‘We fired. Of course, we all shot wide. I damn nearly swung round and put my bullet through the commanding officer who was officiating. Wish I had. Grégoire didn’t drop. He was wounded in the shoulder but not dead. And then the CO stepped forward, cursing us, and drew his pistol. It was routine. It was expected. But it still churns my guts. The swine put it to Grégoire’s head and shot him.

‘It was a pistol just like this.’

Marmont pulled a Lebel service revolver from his pocket, took a step towards Thibaud and held the gun to his temple.

‘And this was the officer.’

They waited, helplessly, for the shot, the coup de grâce so long anticipated.

Joe didn’t think Marmont was savouring the moment – there was no triumph or gleam of vengeance in the man’s face, nothing but disgust, loathing and pain. ‘I lost my rag. I rushed him and clobbered him with my rifle butt. Glad to see he bears the scars. Hope it hurt like hell. I spent the rest of the war in a punishment squad. Shouldn’t have survived. And I thought this bugger must be dead. Lieutenant Colonel Houdart. And then I saw his photograph in a newspaper a week ago.

‘There are two bullets in here. The first’s for him and the second’s for me. Gentlemen that you are, I count on you to do the decent thing and just give me time to turn the gun on myself, will you?’

They stared, unbelieving, at Clovis Houdart’s expressionless face, chlorine pale, a fragile thing against the black gun barrel. A vein throbbed in the temple and Joe wondered for how many more beats it would pulse with life. Each man knew that there was a soldier’s steady hand on the pistol, a determined finger on the trigger. The skull would shatter before a move could be made towards him.

Into the silence Joe’s voice spoke, light and conversational. ‘If that’s really what you want, then I’m sure we can do as you wish. And you will go, knowing you have our sympathy and our understanding because, Didier, we’ve heard your story. And these tears running embarrassingly down my face in an unmanly way are for Grégoire and all the other poor sods who suffered.’

For a second Marmont’s eyes flicked sideways to Joe. Joe pressed on: ‘But isn’t there another name we should be hearing? John – your grandson, John! How old is he? Six months? John.’ He repeated the name with deliberation. ‘He too plays a part in all this.’

Marmont directed another look at him in dawning surprise. ‘Grégoire,’ Joe said again respectfully, acknowledging with a nod of the head the presence of the dead soldier in the room as an honoured guest, ‘Grégoire is remembered. He stands with us. For as long as you are with us to tell us his story. But Grégoire is the past. And John is the future. John will never hear your words of suffering – of explanation. What will he grow up knowing of his grandfather? That he was a brave soldier who gave his all for his native land, who survived against overwhelming odds to hold him in his arms and tell him stories, or – that he is a man never spoken of in the family? A man surrounded by silence and mystery until one day someone tells him his grandfather murdered a defenceless lunatic and then turned the gun on himself. Will he understand, do you think?

‘Look at your target. Take a good look at him. There’s nothing there, Didier. You might just as well fire your bullet into that pillow. Don’t sacrifice your honour, your years of suffering, your grandson’s memory of you, for this empty shell. Give me the gun. And that’s an order, mate! And, Didier, let’s make it the last order you ever take from an officer. From an officer who’s listened, understood and suffered alongside.’

Marmont made no move to lower the gun but his eyes were looking from Clovis to Joe and back again.

The first sign of indecision.

Encouraged, Joe spoke again, taking his time. ‘Look – in the circumstances, I’m supposing you haven’t made any plans for the rest of the day? Well, I have but I’ve decided to put off my departure today to take you out to dinner. My niece, on whom you seem to have made quite an impression, would insist. This calls for a bottle of the best. Not champagne perhaps but a Château Latour. And here’s a joke – we’ll put it on the expense account of the British War Office! Mean buggers! I’ll tell them it was drunk to celebrate two lives saved. Yes, a Latour. I’m sure they’ll have something good to eat with it?’

Confidently, almost casually, Joe started to cross the room.

He reeled back as the gun crashed out once and then again, deafening in that small space. Bonnefoye threw himself to the ground, drawing his pistol as he dropped. Varimont cursed loudly. Joe, shocked, found himself unable to move forward. He began to cough and sneeze and then burst into nervous laughter as he flapped at the snowstorm of feathers descending on all their heads.

The old man stayed for a moment, frozen, staring at the unseeing Thibaud. The officer’s face was only inches from the blackened pillow which had taken the blast but he registered no emotion. Marmont shook his head and looked at his gun, uncomprehending. But Joe understood. Understood that the gap between the height of emotion to which the old soldier had hauled himself and the depths of bathos to which he knew he must plunge could only be bridged by an explosive reaction. The two bullets were always going to tear their lethal way down the barrel and Joe thanked God that Didier had, in the end, had the strength to divert them by a few inches.

He handed his smoking revolver to Joe and slumped in exhaustion as the doctor hurried forward, clucking with concern and reaching for his pulse.

‘We must try not to bore her with too many old soldiers’ stories, then,’ Didier grated out at last, and added, with a wheezing grimace, ‘as we enjoy our . . . ah . . . what would you say to civet de lièvre à  la bordelaise? Or they had a bisque de palombes aux marrons on the menu for today, I noticed.’ He shook for a moment with silent laughter. ‘Can’t say I studied today’s menu at length. Wasn’t expecting to eat again.’

‘The jugged hare would be perfect,’ said Joe. ‘I don’t think I could be tempted by wood pigeon, even accompanied by chestnuts.’

The conference broke up at four o’clock. Two hours which seemed like a lifetime to Joe. And the course of two lives had been decided in that time. Didier was still alive and a free man, Bonnefoye having gallantly offered to look the other way. ‘What’s the charge?’ he’d shrugged. ‘Killing a pillow? I’d be a laughing stock!’ And Thibaud’s identity was established beyond any possible doubt.

His wife had known it all along. He was Clovis Houdart.

And Mireille Desforges had known her man. But he was a phantom. A perhaps loving, but certainly deceitful, phantom.

‘So, let me check this,’ said Bonnefoye. ‘One last time – you are content with this, Varimont? We’re taking a considerable chance, I acknowledge that, and if there are repercussions, I’m afraid you will be the first in the firing line of public opinion. I am a French police inspector – I can extricate myself from anything. No, don’t ask! Sandilands will have taken French leave – English leave as we would say – and be well distanced from any enemy action and you, the professional in all this, and I have to say the instigator, the prodder of wasps’ nests, will bear the brunt of it. And quite right too! It’s a bit unconventional what we propose and it could all go very wrong.’

‘I’m only too conscious of that,’ said Varimont. ‘Which is why I am insisting on the inclusion in the report of so many recommendations, so many clauses. I hope I make it perfectly clear that, in these circumstances, for which I see no precedent, it is essential that no doors be closed. I have promised further reports and reviews at yearly intervals. Everyone likes that. No French official will agree to anything that is likely to blow up in his face. This way he can always find someone else to blame. Most importantly: a close monitoring of the patient and the nurse will be a condition written into the contract.’