‘It pains me, Fairfax. You spoke so wisely about the importance of forgiveness and you spoke with such passion about your friend, the man whose wife had been telling you of his great deeds during the war. I came here to make peace with my torturer and when I saw him by that river, capturing that beautiful bird, I was filled with nothing but a need for blood. He ran from me, Fairfax. And then I came to you. But you spoke so beautifully. You listened and you counselled and in your eyes I saw what God wanted from me. He wanted forgiveness. Wanted me to forget the past and make peace before my death. I cannot shake my abuser’s hand, Fairfax. That would be too much. But I leave you the tooth that I have carried with me for so long. It seems right, somehow, that it be here, in this quiet, peaceful place – within sight of you and your wisdom.

‘I have never been a religious man but I have always felt there is something more – some battle to be fought between good and evil and that symbols could be made to serve any purpose that man invested them with. The tooth was just a hunk of gold but I turned it into something more. Now, as I sit in the cool doorway of your little church and taste my blood, I realize I have been wrong these many years. I needed no emblem. I needed no insignia of my guilt. It seems appropriate that your young friend be the one to see to its removal. He had the same bullying swagger as the men who took so many lives. When he struck me and I felt the gold wrenched free from my gums I thought my heart was being tugged out. But as I sat in the cold gloom of the archway and licked my wounds, I realized he had done me a favour. He had made up my mind for me. He had set me free.

‘I think you know what I am telling you, Fairfax. The stories you have been fed by your neighbours are the worst kind of lies. They are truths made deceitful by their theft. They are the stories of many men and women and they have been woven into one cruel charade that has been used to bind you to their cause.

‘Favre has been in your home many times, Fairfax. He has drunk your wine and eaten your food and made himself the cornerstone of your small community.