The Burning Shore (8 page)

As usual, he and Anna were bickering in a companionable fashion, and as Centaine sat opposite him cupping the big round coffee bowl in her hands, she wondered suddenly if Anna and her father mated together, and immediately after she wondered why the notion had never occurred to her before.

As a country girl, the processes of procreation were no mystery to her. Despite Anna’s original protests, she was always there to assist when mares from the surrounding district were brought to visit Nuage. She was the only one who could manage the big white stallion once he smelt the mare, and calm him sufficiently to enable him to perform his business without injuring himself or the object of his affections.

By a process of logic, she had reached the conclusion that man and woman must work on similar principles.

When she had questioned Anna, she had at first threatened to report Centaine to her papa and wash her mouth out with lye soap. Patiently Centaine had persisted until at last Anna had in a hoarse whisper confirmed her suspicions, and glanced across the kitchen at the comte with a look on her face that Centaine had never seen before, and at the time could not fathom, but which now made logical sense.

Watching them argue and laugh together, it all fell into place, the occasions when after a nightmare she had gone to Anna’s room for comfort and found her bed empty, the puzzling presence of one of Anna’s petticoats under her father’s bed when she was sweeping out his bedroom.

Only last week Anna had come out of the cellar after helping the comte clean out the improvised animal stalls with straw sticking both to the back of her skirts and to the bun of greying hair on the top of her head.

The discovery seemed somehow to increase Centaine’s desolation and her feeling of emptiness. She felt truly alone now, isolated and without purpose, empty and aching.

I’m going out. She sprang up from the kitchen table.

Oh no. Anna barred her way. We have got to get some food into this house, since your father has given away all we possess, and, mademoiselle, you are going to help me! Centaine had to escape from them, to be alone, to come to terms with this terrible new desolation of her spirit.

Nimbly she ducked under Anna’s outstretched arm and flung open the kitchen door.

On the threshold stood the most beautiful person she had ever seen in all her life.

He was dressed in glossy boots and immaculate riding breeches of a lighter tan colour than his khaki uniform jacket. His narrow waist was belted in lustrous leather and burnished brass, his Sam Browne crossed his chest and emphasized his wide shoulders. On his left breast were the RFC wings and a row of coloured ribbons, on his epaulettes sparkled the badges of his rank, and his cap had been carefully crushed in the manner affected by veteran fighter pilots and set at a jaunty angle over his impossibly blue eyes.

Centaine fell back a pace and stared up at him, for he towered over her like a young god, and she became aware of a sensation that was entirely new to her. Her stomach seemed to turn to jelly, hot jelly, heavy as molten lead that spread downwards through her lower body until it seemed that her legs could no longer support the weight of it. At the same time she had great difficulty breathing.

Mademoiselle de Thiry. This vision of martial splendour spoke and touched the peak of his cap in salute. The voice was familiar, and she recognized the eyes, those cerulean blue eyes, and the man’s left arm was supported by a narrow leather strap Michel, her voice was unsteady and she corrected herself. Captain Courtney, and then she changed languages, Mijnheer Courtney? The young god smiled at her, and it did not seem possible that this was the same man, tousled, bloodied and muddied, swaddled in ill-fitting charred rags, trembling and shaking and pathetic, that she had helped load in a stupor of pain and weakness and inebriation into the sidecar of the motor-cycle the previous afternoon.

When he smiled at her, Centaine felt the world lurch beneath her feet. When it steadied, she realized that it had altered its orbit and was on a new track amongst the stars. Nothing would ever be the same again.

Entrez, monsieur. She fell back, and as he stepped over the threshold, the comte rose from the table and hurried to meet him.

How goes it with you, captain? He took Michael’s hand. Your wounds? They are much better. A little cognac would help them, the comte suggested and looked at his daughter slyly. Michael’s stomach quailed at the suggestion and he shook his head vehemently.

No, said Centaine firmly, and turned to Anna. We must see to the captain’s dressing. Protesting only mildly, Michael was led to the stool in front of the stove and Anna unbuckled his belt, while Centaine stood behind him and eased his jacket off his shoulders.

