She had kept the little girl, hardly more than a baby, happy and amused in a way that Howard himself could never have managed alone.
It was a pity that it was impossible to take her.
In normal times he might have been glad of her; he had tried in Cidoton to find a young girl who would travel with them to Calais.
True, Rose was only ten years old, but she was peasant-French; they grew up very quickly...
Was it impossible to take her?
Now it seemed desperately cruel, impossible to leave her behind.
He sat there miserably irresolute for hah0 an hour.
In the end he got up and walked slowly back to the hotel, desperately worried.
In his appearance he had aged five years.
He met the femme de chambre on the landing.
'I have made up my mind,' he said heavily.
'La petite Rose may come with us to England; I will take her to her father.
She must be ready to start tomorrow morning, at seven o'clock.'
Chapter 4
That night Howard slept very little.
He lay on his bed on the floor, revolving in his mind the things he had to do, the various alternative plans he must make if things should go awry.
He had no fear that they would not reach Paris.
They would get there all right; there was a train every three or four hours.
But after that - what then?
Would he be able to get out of Paris again, to St Malo for the boat to England?
That was the knotty point.
Paris had stood a siege before, in 1870; it might well be that she was going to stand another one.
With three children on his hands he could not let himself be caught in a besieged city.
Somehow or other he must find out about the journey to England before they got to Paris.
He got up at about half-past five, and shaved and dressed.
Then he awoke the children; they were fretful at being roused and Sheila cried a little, so that he had to stop and take her on his lap and wipe her eyes and make a fuss of her.
In spite of the tears she was cool and well, and after a time submitted to be washed and dressed.
Ronnie said, sleepily:
'Are we going in the motor-car?'
'No,' said the old man, 'not today, I couldn't get a car to go in.'
'Are we going in a char de combat?
'No.
We're going in a train.'
'Is that the train we're going to sleep in?'
Howard shook his head patiently.
'I couldn't manage that, either.
We may have to sleep in it, but I hope that we'll be on the sea tonight.'
'On a ship?'
'Yes.
Go on and clean your teeth; I've put the toothpaste on the brush for you.'
There was a thunderous roar above the hotel, and an aeroplane swept low over the station.
It flew away directly in a line with their window, a twin-engined, low-wing monoplane, dark green in colour.
In the distance there was a little, desultory rattle, like musketry fire on a distant range.
The old man sat on the bed, staring at it as it receded in the distance.
It couldn't possibly...
Ronnie said: 'Wasn't that one low, Mr Howard?'
They'd never have the nerve to fly so low as that.
It must have been a French one.
'Very low,' he said, a little unsteadily.
'Go on and clean your teeth.'