By Right of Purchase

A gilded cage of chiffon and champagne, Margot Hughes flutters through ballrooms like a rare lepidopterist’s specimen, her wings pinned by the invisible price tag of a loveless union. She auctions her laughter to the rustle of banknotes, yet her purchaser—a husband too courteous to claim possession—leaves the marriage bed as cold as a marble slab. Interpreting his restraint as indifference, she flees to the blood-soaked crucible of wartime France, trading silk for sackcloth, courtesan’s rouge for the ashen dust of field hospitals. Amid the stench of carbolic and cordite, the couple’s gazes re-ignite; comprehension blooms like poppies in No-Man’s-Land, and the dowry she finally cashes is not coin but contrition.