Anna unwrapped the dressings and grunted with approval.

Hot water, child, she ordered.

Carefully they washed and dried his burns, and then smeared them with fresh ointment and rebandaged them with clean linen strips.

They are healing beautifully, Anna nodded, while Centaine helped him into his shirt.

She had not realized how smooth a man’s skin could be, there down his flanks and across his back. His dark hair curled on to the nape of his neck, and he was so thin that each knuckle of his spine stood out as cleanly as beads on a rosary, with two ridges of lean muscle running down each side of it.

She came round to button the front of his shirt.

You are very gentle, he said softly, and she dared not look into his eyes, lest she betray herself in front of Anna.

His chest hair was thick and crisp and springy as she brushed it almost unintentionally with her fingertips, and the nipples of his flat hard chest were dusky-pink and tiny, yet they hardened and thrust out under her gaze, a phenomenon which both amazed and enchanted her. She had never dreamed that happened to men also.

Come, Centaine, Anna chided her, and she started as she realized that she had been staring at his body.

I came to thank you, Michael said. I didn’t mean to make work for you. It is no trouble. Centaine still dared not look into his eyes. Without your help I might have burned to death.”No! Centaine said with unnecessary emphasis. The idea of death and this marvelous creature was totally unacceptable to her.

Now she looked at his face again at last, and it seemed that the summer sky showed through chinks in his skull so blue were his eyes.

Centaine, there is much work to do. Anna’s tone was sharper still.

Let me help you, Michael cut in eagerly. I have been grounded, I am not allowed to fly. Anna looked dubious, but the Comte shrugged. Another pair of hands, we could use. A small repayment, Michael insisted.

Your fine uniform. Anna was looking for excuses, and she glanced down at his glossy boots.

We have rubber boots and overalls, Centaine cut in swiftly, and Anna threw up her hands in capitulation.

Centaine thought that even the blue serge deNim, or denim as it was colloquially known, and black rubber boots looked elegant on Michael’s tall lean body as he descended to help the Comte muck out the animal stalls in the cellars.

Centaine and Anna spent the rest of the morning in the vegetable gardens, preparing the soil for the spring sowing.

Every time Centaine went down to the cellars on the flimsiest of excuses, she paused beside wherever Michael was working under the Comte’s direction, and the two of them made halting and self-conscious conversation until Anna came down the staircase.

Where is that child now! Centaine! What on earth are you doing? As if she did not know.

All four of them ate lunch in the kitchen, omelettes flavoured with onions and truffles, cheese and brown bread, and a bottle of red wine over which Centaine relented, but not enough to hand over the cellar keys to her father. She fetched it herself.

The wine softened the mood, even Anna took a glass of it and allowed Centaine to do the same, and the talk became easy and unrestrained, punctuated with bursts of laughter.

Now, captain, the Comte turned to Michael at last with a calculating glitter in his single eye - you and your family, what do you do in Africa?

Farmers, Michael replied.

Tenant farmers? the Comte probed cautiously. No, no -’Michael laughed.

We farm our own lands. Landowners? The Comte’s tone changed, for, as all the world knew, land was the only true form of wealth. What size are your family estates? Well- Michael looked embarrassed quite large.

You see, it is mostly held in a family company, my father and my uncle-’Your uncle, the general? the Comte prompted. Yes, my Uncle Sean-’A hundred hectares? the Comte insisted.

A little more. Michael squirmed on the bench and fiddled with his bread roll.

Two hundred? The Comte looked so expectant that Michael could not evade him longer.

Altogether, if you take the plantations and the cattle ranches, and some land we own in the north, it’s about forty thousand hectares. Forty thousand? The comte stared at him, and then repeated the question in English so there could be no misunderstanding. Forty thousand? Michael nodded uncomfortably. It was only recently that he had begun to feel a little self-conscious about the extent of his family’s worldly possessions.

Forty thousand hectares! The comte breathed reverently, and then, and, of course, you have many brothers? Michael shook his head. No, unfortunately I am an only son. Ha! said the comte with transparent relief. Do not feel too badly about that! I And patted his arm in a paternal gestur The comte shot a glance at his daughter, and for the first time recognized the expression on her face as she looked at the airman.

