Over the years, Jake was aware of Jean de Brissac’s rise to the rank of full general in the French Army. Jacqueline was a memory so distant that what had happened seemed like a dream, and then de Brissac died of a heart attack. There was an obituary in the New York Times, a photo of the general with Jacqueline. On reading it, Cazalet discovered there was only one child, a daughter named Marie. He considered writing but then thought better of it. Jacqueline didn’t need an embarrassing echo of the past. What would be the point?

No, best to leave well enough alone…

Once elected Senator and regarded as a coming man, he had to take trips abroad on government business, usually on his own, for Alice simply wasn’t up to it. So it was that in Paris in 1989, on government business, he was once again on his own, except for his faithful aide and private secretary, a one-armed lawyer named Teddy Grant. Amongst other things, there was an invitation to the Presidential Ball. Cazalet was seated at the desk in the sitting room of his suite at the Ritz when Teddy dropped it in front of him.

“You can’t say no, it’s a command performance like the White House or Buckingham Palace, only this is the Élysée Palace.”

“I haven’t the slightest intention of saying no,” Cazalet told him. “And I’d like to point out it says Senator Jacob Cazalet and companion. For tonight, that means you, Teddy, so go find your black tie.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” Teddy told him. “Free champagne, strawberries, good-looking women. For you, anyway.”

“Good-looking French women, Teddy. But I’m not in the market anymore, remember? Now get out of here.”

The ball was everything one could have hoped for, held in an incredible salon, an orchestra playing at one end. All the world seemed to be there, handsome men, beautiful women, uniforms everywhere, church dignitaries in purple or scarlet cassocks. Teddy had departed to procure some more champagne, and Cazalet stood alone on the edge of the dance floor.