It was as if he could not help it. Each time he looked hard at Bernard with something like wonder, nodded slightly and drew away. While she waited for him, Bernard prayed. During morning prayers, she pressed the closed steeple of her hands hard against her face and was surprised to find them wet with tears. During the brittle spring dusk of the evening office she found herself flushed and breathless, tingling, the voices of the other nuns splaying from her, her hold on things precarious. In the long routine of the cold days, she floated; when God spluttered His fury in her ear, she did not mind Him, taking only to sleeping on the hard floor of her cell in an attempt to appease Him. But when, finally, they talked again, coming together in the dip of land where the stream ran low behind the wash house, Bernard felt it only right to mention that God disapproved of what they were doing. At first the soldier laughed. He put his sleeve across his face to muffle the noise and looked away towards the orchard where some of his unit were gathered, clustered together, sharing something.
