Danny waited until he was sure the last car had passed, and was about to emerge from his hiding place when he heard a utility coming over the brow of the hill towards him. Hunkering back beneath the foliage, he saw it was Terry – but he wasn’t alone now; there was a man sitting in the flatbed. Perhaps he hadn’t been looking for him at all – if so, the coast would be clear.

He waited impatiently for the sound of the engine to fade and then came back out on to the road. The smell of smoke was really strong now and, as he pushed his bike up the hill, he wondered just how close the fire was.

He had a stitch in his side, and was out of breath and sweating as he reached the crest, but the sight before him wiped away his discomfort and froze him to the spot.

An enormous wall of fire stretched along the horizon for as far as he could see, with billowing clouds of smoke and flame rising hundreds of feet into the air to blot out the sky. He stared in horrified fascination and then reached for the old binoculars.

Taking them from the worn leather case, he adjusted the focus as Granny Gwyn had taught him and watched the fleeing animals bouncing and running across the empty pastures. Then he turned the focus on the fire itself, seeing how the red licks of flame shot skyward and the clouds tumbled and rolled like a stormy sea.

He bit his lip and wondered what to do. The fire was still a long way off, but getting to the railway cutting would mean having to cycle towards it. And fire was unpredictable – Ben Freeman had told him how a change in the wind could send it roaring back on you, and how the explosive elements in the eucalyptus trees could trigger even more fires. Perhaps it would be better not to risk it.

Danny felt a huge surge of disappointment, because he’d set great store in finding the mysterious soldier – and now the doubts over who he was would never fully be cleared up, his curiosity and longing never satisfied.

He was close to tears and he knuckled them away, angry at how childish he was being. And yet he was wise enough to know it was time to forget about the soldier, to be like his mate George Blake and accept that no matter how many questions he had, he would never know the answers – and that nothing could be changed by wishful thinking.