She rose, intending to make her way unobtrusively to a side door. As she did so, the Emperor stopped in front of Le Dru and put out a finger to lift the cross that glittered on his breast.

'You are a brave lad, it seems. Where did you get this?'

The soldier's set face flushed with pride.

'At Ciudad Rodrigo, sire. From Marshal Ney in person.'

'What for?'

'For – a peccadillo, sire.'

The Emperor's face lit briefly with his rare and wonderful smile. He put up his hand and tweaked the boy's ear. The young eyes filled with tears.

'I like such peccadillos,' Napoleon said, 'and I like your modesty. What is your message, my friend?'

Marianne had stayed where she was, held in spite of herself. After all, she thought, why should she run away? Her past was no secret from the Emperor now and even if Le Dru dared to attack her in his presence, he could not hurt her. Somewhere inside her, there was an irresistible curiosity, tinged perhaps with perversity, urging her to stay and watch this young man of whom at one time she had been so afraid, and towards whom she was no longer very sure what her feelings were. Quietly, she resumed her seat at the harp.

Le Dru was feverishly pulling a large sealed package from inside his jacket. His colour had faded and now he looked to Marianne to be growing paler with every second, as though about to collapse. The spasm of pain that crossed his face as he held out the despatch told her all she needed to know. She found her voice at last, experiencing a sense of excitement in thus challenging the danger.

'Sire,' she said tranquilly, 'this man can hardly stand. I am sure he must be wounded.'

At the sound of her voice, Le Dru turned to look at her. Marianne saw with some amusement the erstwhile sailor's blue eyes widen with astonishment.

'True, by thunder,' Napoleon began. 'Are you—'

The sound of the man's fall cut short his words. Le Dru had only held himself upright by a supreme effort of will but the unexpected shock of finding himself gazing full at Marianne had been too much for his overstrained nerves, and the courier from Madrid had fainted clean away at the Emperor's feet.

'Well, well,' commented his sovereign, 'if my dragoons take to swooning like green girls…'

But even as he spoke he was on his knees ripping open the high collar of the green dolman to give the man air. Blood spread in a widening stain across his shirt near the shoulder.

'You were right,' Napoleon said to Marianne, 'this man is wounded. Come and help me.'

She had already fetched a crystal decanter from a side table and was pouring a little water on to her handkerchief. Kneeling beside the Emperor on the carpet she began bathing Le Dru's temples, but without effect.

'He needs a cordial,' she said, 'and a doctor as well. Have we any brandy?'

'We call it cognac in this country,' Napoleon retorted. 'As for the doctor – '

He went quickly to the hearth and pulled the bell. The frightened page reappeared, his eyes growing rounder than ever with horror as he saw the man he had let in stretched unconscious on the floor.

'A doctor, at once,' the Emperor commanded. 'Also a stretcher and two footmen to see this man put to bed in the soldiers' quarters.'

'Send a wounded man out in the cold in this weather?' Marianne protested. 'Your majesty cannot be serious?'

'You may be right, though my soldiers have tough hides, you know. Never mind. Have a room made ready for him here. Well, go on, hurry, imbecile! What are you waiting for?'

Le Dru must have been in the last stages of exhaustion. He was still deeply unconscious when the palace doctor appeared, accompanied by the servants who were to carry him to bed.

While the medical man made his brief examination, Marianne retired to an armchair and watched Napoleon break the seal on the despatches and cast a quick eye over them. She was disturbed to see him frown and look grim. The news must be bad. When he had finished reading, the Emperor crushed the thick sheet angrily in his fist.

'Incompetents!' he muttered between his teeth. 'I am surrounded by incompetents! Could there not be one person in my whole family capable of making reasonable plans, or at least of carrying mine out with disinterested greatness!'

Marianne said nothing. The words, she knew, were not addressed to her. For the moment, Napoleon had forgotten her, preoccupied as he was with the new problems raised by the despatch. He was talking to himself and to have risked a reply would inevitably have been to seek a rebuff. In any case the doctor was on his feet again.

'The man may as well be put to bed, sire,' he said. 'I will be able to attend to him more readily there.'

'See to it, then. But make sure he is fit to talk soon. I have several things to ask him.'

