The Rainbow Bridge by Aubrey Flegg Page B

in an earthquake?’
    ‘No, sir.’ Raoul detached Gaston’s hand and put it against the wall.
    ‘Swan. Have you ever tasted swan, Raoul? Krayenhoff’s men found two swans frozen into a canal on their way backfrom Amsterdam. Served them dressed up in their own skins, feathers and all. Set them sailing down the table in majesty. Tough as old boots, actually. Must have been starving, the poor creatures. So, Amsterdam has fallen and I never even unsheathed my sword!’
    ‘Just as well, if you ask me,’ Raoul commented dryly, stepping back to see if Gaston could be left unsupported.
    ‘Ha! You’re right, the devils wouldn’t have had a chance,’ Gaston chuckled as Raoul made himself busy at the bed. ‘Remember the engagement at the Pont de Chasse, Raoul, and that black-visaged Royalist I downed?’
    ‘I remember you falling off your horse, sir.’
    ‘Nonsense, I threw myself on the man.’ Gaston started some complicated manoeuvres with his sheathed sabre, bracing it against the floor so that it acted as a third leg. ‘Look … steady as a rock now. I learned this from Commandant Pêche – the old soak.’ Gaston gazed about the room and then noticed, for the first time, that the boys had returned the portrait of the Dutch girl. It was standing at the end of his bed; they had had a travelling case made for it, which, when opened up, stood on three legs like an easel. Gaston blinked, the girl’s face was curiously animated by the moonlight breaking through the uneven glass of the window. He bowed to her, feeling embarrassed and a little ashamed at his condition.
    He said to himself: ‘Now, how am I to get undressed?’ Unfortunately Raoul heard him; he threw down the pillow he had been straightening and turned on him in irritation. Nursing his officer was one thing, but he was damned if he was going to start undressing him.
    ‘On your own, sir!’ he flared. ‘Anything else?’
    ‘A little punch?’ Gaston asked hopefully as Raoul brushed past and clattered dismissively down the stairs.
    Gaston turned to the portrait. ‘Mademoiselle Louise, your servant. I’m sorry you find me … shall we say … incapacitated. I will recover my dignity in due–’ He was bending to deliver one of his specially deep bows when he heard a laugh, a girl’s laugh, somewhere in the room. He whipped about, trying to place the sound. Perhaps one of the street women had followed him up the stairs. But that was no whore’s cackle; it was a clear liquid laugh that made him want to smile.
    ‘Oh, but I like you without your dignity!’
    And there she was – the girl from the picture – sitting on the chair beside his bed, just as she had been when he was sick. For an instant Gaston saw, as others had seen before, a flash of beauty as transitory and as intense as a jewel tossed in the air. He gasped, his sword slipped, and he lost his balance. He struggled to recover. She must be a hallucination; perhaps it was the effects of the swan. He wanted to look again … but yet he dared not. He scrabbled blindly towards the door.
    ‘Raoul!’ he bellowed down the stairs, then covered his mouth. What if Raoul came up? A door was snatched open below and Raoul’s voice rasped up the stairs.
    ‘Holy mother of God! What is it now?’
    ‘Er … forget about the punch,’ he called weakly, and winced as the door slammed below. He turned and peered cautiously back into his room. She hadn’t gone; she was still there, looking about her. Gaston found refuge in his innate good manners. He addressed her from the door: ‘Mademoiselle, I believe it was you who came and sat with me when I was sick?’ She turned with a smile.
    ‘Yes, you asked me to, if you remember.’
    ‘Did I? … I was so grateful for your company.’ He moved back into the room tentatively, as if his rights there werenow uncertain. He had a soldier’s ability to sober up in a crisis and he was beginning to think clearly now, even if everything appeared a little bit