‘We all want to leave, I think,’ Stefan suggested quietly.
‘I was going to. I am going to.’
‘Really?’ Stefan said.
‘I was planning to find a way to take Dido and Persey with me. But I sense you’ve scuppered that.’
‘Me?’ Stefan asked. ‘Why me?’
But it was Dido who spoke next, ‘You were taking me?’
‘Yes, want to come?’ Jack asked with a laugh. ‘Fancy getting away from the Nazis?’
‘I don’t know,’ Dido replied, the vegetables she was choppinglong since forgotten. ‘I would have done before,’ she said. ‘But now it’s different. Now … I’m in love,’ she said with a smile.
‘Oh, not you as well. You were desperate to get away before, but now you’ve met a man,’ Jack said, drinking from his glass and wincing as the alcohol stung his cut lip. He put his hand to his face. ‘I think my nose is broken.’
‘Come with me and I will see if I can clean it up and bandage it for you,’ Stefan offered.
Jack thought and then nodded, ‘All right.’
‘I am sorry I hit you, Jack.’
‘Twice,’ Jack stated.
‘Twice,’ Stefan replied.
‘It’s all right, I probably deserved it.’
‘You did. But I am sorry.’
‘I’m sorry I hit you, too,’ Jack said.
‘You did not actually manage to hit me,’ Stefan pointed out but before Jack could protest Stefan said, ‘None of this can be good for your heart.’
‘My heart?’ Jack said. And then, ‘Oh yes, my heart.’
‘Jack,’ Stefan said, ‘I think the game is perhaps up on that one.’
‘Oh, bloody hell,’ Jack replied and then changed the subject. ‘Will you help me get Persey and Dido off the island? When the time comes?’
‘If they want to go, yes but if not, I will help you to leave.’
‘Will you? Really? Maybe you’re actually not that bad, Stefan. Do you know that?’
‘Yes, I know,’ Stefan said wearily.
‘You fight rather well, too.’
‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I was taught.’
‘So was I but you’re better than me,’ Jack said as the two men walked down the hall and climbed the stairs, leaving Persey and Dido alone.
‘Will you go?’ Persey asked her sister.
‘No. Not now. Despite all this, I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.’
‘I’m pleased for you,’ Persey said smiling. ‘Genuinely. I’m happy for you.’
