The results of eight years’ hard work were all around them as they stood in the hot August sunshine. The mairie itself, the school and the two bridges spanning the winding river Meuse owed their existence in large part to transatlantic generosity. And, in return, the French had built for the American dead the cemetery and monument they were on this day to hear the Colonel dedicate.

To the crowd’s claps and cheers, the Colonel, a career soldier, stepped forward to respond to the mayor’s introduction. Didier’s son-in-law. It hardly seemed possible. Then he looked at his daughter standing in the front row of the audience, proudly holding up her baby son to witness his father and his grandfather sharing a platform. Though how much a six-month-old could make out he wasn’t sure, and Didier rather thought little John ought to be tucked up at home in his cot, not sweating it out with the rest of them in this heat and noise. Didier had been overjoyed to see his first grandson though he had wondered about the wisdom of subjecting a small infant to a transatlantic crossing. America was so impossibly far away. He was always surprised that the people they loved continued to return.

His daughter was not the only local girl to be lured west by these handsome great fellows with their promise of excitement and an expanded life. The girls came back on their arm and you could pick them out in the crowd by their silk stockings, high-heeled shoes and pretty dresses. And, especially in his daughter’s case, Didier acknowledged, by her happy face. He was thankful to see it. Yes, Paulette was happy.

The Colonel spoke briefly in English and then launched into French to a rising cheer from the crowd. He knew the strings to tug at and the emotive words rang out with pride and certainty: l’entente cordiale, l’amitié éternelle, nos amis, nos épouses, nos confrères . . . And he finished with a ringing reminder of the phrase which had been on all their lips ten years ago: Ils ne passeront pas! Ils ne passeront jamais plus!

The ceremony over, Didier made his excuses and slipped away. He hadn’t the energy to confront his daughter and her forceful husband again just yet. He agreed there were many advantages to joining his only living relations over the Atlantic but he shuddered at the idea of the long sea crossing and he felt faint at the thought of the effort he would have to make to start, in approaching old age, on a life in a new land. He fled to the Promenade down by the river. A walk under the chestnut trees would cool him and help him to consider his future. What remained of it.

As he strolled deep in thought a sound above his head distracted him. He looked up to see an aeroplane looping the loop, stalling and beginning to drop from the sky. A paper aeroplane. To the accompaniment of excited giggles from the branches of the chestnut, he threw off his dignity and dashed about like a music-hall mime artist, chasing and finally catching the plane in his upturned top hat.

‘Pierre! Alphonse!’ He called the boys down. ‘What a useless pair! You’ll never be aero-engineers on this showing. What’s this you’ve designed? A Blériot special?’

‘No, sir!’ His suggestion was dismissed with scorn. ‘We’re designing something that will cross the Atlantic. Papa says there’s a huge prize offered to the first man to cross without stopping. Papa thinks it should go to a Frenchman.’

‘Well, take the word of a trained engineer – this is never going to work. Look, why don’t you put a paperclip on the tail to weigh it down a little? And while you’re at it, think of refolding the fuselage. Like this. May I?’

Honoured to have the full attention of the mayor, the boys closed round, kneeling with him in the middle of the path, all eager interest. Didier began to unfold and smooth out the sheet of newspaper the frail craft had been fashioned from and stopped suddenly. His gaze fixed on the sheet, his voice stilled, his breath began to come in harsh rasps. He groaned and muttered something unintelligible to the boys.

‘Are you all right? Sir? Monsieur Marmont?’ Anxious, they looked at each other, startled by the abrupt change from bonhomie to distress.

‘He’s having one of his turns,’ said Alphonse. ‘Look, his lips are blue and he can’t breathe. Ah, yes, he’s clutching his chest,’ he said knowledgeably. ‘Seen my uncle do that . . . week before he snuffed it. You stay here. I’ll run for my mum. She’ll know what to do.’

The rescue party, which included the local doctor, was soon at the spot. They found the mayor, breathing fitfully and in obvious pain, but still alive and, improbably, clutching the remains of a paper aeroplane to his breast.

‘He’ll be all right,’ pronounced the doctor to the worried crowd beginning to collect. ‘It’s his heart problem, of course. But he’s had this before and bounced back, haven’t you, old chap? And this time – you see – he’s smiling! Yes, he’ll be all right.’

Chapter Ten

‘A wart on the backside, was it, then?’ Dorcas enquired without emphasis. ‘Aren’t you going to tell me what makes Dominique so distinctive?’

She’d waited until her lemonade and Joe’s black coffee had been served in the cool interior of the tea shop they’d used the previous day before she referred to their interview. A pair of elegant old ladies nursing matching apricot poodles were taking a very long time choosing the brand of tea they would have served in china cups. They spent even longer deciding which cakes their sculptured pets would prefer but at last, their order given, changed and given again, they settled to look around and smile indulgently at the kind uncle entertaining his niece at the next table. A civilized scene until Dorcas struck up. Joe wondered if they spoke English.

He breathed deeply. Would he ever become accustomed to this wild girl’s free way of speaking, her irreverence bordering on rudeness? He blamed Orlando. His loose life and the dubious characters he chose to associate with had had a devastating and probably irreparable effect on a child who lurked behind sofas, listening, understanding and copying speech and manners that ought never to have been exhibited in her vicinity.

‘No? Well then – a birthmark in an intimate place? A dislocated penis perhaps?’ she said, her voice rising. ‘There’s a boy in our village whose father has trouble with his tyres and his tubes . . .’

He had learned the wisdom of cutting her off the moment she called in evidence ‘a boy from the village’. More of them than he privately thought possible had uncles who’d passed through Port Said and sisters who’d worked in armaments factories. All had returned only too willing to share their worldly knowledge. And, at the end of the chain of information apparently, was Dorcas.

‘One more attention-grabbing word and my lips are sealed for ever in the matter of Dominique’s distinction,’ he growled. He waited for and accepted her silence with a nod, then went on: ‘Let us say . . . front elevation, left of centre, port-wine stain, so slight and so centrally placed as to escape the examination accorded by the medical establishment.’

‘Interesting! We shall have to return to the doctor and ask him to look again. I say, Joe, this seems to me like proof positive that he’s who she says he is.’

‘Well, thinking ahead – as I’ve been taught! – I rang the good doctor when I slipped back to the hotel just now. While you were buying postcards.’ To his chagrin, Joe couldn’t hide his pleasure at scoring a point over Dorcas. ‘I asked him to supply further and better particulars regarding Thibaud’s nether regions. We’re in luck. It’s the day for the patient’s weekly bath and delousing and Varimont agreed to bring forward Thibaud’s time and instruct the orderlies who officiate at these ablutions. He’s intending to supervise the operation himself and record anything interesting. I’m to ring him for a report this afternoon.’