I felt the cold hand twitch in mine. I looked down. The child's face was a blur with great dark pools for eyes. I whispered: "Keep close behind the statue. He may put some lights on."
I had hardly spoken before the salon windows blazed to brilliant oblongs, and the light leaped out across the terrace to touch the lawn. We were still in shadow. We waited, tense behind the statue. It was the figure of a boy, naked, leaning over to look at himself in the pool; a poised, exquisite Narcissus, self- absorbed, self-complete…
Room after room leaped into light, was quenched. We followed his progress through the house; light and then black darkness. The windows on the terrace facing us remained lit Finally they were the only ones. He came to one of the long windows, opened it, and stepped out onto the terrace. His shadow leaped across the lawn to the edge of the water. He stood there for a minute or two, very still, staring at the night I put a gentle hand on Philippe's head, pushing it down so that no faint probe of light would touch his face. We were crouching now. My cheek was against the stone of the plinth. It was I cold and smooth and smelt of lichen. I didn't dare lift my head to look at Raoul. I watched the tip of his shadow.
Suddenly it was gone. In the same moment I heard another car came fast along the road. Lights swept in at the gate. The salon windows went black, blank. I lifted my head and waited straining my ears.
Steps on the gravel. Raoul's voice, still on the terrace, saying: "Bernard?"
"Monsieur?" The newcomer came quickly round the corner of the house. I heard Raoul descending the terrace steps. He said in that quick hard voice he had used to Madame Vuathoux "Any sign?"
“None, monsieur, but-"
I heard Raoul curse under his breath. "Did you go back to the hut?"
"Yes. They weren't there. But they'd been, I swear they-"
"Of course they had. The Englishman was up there last night till midnight. I know that. They'd go to find him. Have you found out where he is?"
"He's not back yet. He went out with a party up to the plantation beyond Bois-Roussel early this morning and they're not back yet. But, monsieur, I was trying to tell you. I rang up just now, and they told me she'd telephoned him at the Coq Hardi. She-"
"She telephoned him?" The words flashed. "When?"
"Thirty to forty minutes ago."
"Sacré dieu." I heard his breath go out "Where was she speaking from? Did the fools think to ask?"
"Yes, indeed, m'sieur. They had heard the scandal from Jules, you understand, and-"
“Where was she speaking from?"
"The Cent Fleurs, in Évian. They said-"
"Half-an-hour ago?"
"Or three-quarters. No more."
"Then the Englishman can't have heard anything. He must be still away with the party. She's not with him yet."
He turned away abruptly and Bernard with him. Their voices faded but I heard him say roughly: "Get over to Évian immediately with that car. I'm going myself. We have to find them, and quickly. Do you hear me? Find them."
Bernard said something that sounded surly and defensive, and I heard Raoul curse him again. Then the voices faded round the corner of the house. Seconds later the Cadillac's engine started, and her lights swept their circle out of the driveway. The dog was barking once more. Madame Vuathoux must have come out of her cottage at the sound of the second car, for I heard Bernard speak to her, and she answered him in that high, overpitched voice: "He said he'd be here at twelve. Twelve at the latest."
Then Bernard, too, was gone. I lifted my head from the cold plinth and slid an arm round Philippe. I waited for a moment.
Philippe said, with excitement colouring the thin whisper "He's coming at twelve. Did you hear? "
"Yes. I don't suppose it's far off nine now. Only three more hours to wait, mon gars. And they've gone chasing off to Évian."
"He came down the terrace steps. He must have left a window open. Shall we go in?"
I hesitated, then said dully: "No. Only three more hours, Let's play it quite safe and go back and lock ourselves in the boat-house."
The boat-house looked, if possible, rather more dismal than before. Philippe vanished round the back of it and after a minute reappeared with a key which he displayed with a rather wan air of triumph.
"Good for you," I said. "Lead the way, mon lapin."
He went cautiously up the steep outside stair to the loft over the boats. The treads were slippery with moss and none too safe. He bent over the door, and I heard the key grate round in the lock. The door yawned, creaking a little, on a black interior from which came the chill breath of dust and desertion.
"Refuge," I said, with a spurious cheerfulness that probably didn't deceive Philippe at all, and switched on the torch with caution.
The loft, thank heaven, was dry. But that was its only attraction. It was a cheerless little black box of a place, a dusty junk-hole crowded with the abandoned playthings of forgotten summers. I found later that one of the concrete piers of the harbour had a flat platform in its shelter which in happier days made a small private lido. Here in the loft had been carelessly thrust some of the trappings that in July's sunshine were so amusingly gay; striped canvas chairs, a huge folded umbrella of scarlet and dusty orange, various grubby objects which looked as if, well beaten and then inflated, they might be air-cushions, a comical duck, a sausage-like horse with indigo spots… Seen by torchlight in the chilly April dark, with a vigil ahead of us and fear at our elbow, they looked indescribably dreary and grotesque.
There was a small square window low down in the shoreward wall. I propped a canvas chair across it to conceal the torchlight from a possible prowler, then turned to lock the door.
Philippe said dolefully behind me. "What are we going to do till twelve o'clock?"
"Failing Peggitty and chess," I said cheerfully, "sleep. I really don't see why you shouldn't. You must be worn out, and there's nothing now to worry you and keep you awake."
"No," he said a little doubtfully, then his voice lightened. “l shall sleep in the boat."
"Little cabbage, the boat isn't there. Besides, how wet. Now up here," I said falsely, gesturing with the torch towards the dreary pile, "it's much nicer. Perhaps we can find-"
"Here it is." And Philippe had darted past me and was pulling out from under three croquet mallets, a half-deflated beach-ball and a broken oar, a flat yellowish affair that looked like a cyclist's mackintosh.
"What in the wide world-?" I said.
"The boat."
"Oh. Oh, I see. Is it a rubber dinghy? I’ve never seen one.
He nodded and spread his unappetising treasure out on the unoccupied half of the floor. "You blow it up. Here's the tube. You blow into that and the sides come up and it's a boat. I want to sleep in it."
I was too thankful that he had found something to occupy him to object to this harmless whim.
"Why not?" I said. "It's a good solid damp-proof ground- sheet anyway. And after all, who minds a little dust?"
"It's not a ground-sheet. It's a boat." He was already rootling purposefully behind some dirty canvas in a corner.
“Ça se voit,” I said untruthfully, eyeing it.
"You blow it up," explained Philippe patiently, emerging with an unwonted spot of colour in his face, from between an oil-drum and the unspeakable spotted horse.
"Darling, if you think either of us has got enough blow left in them-"
"With this" He was struggling with some heavy-seeming object. I took it from him.
"What is it?"
"A pump. It's easy. I'll show you." He was already down on the floor beside the dismal yellow mass, fitting the nozzle of the pump to the mouth of the tube. I hadn't the heart to dissuade him. Besides… I had been uneasily aware for some minutes now of the bitter little draught that crept under the door and meandered along the boards, cutting at my ankles. Philippe was busy with the footpump, which seemed remarkably easy to work. If the blessed boat really would inflate…