'So it is. A very big town.'
'I like being in the country like this,' Rose said. 'This is like it was where we used to live.'
Ronnie said: 'But we're all going to London.'
'Not all of you,' the old man said. 'You and Sheila are going to live with your Aunt Margaret at Oxford.'
'Are we? Is Rose going to live with Aunt Margaret, top?'
'No. Rose is going to live with her daddy in London.' Sheila said: 'Is Pierre going to live with Aunt Margaret?'
'No,' he said. 'Pierre and Willem are going to America to live with my daughter. Did you know I had a grown-up daughter, older than Nicole? She's got a little boy of her own.'
They stared at him incredulously. 'What's his name?' Ronnie asked at last.
'Martin,' the old man said. 'He's the same age as Pierre.'
Pierre stared at them. 'Won't you be coming with us?'
'I don't think so,' Howard said. 'I think I shall have work to do in England.' His Up trembled. 'Won't Rose be coming?' Nicole slipped down by his bed. 'It's going to be lovely in America,' she said gently. There will be bright lights at night-time, not like the black-out we have here. There is no bombing, nor firing guns at people from the air. There will be plenty to eat, and nice, sweet'things like we all used to have. You will live at a place called "Coates Harbor" on Long Island, where Madame Costello has a great big house in the country. And there is a pony for you to ride, and dogs to make friends with, like we all used to have before the war when we had food for dogs. And you will learn to sail a boat, and to swim and dive like the English and Americans do, and to catch fish for pleasure. And you will feel quite safe then, because there is no war in America.' Pierre stared up at her. 'Will you be coming with me to America?'
She said quietly: 'No, Pierre. I must stay here.'
The corners of his mouth dropped. 'I don't want to go alone.'
Howard said: 'Perhaps Rose's father will want her to go too. Then she would go with you. You'd like that, wouldn't you?'
Sheila said: 'May Ronnie and I go, Mr Howard? Can we all go with Pierre?'
He said: 'I'll have to see about that. Your Aunt Margaret may want you in England.'
Ronnie said: 'If she doesn't want us, may we go to Coates Harbor with Pierre?'
'Yes,' he said. 'If she wants you out of England you can all go to Coates Harbor together.'
'Coo,' said the little boy, unfeelingly. 'I do hope she doesn't want us.'
After a time they got the children settled down to sleep; they went downstairs again and out into the garden until supper was ready. The old man said: 'You know a good deal about my daughter's house in America, mademoiselle.'
She smiled. 'John used to tell me about it,' she said. 'He had been out there, had he not, monsieur?'
He nodded. 'He was out there with Enid for a time in 1938. He thought a great deal of her husband, Costello.'
She said: 'He told me all about it very early one morning, when we could not sleep. John loved America. He was amateur, you understand - he loved their technique.'
Not for the first time the old man wondered doubtfully about the nature of that week in Paris. He said absently: 'He enjoyed that visit very much.'
He roused himself. 'I am a little worried about Pierre,' he said. 'I had not thought of sending anybody over with him to America.'
She nodded. 'He is sensitive, that one. He will be lonely and unhappy at first, but he will get over it. If Rose could go too it would be all right.'
He faced her. 'Why not go yourself?' he suggested. 'That would be best of all.'
'Go to America? That is not possible at all, monsieur.'
A little fear stole into his heart. 'But you are coming to England, Nicole?'
She shook her head. 'No, monsieur. I must stay in France.'
He was suddenly deeply disappointed. 'Do you really think that is the best thing to do?' he said. This country is overrun with Germans, and there will be great hardships as the war goes on. If you came with us to England you could live with me in my house in Essex, or you could go on to America with the children. That would be much better Nicole.'
She said: 'But monsieur, I have my mother to consider.'
He hesitated. 'Would you like to try to get hold of her, and take her with us? Life in France is going to be very difficult, you know.'
She shook her head. 'I know that things are going to be difficult. But she would not be happy in England. Perhaps I should not be happy either - now.'
'Have you ever been to England?' he asked curiously.
She shook her head. 'We had arranged that I should visit John in England in October, when he could get leave again. I think he would have taken me to see you then, perhaps. But the war came, and there was no more leave... And travelling was very difficult. I could not get a visa for my passport.'
He said gently: 'Make that trip to England now, Nicole.'
She shook her head. 'No, monsieur.'
'Why not?'
She said: 'Are you going to America with the children, yourself?'
He shook his head. 'I would like to, but I don't think I shall be able to. I believe that there'll be work for me to do when I get back.'
She said: 'Nor would I leave France.'
He opened his mouth to say that that was quite different, but shut it again without speaking. She divined something of his thought, because she said: 'Either one is French or one is English, and it is not possible that one should be both at the same time. And in times of great trouble, one must stay with one's own country and do what one can to help.'
He said slowly: 'I suppose so.'
Pursuing her train of thought,, she said: 'If John and I -' she hesitated - 'if we had married, I should have been English and then it would be different. But now I am not to be English, ever. I could not learn your different ways, and the new life, alone. This is my place that I belong to, and I must stay here. You understand?'
He said: 'I understand that, Nicole.' He paused for a minute, and then said: 'I am getting to be an old man now. When this war is over I may not find it very easy to get about. Will you come and stay with me in England for a little? Just for a week or two?'
She said: 'Of course. Immediately that it is possible to travel, I will come.'
They walked beside each other in silence for the length of the paddock. Presently she said: 'Now for the detail of the journey. Focquet will take the boat tonight from Le Conquet to go fishing up the Chenal as far as Le Four. He will not return to Le Conquet, but tomorrow night he will put into l'Abervrach to land his fish, or to get bait, or on some pretext such as that. He will sail again at midnight of tomorrow night and you must then be in the boat with him, for he will go direct to England. Midnight is the latest time that he can sail, in order that he may be well away from the French coast before dawn.'
Howard asked: 'Where is this place 1'Abervrach, mademoiselle? Is it far from here?'
She shrugged her shoulders. 'Forty kilometres, no more. There is a little town behind it, four miles inland, called Lannilis. We must go there tomorrow.'
'Are there many Germans in those parts?'
'I do not know. Aristide is trying to find out the situation there, and to devise something for us.'