So too was Xan. He was not permitted to handle his father’s Purdeys but had his own couple of guns with which we would pot rabbits, and there were two pistols which we were allowed to use with blanks. We would set up target cards on trees and spend hours improving our scores. After a few days’ practice I was better than Xan both with gun and pistol. My skill surprised us both, me particularly. I hadn’t expected to like or be good at shooting; I was almost disconcerted to discover how much I enjoyed, with a half-guilty, almost sensual pleasure, the feel of the metal in my palm, the satisfying balance of the weapons.

Xan had no other companions during the holidays and seemed not to need them. No friends from Sherborne came to Woolcombe. When I asked him about school he was elusive.

“It’s all right. Better than Harrow would have been.”

“Better than Eton?”

“We don’t go there any more. Great-grandfather had a tremendous row, public allegations, angry letters, dust shaken off feet. I’ve forgotten what it was all about.”

“You never mind going back to school?”

“Why should I? Do you?”

“No, I rather like it. If I can’t be here, I’d rather have school than holidays.”

He was silent for a moment, then said: “The thing is this, school-masters want to understand you, that’s what they think they’re paid for. I keep them puzzled. Hard worker, top marks, housemaster’s pet, safe for an Oxford scholarship one term; next term big, big trouble.”

“What sort of trouble?”

“Not enough to get kicked out, and of course next term I’m a good boy again. It confuses them, gets them worried.”

I didn’t understand him either, but it didn’t worry me. I didn’t understand myself.

I know now, of course, why he liked having me at Woolcombe. I think I guessed almost from the beginning. He had absolutely no commitment to me, no responsibility for me, not even the commitment of friendship or the responsibility of personal choice.