I was left alone for several hours, during which time the only soul I saw was the big peasant, who brought me some food and beer (still addressing me as “highness”, but in a rather puzzled way). It was night before my three inquisitors returned, and I noticed that both Sapten and Hansen were splashed with mud about the legs, as though they’d ridden hard. Sapten set down a lamp on the table, threw aside his cloak, and eyed me grimly.

“Captain Arnold,” says he, “if that is your name, you puzzle me. I don’t like being puzzled. As these gentlemen here have pointed out, no sane man would believe your story for a moment. Well, maybe I’m not sane, but I’ve decided to believe it—most of it anyway. I don’t know whether you’re the biggest knave or the unluckiest wretch who ever drew breath—I incline to the first view, personally, having a nice nose for knavery—no, don’t bother to protest, we’ve heard all that. But I can’t be sure, you see, and it suits me to assume that you’re honest—up to a point. So there.”

I kept quiet, fearful and hopeful together. He produced his pipe and began to rub tobacco.

“Fortunately, we can test you and serve our own ends at the same time,” he went on. “Now then,”—he fired me with that cold eye—“here’s the point. Victim or scoundrel, whichever you may be, you’ve committed a monstrous wrong. Are you prepared to help to set it right?”

With those three grim faces on me in the lamplight, I was in no doubt about the right answer here—no doubt at all.

“Gentlemen,” says I, “God bless you. Whatever I can do”—and I couldn’t think, thank God, that there was much—“that I shall do, with all the power at my command. I have been thinking, as I sat here, of the terrible—”

“Aye, we know,” Sapten cut in. “You needn’t tell us.” He lit his pipe, pup-pup-pup, and blew smoke. “All we want is yes or no, and I take it the answer’s yes.”

“With all my heart,” I cried earnestly.

“I doubt it,” says Sapten, “but never mind. You’re a soldier, you say. Tell me—have you seen much service?”

Well, I could answer truthfully to that—I had seen plenty, and I didn’t see any need to tell him that I’d been sweating with panic all through it. Like a fool, I implied that I’d been in some pretty sharp stuff, and come out with (in all manly modesty) some distinction. The words were out before I realised that I might be talking myself into more trouble.