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sent her.
    'No, he would not,' he said briefly. 'The child is my heir and his place is here, with his heritage.'
    'But what if you have a child of your own…' Andrea said unthinkingly, and crimsoned as she realised the implication in her words.
    'Aren't you afraid I might take you at your word?' His eyes appraised her with sudden insolence. 'What would you do, I wonder? What is that saying you have—close your eyes and think of England, or in this case, France?'
    She pressed her hands to her burning face. 'I didn't mean…' she stumbled, and his smile widened unpleasantly.
    'I believe you,
mademoiselle
. Don't look so frightened. I would not demand a sacrifice of that magnitude. I am well aware that my—face would give nightmares to any woman forced to share my bed.'
    She shrank from the bitterness implicit in his words. Someone—his fiancée?—must have said that, or something very like it, to him. It betrayed a lack of sensitivity and compassion that was almost inconceivable. Whoever this girl had been, he was well rid of her, she found herself thinking stormily, and checked herself sharply. No matter where her sympathies might instinctively lie, he was still her adversary.
    She tried reason again. '
Monsieur
, you've been hurt, I know, but is that any reason to hurt in your turn? This— marriage would be a total disaster. We—we don't know each other. What kind of a relationship could we have?'
    Again she was conscious of that uncanny feeling that she was pleading not for Clare but for herself, and she shivered slightly.
    'You are cold? Come and sit by the fire.' He got up and strode to the fireplace, flinging on a couple of logs from the basket that stood in the hearth.
    'I'm all right here, thank you,' her voice faltered a little and he looked at her impatiently.
    'What are you frightened of? This relationship that is only a figment of your own imagination? All I require,
mademoiselle
, is a marriage on paper that will satisfy the lawyers and release Philippe into my custody. Once that has been achieved, you are free to go or stay as you please.'
    'But you can't use me like this…' she began hotly.
    His eyes flashed. 'You did not display the same aversion to using me to heal your pride over your broken love affair,
ma mie
. You were almost brutally frank on the subject. What was it you called me—a lifeline? You cannot now complain if that lifeline becomes a chain to bind you.
    She rose to her feet, pushing her hair back with a weary gesture.
    'I—I think I'd like to go to my room,' she said. 'I'm rather tired.'
    'Certainly. I will ring for Clothilde.' He reached for the bell rope. Then he turned and walked back to her and stood looking down at her. 'Sleep well,' he said abruptly. 'Perhaps everything will seem a little better in the morning,
hein
?'
    She shook her head, suddenly unable to think of a single thing to say in reply.
    For a moment he too was silent, looking down at her, and then almost casually he raised his hand and brushed one finger across her parted lips in a gesture that was almost more intimate than the kiss he had greeted her with on her arrival. She made herself stand her ground, refusing to allow herself to recoil in case he misinterpreted it as an act of repulsion. Whereas, if she was honest with herself, the opposite was true. Why else this almost terrifying tingle of awareness along her nerve-endings? It was a response, the implications of which she did not care to study too closely, and she was thankful when a tap on the door heralded the arrival of Madame Bresson.
    The interior planning of the chateau was an architect's nightmare, Andrea thought resignedly as she was led by the housekeeper up a winding stone staircase to the first floor. She found herself in a long, draughty passage at one end of which were a pair of imposing double doors. Andrea gathered from Madame Bresson that that was the chateau's main bedroom, and was presumably occupied by the master of the house.
    Her own room,