“It was Thompson who shouted that he should stop. The girl on the chair was probably his own age. I’d say she was. And it was that, the boy’s protest, that finally woke in me some sense of duty, of decency. I made to draw my sword only to realise I had left it in the house where I had slept. My pistol, thank God, I did still have and I would have been entirely within my rights to have used it on him. He was only a few feet away, I could hardly have missed. He looked at me again. I think he was surprised though he was careful not to show it. He brushed some hair from the girl’s shoulders, dusted it away. Here, he said, is one who will remember the British army. Only then did he come down.

“I ordered them out, all of them, told them the French would be on us at first light. Thompson hung on my sleeve asking about the girl. She was still on her chair. He wanted me to do something for her. I made some promise or another, shook him off, went back for my horse. I didn’t go into the house for my sword and so lost it, itself a shameful thing to confess. But there was more, there was more. When I rode into the square I saw, by the light of the burning church, the use they had put the tree to. Firelight on bare feet, bare feet floating a half-yard off the ground. I did not stop to count them. I did not want to risk seeing their faces. I did not even look round to see if the others were following me. For the villagers watching from the hill I must have looked like Death himself riding out of the village.