Les Prisonniers, 1 June

The soldier's obvious discomfort with the situation was surprising, but Olivia nodded at him. "Merci," she said.

Then, sending a tight smile to Jenny, "Well, Miss Ross. Shall we?"

Jenny grimaced but moved as she was directed. "Where are we going, Paul?" she asked in French. "Who are the officers?"

"Lieutenant Jourdain wants you brought to his tent. The other officer is Lieutenant Goyette. I don’t know if there will be others."

"Lieutenant Jourdain... what?" Jenny asked, narrowing her eyes as she tried to follow his French. She looked at Mrs. Graham to see if she had understood.

"His tent?" Olivia repeated in English, eyebrows raising. Switching back to French, she added: "I thought we were going to dinner."

Dinner? Was that what he had told them? Paol struggled to keep the disgust out of his face.

"I don’t know what he wants. He said that you must be brought to his tent. Perhaps...." He shook his head, "I don’t know. Maybe you will go to dinner from the tent, maybe not."

Jenny's frown deepened to a scowl. "You don't know?" she repeated. "Yes, you know. Tell me, or you are a badly man and a badly soldier!"

He was a soldat. He didn't know anything. Certainly not where officers were concerned.

He looked at her seriously. "I have told you what my corporal told me. That is what I know." What he thought....That was a different matter.

Olivia frowned. "And just who are Jordaine and Goyette to order women to their tents?" she demanded tartly.

"They are officers. You are prisoners," he said bluntly. Perhaps he had misunderstood the question. Or perhaps, he thought in mounting confusion, it was one of those questions one wasn’t actually supposed to answer. He just wished they would stop asking.

"But we are - " Jenny stopped, realizing she did not know the word for civilian in French. "We are women, not soldiers. I hope that the officers are men of honor." She glared at him accusingly.

"So do I," he retorted.

Jenny was at first shocked, and then enraged. He only thought so? He didn't know? He wasn't even going to bother denying that the officers' intent might be less than honorable? She wanted to slap him, to draw back her arm and slap him good and hard across his face with all her might. She had been tried beyond all patience and this soldier would bear the blame for all of it. But she knew it would end badly if she laid the card of physical violence on the table. So instead, she leaned forward and spoke in a low, hateful tone, telling him for once in perfectly clear French terms where to go and what to do to himself.

Olivia's eyebrows went up at Jenny's outburst. She hadn't heard those phrases since her brother had first, gleefully taught them to her as a child. On repetition in front of their French tutor, she had been rather soundly slapped across the cheek. Now they made her nearly laugh, despite her own mounting anger, but she clamped down on the urge, afraid that it would quickly become hysteria.

She might as well have struck him. He rounded on her in helpless frustration, opened his mouth to speak and, almost immediately, shut it again. She had flinched. As though he might strike her. And the reflection of himself he saw in that slight movement made him flush with shame. He turned away, keeping his gaze determinedly focused on the ground ahead of them.

Not far off, some Englishwoman or another was raising hell over one thing or another. That was always the way with women and, he thought to himself, English women in particular. Something they were not happy about, and what do they do? Make noise. Her accented French, rising in volume, was jarring to the ears. Sounded flat.

He recognized Kerjean with them, looking red. More red than he usually did, in any case. Mouth pressed all flat and shut, looking like he was suffering from some kind of particularly unpleasant maladie. Sure he was, and it was called a bunch of pouting Englishwomen.

He strode the couple of paces it took to meet them. "He can't help it," he shrugged, not really addressing either the women or Kerjean in particular.

The other Frenchman's sudden arrival was startling, and Olivia turned to face him, fully ready to give him a verbal lashing as well. She raised her eyebrows at the sheer size of the man, but still glared up at him, refusing to be intimidated.

"Can't help what?" she snapped. "The apparent lack of honour in the French army?"

He nodded, then. And shrugged, which was his dominant means of expression. He wasn't much phased by the Englishwoman's temper. She was of no consequence to him, and in any case, there wasn't a single name in the book which Fréres hadn't already been called at one point or another. Dishonorable was among the least hostile.

"Sure," he said. If she thought he'd pitch a fit for making a mockery of the French, she had another thing coming to her. Fréres wasn't fond of his side any more than he was of the other, but at least his side hadn't tried to shoot him. Recently.

"We're soldats. We have orders," he explained. That was just the way of things. The order of things.

Jenny simply stared at them all. She was bloody well tired and becoming a bit stupid. She had realized that belatedly when Kerjean had spun around at her insult, and she had flinched thinking that he was going to strike her. "That was a stupid thing to say," she thought. "Get a hold of yourself." Self-preservation was of primary importance, and insulting angry armed men might easily destroy that goal.

"Let it be, Turcat," said Paol wearily. He appreciated what the other man was trying to do, but arguing with the two women would do nothing to ameliorate their plight. If anything it would simply provoke them further.

The soldier's complete resignation took some of the heat out of Olivia's anger. She was tired and sore, and none of this seemed to be helping the situation.

With a sigh, she said, "I suppose you had better lead on. If nothing else, we can give your officers pieces of our minds."

Jenny shivered, suddenly growing chilly with her weariness. "Might as well get it over," she agreed.

“Took you long enough!” Bourque, Jourdain’s batman called, hurrying over to the small group. He looked the two women up and down appraisingly, then smirked. “The tent.” His English was heavily accented, spoken in an overloud voice and accompanied by exaggerated gestures. “You go in the tent.” Waving away Paol and Turcat, he began attempting to herd the women in the desired direction. “The clothes. The clothes are in the tent. Wear the clothes.”

"I want wine," Jenny demanded, cutting him off. "Vin rouge, immediately. That will be all." And she waved her hand dismissively as she moved into the tent.

Olivia followed Jenny into the tent, purposely not even sparing a glance for the batman.

She turned her attention to the clothes to which they had been directed. There were two dresses laid out, both simple but fairly lovely. Olivia frowned at them.

"I'm a little worried to know why a French officer would have women's clothing at the ready like this," she said. "Where on earth do you imagine they came from?"