guy in suit and tie, maybe a local businessman or a bank manager, reading a newspaper. At another sat a couple, not old, not young, in their thirties. They were clasping hands across the table and obviously in love. The guy was heavily built, in jeans and a polo shirt. The woman was wearing a light sleeveless top and shorts and sandals, and had her back to Ben.
There was another table nearby that was empty. He walked towards it. His plan was to stay a while, watch the world go by, bide his time while the mechanics were doing their bit and then slowly wander back to the garage to pick up the truck. There was no hurry. No pressure. He felt relaxed and easy about the whole thing. The monastery had taught him to feel that way.
As Ben approached the café terrace, he did a double-take at the woman sitting with her back to him and suddenly halted dead in his tracks as if he’d been shot. He felt himself go very cold. He stood there, staring.
Her auburn hair was thick and loose, falling down in curls between her shoulder blades and moving nicely when she did. Her shoulders were slightly burned, a touch too much sun on her fair redhead’s skin. Everything about her was stunningly familiar. He was certain he recognised the curve of her slim back. Her elegant posture, the way she had her ankles crossed under the chair as she leaned forward talking about something and gesticulating with her free hand. The fingers were tapered and delicate. She wore no rings.
A million emotions suddenly flooded through Ben’s mind, stinging him like electric shocks. His hands began to shake. He blinked. It was her. He couldn’t believe it.
She was oblivious of his presence, but as Ben went on staring, the guy she was with began to take notice of him.
Ben walked a few steps closer. His legs felt wobbly. He reached out to touch her shoulder. The guy she was with narrowed his eyes and looked to be about to say something, but Ben spoke first.
‘Brooke?’
Ben couldn’t help himself. He put his hand on her shoulder. Her skin was warm and soft and dry against his fingers. She flinched a little in surprise and let go of her companion’s hand, breaking off from whatever she’d been saying to him in mid-sentence.
‘Brooke?’ Ben said again. He was positively amazed, amazed, to see his ex-fiancée here. It was like something out of a dream, the dream he’d had so many times.
She turned. Her mouth opened. Her eyes locked on to his, as blue as a summer sky.
Blue. Not green. Brooke had eyes the colour of emeralds.
It wasn’t her. This woman was a couple of years younger than Brooke. Her mouth was thinner, her cheekbones higher, her features sharper. Especially with the hostile look she was giving him.
The millisecond that Ben realised his mistake, he withdrew his hand and stepped back. ‘Please forgive me, Madame. I mistook you for someone else.’
Her blue eyes flared. ‘It’s Mademoiselle,’ she snapped, as though calling her ‘Madame’ was a far worse crime than laying your hands in a familiar way on a total stranger. So much for the neo-post-feminist political-correctness movement in France.
Ben went on apologising, but it was too late. Now the guy with her was getting involved, standing up abruptly and scraping his chair across the terrace with the backs of his legs. He had to step away from the table to avoid butting the parasol, because he was a big guy. At least three inches taller than Ben and about a foot broader across the chest. The mild irritation in the woman’s eyes was eclipsed by the fury in his. Ben couldn’t entirely blame him. It was a normal thing. A male thing. Like a rutting stag wanting to win his mate by scoring over the potential competition, this guy obviously felt he had to put on a show. Naturally, he was going to make a big thing of wanting to protect her.
Too big a thing. Right away, Ben could see the signs of a situation about to turn ugly. He wasn’t the only one. The businessman was watching over the top of his newspaper. The white-haired group had stopped talking and were throwing anxious glances at them.
‘Hey, I said I was sorry,’ Ben said, keeping his tone light and his body language unthreatening. ‘Let me buy you a drink, okay? No hard feelings.’
‘Get your fucking hands off her,’ the guy raged.
‘I did,’ Ben said. He’d backed off two long steps and now couldn’t have touched her if he’d wanted to.
‘Who the fuck do you think you are?’
‘I’m from the monastery,’ Ben said.
The big guy sneered. ‘Joker, eh?’ He came around the table, brushed past his girlfriend and moved towards Ben with his fists clenched and raised.
‘Let’s not take this too far,’ Ben said. ‘It was a mistake. I apologised.’
The woman was saying nothing. There was a gleam in her eye. Maybe she was enjoying this. Maybe the idea of being fought over was making her day. Ben couldn’t be sure, but in any case he was too busy watching her beau to take too much notice. The guy stepped closer, within punching distance. Which, with arms the length of his, was a fair stretch. ‘I’m going to knock your damn head off, asshole.’ Then the punch was on its way. Ben could have sat down, eaten his croque-monsieur, drunk his Perrier and maybe taken a little nap in the time it took coming. He stepped out of the way of the swinging fist. The guy’s momentum carried him forwards, past Ben.
‘You don’t want to do this,’ Ben said. ‘Why spoil a beautiful afternoon?’
But now it was even more too late. This wasn’t about the woman any longer. His face mottled with humiliation, the guy gathered himself up for a second punch. It was faster than the first, though not much. Ben had time to say, ‘You’re an idiot,’ before he caught the fist that was flying towards his face. He twisted it. Just a little twist. Nothing too aggressive. Certainly not vicious. But once he had the guy’s arm trapped, he wasn’t going to let go either. A lucky hit from this opponent could break his nose, smash his teeth. Ben didn’t much feel like returning to the monastery all banged up and bloody. He was fairly certain they had disciplinary rules against lay brothers who brawled in bars in their spare time. Père Antoine might just show him the door, and Ben wasn’t ready to leave.
So as Ben saw it, he really had no choice. He twisted the guy’s thick arm all the way around behind his back and used the painful leverage to dump him on his face. He hit the ground hard.
‘Stay down,’ Ben warned him. ‘It’s finished. You made your point. You’re a hero.’
But the hero wouldn’t stay down, which was a bigger mistake than the one Ben had made in touching his girlfriend’s shoulder. He swayed up to his feet and came on again. Blood was leaking from his nose and spotting all down the front of his polo shirt. Ben stepped in between the flailing arms and hit him in the solar plexus. Minimum force. It didn’t feel to Ben like much more than a tap, but the guy went sprawling backwards as if a horse had kicked him. He crashed into the table at which Ben would have been quietly enjoying his lunch now, if this hadn’t happened. The table capsized, spilling the big man back to the ground. Bloody-faced and wheezing and clutching at his stomach, this time he didn’t seem inclined to get up again. At that moment the waiter came bursting out of the bistro, along with a couple more guys. One of them pointed at