While the servants, acting on the doctor's instructions, were getting the unconscious Le Dru on to the stretcher, Marianne approached the Emperor who, with the letter still in his hand, was clearly about to depart for his office.

'Sire,' she said, 'have I your permission to go and inquire how the man does?'

'Are you afraid he will not be well cared for?' Napoleon sounded half angry, half in jest. 'My medical men know their job, I promise you.'

'It's not that. The reason I wish to learn how he goes on is because I know him.'

'What, another? You are as bad as Talleyrand for being intimately acquainted with half Europe! Do you mind telling me how you come to know this fellow who is sent from Spain when you yourself came straight from England?'

'I met him in England, on a stormy night in Plymouth Sound, on board the vessel belonging to Nicolas Mallerousse. He was escaping from the hulks. He had sailed under Surcouf and was with me when I was taken by the wreckers.'

Napoleon frowned. Evidently the story did not altogether convince him.

'I see,' he said sardonically. 'You are old comrades-in-arms! But what intrigues me is what your friend is doing in the dragoons? There is still fighting at sea and Surcouf needs men more than ever. And, I might add, his men are generally so devoted to him they would rather lose their right arms than leave him. So what is he doing on land? Was he seasick?'

Marianne began to wish she had not spoken. Napoleon's ironic tone boded no good and she even had a vague suspicion that he did not altogether believe her. But it was too late now to draw back. She could only go on to the end.

'He was indeed devoted to Surcouf but he loved the Emperor more,' she began cautiously, wondering how she was going to explain the episode at the Compas d'Or without provoking a storm and, still more important, without finding herself obliged to go into the mortifying happenings in the barn. It had not occurred to her that he could ask so many questions and as she paused, searching for a way to go on, she was expecting every instant to hear a dry: 'That is no explanation,' or something equally forbidding.

But to her surprise, the ominous crease vanished from the imperial brow, to be replaced by an indulgent smile.

'There are some such,' Napoleon said complacently. 'Very well, my heart, go and visit your fellow-fugitive whenever you wish, you have my permission. The page on duty, young St Géran, will take you. But don't forget what time we sup. Until then, farewell.'

A second later, to Marianne's intense relief, he was gone. She heard his quick tread fading down the corridor and could not repress a grateful sigh. It had been a near thing and she sank into a chair to recover. She was in no hurry to visit Le Dru. First, she needed time to think what she meant to say to him.

She was certainly under no obligation to go and see a person she had no cause to remember with kindness. If she made no move he might even think when he recovered consciousness that he had been under a delusion and had dreamed her sudden appearance. But the idea no sooner presented itself than Marianne rejected it. Le Dru might be a superstitious Breton, but he would hardly believe in hallucinations of that order. At least he would ask the doctor whether the woman in the green dress he had seen with the Emperor had been dream or reality. And how could she be sure that once he had learned the truth he would not commit some folly in order to see her again? As a result of which Marianne would undoubtedly find herself compelled to furnish explanations infinitely more detailed than those she had already provided… No, her request to visit the injured man had been an inspiration. In that way she had every hope of doing away with misunderstandings and putting matters to rights with him without the Emperor suspecting anything.

Her mind made up, Marianne went to her room to fetch a large cashmere shawl in a mixture of autumnal shades from dark green to palest gold, and with this draped round her shoulders over the low-cut gown, she went in search of young St Géran to ask him to take her to the bedside of the wounded man.

The page was killing time out in the gallery, staring out with a disillusioned air at the sentries marching to and fro in the snow outside with their bearskin hats pulled well down to their eyebrows. He welcomed Marianne with eagerness.

'Do you know where the injured courier was taken?' she asked him. 'The Emperor wishes me to inquire how he does and would have you lead me to him.'

'It will be an honour, madame! He has been put in one of the small rooms upstairs.'

The boy was clearly delighted at the chance and Marianne suppressed a smile as she caught the admiration in his gaze. He could not have been more than fourteen or fifteen, but even at that age boys know beauty when they see it and Henri de St Géran had instantly constituted himself her slave. With the utmost dignity he went before her up the staircase and flung open the door of one of the rooms, then stood back for her to enter, inquiring politely if she wished him to wait for her.