He told them that, in his own country, this was called a ‘gillie’ suit, and he said it was the best he had ever seen and that, pray his God and theirs, he would be invisible to the enemy of them all – and they seemed not to understand a word he said. And he thanked them. With his hands and his eyes, he thanked them, and there was a murmur of appreciation. The oldest woman pushed herself up arthritically from her place by the fire and touched his arm, a gentle, sweeping brush as if now he was understood.

After he had laced his boots, the oldest woman took the mirror from him and held it where he could best look into it. He lifted the veil then bent to take the small tubes of camouflage cream from his rucksack. He smeared lines of ochre, black and green on to his hands and throat, his nose, cheeks and chin.

The door opened behind him. The wind howled into the room, guttered the fire, spread the smoke and flickered the lamp. The children cowered under their tent of sacks and blankets.

‘It is time, Mr Peake? You are ready?’

‘Yes, Haquim, I am ready.’

Kneeling beside the rucksack, he put the tubes of cream back into a side pouch and gazed down at the rifle around which the hessian bandage was already wound. The lens of the telescopic sight flickered in the lamplight. Abruptly, he zipped shut the camouflaged, padded carrying case that held the rifle. He turned for the door.

They would be finished now. The night would have fallen heavy on Stickledown Range, his colleagues of the Historic Breech-loading and Small-arms Association would be gone. They would have had their last beer, worried over their scoring charts, packed their cars, locked up their caravans, and would be on the crowded roads going their separate ways to their homes. He doubted that they would have missed him… The owls would be out now over the quietness of the range, hunting for the rabbits that would have emerged once the boom of the old rifles was silenced.