Then, in the golden days of her youth, she had swept through the doors of the Orient's great hotels, into a world where bell-boys ran to answer every whim, where the champagne was permanently on ice, where elegant men in tails and women in exclusive haute couture danced to the endless music of orchestras.

It was then, she recalled that she had first seen him, lounging languidly in a rattan chair, already in uniform, cigarette smoke curling lazily around half-closed hazel eyes. It was a dangerous face, she had thought in that first startled moment. A face to be reckoned with . . .

But then the War had intervened . . .