Quite right too, he thought comfortably. Forty thousand hectares, and an only son! His daughter was a Frenchwoman, and knew the value of a sou. and a franc, sacrg bleu, she knew it better than he did himself. He smiled lovingly across the table at her. A child in many ways, but a shrewd young Frenchwoman in others. Since the comte’s factor had fled to Paris, leaving the accounts and books of the estate in chaos, it had been Centaine who had taken over the purse-strings. The comte had never bothered much with money anyway, for him land would always remain the only true wealth, but his daughter was the clever one. She even counted the bottles in the cellar and the hams on the smoke-rack. He took a mouthful of red wine and mused happily to himself.

There would be so few eligible young men left after this slaughter, this charnel-house … and forty thousand hectares!

Cherie, he said. If the captain were to take the shotgun and get us a few fat pigeon, and you were to fill a basket with truffles, you might still find some, what a dinner we could have this evening! Centaine clapped her hands with delight, but Anna glared at him in red-faced indignation across the table.

Anna will go with you as chaperone, he said hastily. We don’t want any unseeming scandal, now, do we? Might as well sow a seed, he thought, if it wasn’t already ripely germinating. Forty thousand hectares, merde!

The pig was named Kaiser Wilhelm, or Klein Willie, for short. He was a piebald boar, so gross that as he waddled into the oak forest, he reminded Michael of a bull hippopotamus. His pointed ears drooped forward over his eyes and his tail curled like a roll of barbed wire up over his back, exposing ample evidence of his gender, contained in a bright pink sac that looked as though it had been boiled in oil.

Willie! Cherchel cried Centaine and Anna in unison; at the same time it required both of them on the leash to restrain the enormous beast. Cherche! Seek up! And the boar snuffled eagerly at the damp, chocolatebrown earth under the oak trees, dragging the two women behind him. Michael followed them, a spade over his good shoulder, laughing delightedly at the novelty of the hunt, and trotting to keep up with it.

Deeper into the forest they came across a narrow stream, running strongly with discoloured water from the recent rains, and they followed the bank, with snorts and cries of encouragement. Suddenly the pig let out a gleeful squeal and began rooting in the soft earth with his flat wet snout.

He’s found one! Centaine shrieked with excitement and she and Anna hauled unavailingly on the leash.

Michel! she panted over her shoulder. When we get him away, you must be very quick with the spade. Are you ready? Ready! From the pocket of her skirt Centaine pulled a wizened nub of a truffle that was mildewed with age. She pared off a sliver with a clasp knife, and held as close to the boar’s snout as she could reach. For a few moments the pig ignored her, and then it got the fresher scent of the cut truffle and grunted gluttonously, tried to take her hand in his streaming jaws. Centaine jerked away and backed off with the boar following her.

,Quickly, Michel! she cried, and he went at the earth with the spade. In half a dozen strokes he had exposed the buried fungus and Anna dropped to her knees and freed it from the earth with her bare hands. She lifted it out, crusty with chocolate soil, a dark knobbly lump almost the size of her fist.

Look, what a beauty! At last Centaine allowed the pig to take the sliver of fungus from her fingers, and when he had gulped it, she let him return to the empty hole and snuffle around in the loose earth to satisfy himself that the truffle had disappeared, then Cherche! she shouted at him, and the hunt was on again. Within an hour the small basket was filled with the unappetizing-looking lumpy fungi, and Anna called a halt.

More than this will merely spoil. Now for some pigeons. Let’s see if our captain from Africa can shoodThey hurried after the boar, laughing and panting back through the open fields to the chAteau, where Centaine locked the truffles in the pantry and Anna returned the boar to his stall in the cellars and then lifted the shotgun down from its rack on the kitchen wall. She handed the weapon to Michael and watched as he opened the breech and checked the barrels, then snapped them closed and put the gun to his shoulder and tried the balance. Despite the burns that hampered his swing a little, Anna could tell a good workman by the way he handled his tools, and her expression softened with approval.