there for a while.

His word was law in the castle and no one questioned anything he commanded. That he should arrive with two women and a child from the siege of Paris was treated as though it were a part of the natural course of events-because that was how he wished it to be accepted.

When I thought about it, I could see that a perfectly logical explanation could be put on what had happened. He had found himself in Paris; he had seen a child about to be crushed to death and had thrown himself on the child and borne the brunt of the collapse of bricks and mortar. He had discovered the child to be the son of an artist whom he had once employed and because of the disorder in the Paris streets and the inability to get medical attention, she had taken him in injured as he was and he had stayed in her house to be nursed by her. It was all perfectly logical except one thing. He could not hide his affection for Kendal; and when it was considered how he behaved towards William who was generally accepted as his son this was very strange. Moreover, William was small and dark with his mother’s Valois nose. He seemed to be a nervous child but I quickly deduced that this was due to the treatment he had received. The man he believed to be his father ignored him and his mother seemed indifferent towards him too. Poor child, he had been made to feel that his presence in this life was rather unnecessary.

So of course they were wondering about us. Then there was the fact that the Princesse constantly referred to me as Mademoiselle Collison -and indeed I had been so called when I visited the castle all those years ago, and many of them remembered me. Moreover, the resemblance between Kendal and the Baron was becoming more obvious every day.

Oh yes, understandably there were speculations.

They were strange days. I think that if I had been my previous self I should never have stayed at the castle. But I had been more weakened by that sojourn in Paris than I realized. I was still suffering from the shock of Nicole’s death, which had been temporarily muted by other momentous events, but now that I had left Paris behind me, I thought of Nicole a great deal.

Then again there was the death of my father. The days of my childhood were constantly in my mind when my father had been closer to me than any other person. I was only now realizing that I should never see him again. So I mourned the two of them. I longed to hear what was happening to Clare. So my thoughts were dominated by my father and Nicole. I mourned them both afresh. The knowledge that it was the Baron who had sent Nicole to care for me made no difference to my feelings for her. She would always be remembered in my heart as my good friend-in-need, and it was only now that I fully realized what a big gap her death following on that of my father had made in my life.