She reached the head of the path and for the second time that evening her heart almost stopped with fright. Below her on the path she saw two troll-like figures bent double over what appeared to be a sack on the ground. They jumped up when they heard her and she and the children faced each other in horror and astonishment, the body of the major lying between them. He was naked, his ankles tied together. They had been dragging him up the path by his feet.

None of them spoke; words were unnecessary. It was as if they all knew what had happened and what had to be done. She ran down to join them, taking hold of his ankles. They stepped back and took his shoulders, one of them at each side. They dragged him up the path together. At the top of the slope she stopped as it dawned on her that she had no idea where they were going with the corpse. The children dropped their burden and she lowered the feet to the ground.

As she raised her eyes, she realised that his head was hanging in a strange, lopsided manner. There was a slash in his throat and the children, dressed in the summer frocks they had been wearing the previous day; were drenched in blood. Suzie’s dress was soaking, clinging to her body; Sabine’s was spattered to the hem which was bordered with blood and coated with dust. Ariane was by then beyond feeling horror, beyond exclamations and questions. Still without words, the children abandoned the body where they had dropped it and pointed down the path. She followed them to the winepress and gasped when she saw the blood. She started to draw water, jerking the lever of the pump with a desperate urgency. The children, without being told, set to swilling the floor, pushing the bloody water out of the door, just as they had done at the end of the pig-killing. It was as if it had been rehearsed.

They found his clothes, sodden with blood, piled in a corner near the door. His false hand, wooden with a leather socket, had become detached from his arm and they swept it up, bouncing in front of the broom, as they cleaned the floor.

Ariane’s only desire was to cleanse and purify. She had no plan to deal with returning, vengeful Germans beyond her initial idea when they had roared into the yard two months earlier: to get the children out of the way with Micheline and Florence, and to remain herself with the aunts. When the winepress was sluiced and scoured, she called the girls and they climbed back to the house, walking past the body of the major, ignoring it.

Ariane carried his clothes and false hand to the boiler in the farmyard. Crouching down she struck a match and fed the flame with the kindling that was kept nearby. The children stood in front of her in the greyish light of the pre-dawn, in their blood-drenched dresses. Their limbs and hair and faces were spattered with red. Frantically, she seized Suzie, turning her round, unbuttoning her dress, dragging it off her. She pulled her over to the farmyard pump and forced her to bend down so that the cold water ran over the back of her head and neck.