And a hero he was. The news that William was to be decorated with the Queen’s new medal had been announced in the London Gazette in February and had brought colour to William’s mother’s cheeks for the first time since the loss of her younger son. The honour was very great. The Cross was to be awarded only for acts of exceptional gallantry and its recipients would be few. News of William’s courage at Alma had reached the ears of his family through a number of sources, from one or two invalided officers who had, perforce, returned home; as well as the letters of fellows who had been witness to events, or close to them. Word had spread around the county, so that whenever Alice went about she was everywhere lauded on her husband’s behalf. In his own correspondence he had himself been reticent. It was not like him to expand upon any act which would put himself in an especially good light, not least when so many of his fellows had been wounded or worse. All he had vouchsafed, of the battle, was that it had been the most frightful din you ever heard and as smoky as bonfire night. He admitted that the Cossacks took a thrashing, but it was not soon done. He himself had had a close shave, he told her, but came all right in the end. She hoped that her husband would elaborate once they had gained the privacy of the tête-à-tête.