I nodded respectfully and replied calmly, “My name is Feodor, I served with a man by the name of Jonathon Doyle, who I believe was engaged to the lady of this house.”

“Oh really!” she snapped, “we’ve had four men with news of Mister Doyle already, two said he was dead, one said he was sick and the other said he was alive and well and to be given awards for his bravery! We don’t need any more lies from strangers, sir!”

“I was a friend of his,” I explained. The woman snorted and was about to shut the door, when I showed her Jonathon’s photograph of Lucy. “Is this your lady?” I asked her.

“That was his!” she murmured, snatching the frame from my hand “where did you steal that from?” I told her that I must see Miss Lucy and, after much debate, the woman disappeared into the house and I heard the creak of stairs as she ascended to her lady’s room. I heard their voices and then the lighter sound of a young woman coming downstairs. The lady who opened the door next was tall and elegant, wearing a dark green dress. She brushed her golden hair away from her face and looked enquiringly at me. “Well? Where is he? Where is my Jonathon?”

I sighed and lowered my head. “I am afraid, lady, that your fiancé is dead.”

Lucy sagged and said very quietly, “you had better come in.”

I followed her into her stylish home, and into a small room decorated in pale blue. I told her everything I knew about Jonathon, of his death and of my relationship with him. She listened in silence, neither weeping, nor cursing. She seemed distant, as if she were not a part of the world. When I had finished she said at length, “poor dear Jonathon. I appreciate your help, Feodor, but could you please tell me, in what country does he now lie?”

“He is being carried by ship to this country, madam, on my own instructions,” I told her, “I thought it would be better for you to bury him in his native land.”

She smiled faintly, as if my words were mere echoes of an old memory. “Yes, thank you.” She remained silent for a considerable time before she turned to me and asked, “will you stay for his funeral?”

“I would be honoured,” I said. In fact, I stayed for longer than the funeral. I stayed even when the bombs of the second war began to fall. I remained in England until that war was over, when the dictator was killed, when I decided to move back to France. I liked it there, it was full of culture and beauty, but far enough away from my homeland. Although I knew that my family must have died out, my lady doctor lying in her tomb and my tutor rotting in his, but I still felt that to return there, and to feed from the people of that country would be the most terrible crime I could ever commit.