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Then in panic, because I was ain But as soon as they let o I was back on top of him ‘I FREED YOU! You would still be IN CHAINS and packed in a stinking freight wagon LIKE A COW by now if it wasn’t for me! You wouldn’t have helped another prisoner EAT AND DRINK?’
‘K&au, tried to take my face between her hands to comfort me and shut me up ‘Käthe, arrête – stop, stop! Tu dois – you must! Wait – Attends –’
She held a tin cup of cold coffee laced with cognac up to my mouth – helped me Helped me drink
That was the first ti to work Suppose I’m lucky they didn’t hit me over the head with a bicycle to speed it up
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When I woke up they o with the chauffeur up to the villa I felt like hell warmed over, stupid and faintly sick and absolutely famished, and I think I probably wouldn’t have cared if the old woman who lived there had turned me over to the police ISN’T THAT WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU KILL YOUR BEST FRIEND?
But no, the chauffeur took ant oak-panelled hall and the woman came to meet me – she is one of those beautiful, porcelain-perfect people of the last century, with snohite hair done up in exactly Julie’s chignon – I noticed that She tookand led me upstairs into a bathroo bath drawn up and waiting, and she sort of pushed et on with it
I thought about putting Etienne’s pocket knife to use by slitting my wrists, but it seemed rather unfair on the frail, heroic woman whose house it was, and also – ALSO I WANT REVENGE, BLAST IT
So I had a bath Which, I confess, was heavenly Dried off in a huge fluffy towel obviously left forsinful And a bit unreal
The old woman – I should say elderly, not old, she is a refined sort of person – she met me at the door when I ca trousers were caked withon end and I felt shabby as a street urchin Didn’t seem to matter – once more she took me by the hand, and this ti, and a kettle on the hob She hteenth-century settee while she made me a little supper, with bread and honey and coffee, and tiny yellow apples, and a boiled egg
The tray went on a small,off for h I were a baby and needed feeding Then she dipped the spoon into the egg and the yolk ca out of a cloud bank ItCastle Irregulars the first time I went there Then I realised that Julie and I had never been there at the saan to cry
The old woer just because she had me in her house, sat down beside me on the old settee and stroked my hair with thin, wrinkled hands, and I sobbed hopelessly in her arot up and said, ‘I willfor you, three lish like it This one is cold now’
She did another and she made me eat it while she ate the cold one herself
When I left to go back to the stables she kissed me on both cheeks and said, ‘We share a terrible burden, chérie We are alike’
I am not sure what she meant
I kissed her cheeks too and said, ‘Merci, Madame Merci h But I haven’t anything else to give her
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