He plodded through the snow, shivering in the unaccustomed cold. The man was a stranger here, and did not know which direction to take.

There was a sign up ahead; reluctantly, he withdrew a hand from the sanctuary of his jacket pocket, and brushed aside the flakes obscuring the letters beneath.

'Holmeworth', he read, lips forming the word as if it were sacred. His breath hung in the air, like a prayer frozen in the act of being uttered.

At long last. It felt as if he had been travelling forever, a latter-day pilgrim in search of - what? Absolution? A short bark which might have been a laugh broke the uncanny stillness. No. There was no such thing. Nate was gone, lost, and there was no power on earth that could take way the bitterness of that.

The stranger glanced at his watch before slipping his hands back into the relative warmth of his pockets. 6 A.M. : a bit early to come calling.

Inside his left hand pocket, the envelope rustled, accusing. Maybe, he thought, he ought to just tear it up, slink away. Then there would be no need to face the staring eyes, the condemnation which would surely glare out at him from their uncomprehending depths. It would be easy, and no-one would ever know. The bark came again. Nate certainly wasn't going to tell anyone.

Maybe he shouldn't have come. It all seemed so far away, so long ago. The stranger shook the white frosting from his straggly, rather dirty hair.

Maybe he should have come sooner, before time had had a chance to amplify his guilt.

Nate had been a good friend, though. Hell, he had been the best. If he hadn't leaped across, putting himself right into the firing line, then...Well, let's just say that there were debts that couldn't be paid, even if a person walked a million miles instead of merely hitch-hiking a few hundred.

The stranger's pinched face contorted into a strange grimace. He could almost smell the cold. Christ, would he ever feel warm again?

It had been hot, that day when Nate fell crumpled and broken, on the sands of some nameless (or unpronounceable) desert. 'Hot as Hell itself,' muttered the stranger, eyes misting over. He could almost feel the heat of it through his army boots, red hot coals searing their way through the soles. Odd, as the snow was swirling around his feet even as he was thinking about it.

The stranger - an old soldier, by his bearing - limped along the road, head bowed. Hours before, he'd hitched a lift on a farm truck, but that grace was a fading memory. Not very friendly round these parts, he mused. The old fellow had drawn him a few suspicious looks, then pulled over and turfed him out to walk.

'I ain't afeard o' the likes o' you.' the old fellow had blustered, terror shining of his eyes.

It should have been amusing, the way the old geezer had seemed so afraid of him, but somehow, it hadn't been.

'Maybe something to do with the fact that I had to get out and walk,' that strange half-bark rang out again. 'Not my fault that folks up here are so backwards,' and, he added, grudgingly,' I s'pose the old man had a right to decide against driving me any further.' Well, you heard about things happening to the unwary on lonely stretches of road, didn't you?

It was hard, though, and him being an ex-soldier and all. Fought for his country, hadn't he?

The guilt surged through him again. Sure, he'd served his country, but it had been Nate who had paid the price.

Nate, who had been his best mate, Nate who had had a pretty young wife and a new little daughter. Nate had been the one with everything to lose, while he - all he'd had to call his own was his own miserable life.

'Should've been me, Nate old buddy.'

Would've been too, if Nate hadn't played the hero and saved him. The stranger rubbed his leg again. How long had he been in the army hospital? A week, a month, a year? He couldn't be sure; time had sort of melted into itself while he had been recuperating.

And all he could really remember was the promise he had made to his mate, before the terrible day when everything had exploded around them.

'Got a kid,' Nate had said, holding up his letter from home. 'A little girl - called Petronella, after my Mum. Christ, to think she'll be weeks old already, and I've never even seen her, didn't even know until now that she'd been born!'

'Buddy, what if I never do get to see her?'

It had been hard to reassure Nate, in among the noise of screaming shells, that his fears were groundless.

'If you make it through,' he'd said - to half the company, it had seemed - you'll take a letter to my wife, won't you?'

It had been almost laughable, how Nate had scribbled letter after letter, giving one to any of the laughing lads he could persuade to accept one. Almost as if he had known that he wouldn't be going home with the rest of them. Maybe he'd had a premonition. Whatever the reason had been, events had proved Nate right, in the end.

The one-time soldier drew a weary hand across his eyes. Most of those laughing lads hadn't made it home either. But he had, and it was his bounden duty to deliver Nate's letter.

That proved difficult. Although he waited until the morning bustle indicated that the village was up and about its business, the stranger could not find the address written so hastily on the crumpled envelope.

And the folks were not much friendlier than the old farmer who had kicked him out of his truck. Most of them averted their eyes - well, he did look a bit unkempt, a bit like a scarecrow - and the rest simply ignored him. What a way to treat someone who was supposed to be a war hero! What the heck, he must look a sight; it was hard to blame them.

The stranger wandered around the village, seeking the street, but he couldn't find any trace of it or the house for which he was looking. What he needed, he admitted to himself, was a street map of the town.

In the end, he headed towards the church; surely the vicar would have to talk to him, if only out of Christian charity, and he would be bound to know where a Mrs Simonescu and her baby daughter Petronella could be found. Surely, there couldn't be many people in a small English country town going by the name 'Simonescu', he reasoned.

Dragging his game leg behind him - a sure sign that he was growing weary - the weary man made his way through the lych gate. From somewhere to his right, a dog yelped, and ran away, slithering comically over the deepening carpet of snow.

The stranger trudged through the graveyard - one of the type which is so often found in the grounds of the more venerable country churches - heading towards the building. He walked all around the church, trying doors and calling out, yet there was no reply. The vicar must still be in the Vicarage, probably at his breakfast.

The stranger became vaguely aware that it was some time since he himself had eaten. Well, that could wait until he had completed his errand.

With a slump to his shoulders, the man walked back across the cemetery, skirting the ancient stones. Some of them, he noted, dated back several hundred years. There was a lot of history in these small country towns. Then, his attention was caught. That name: surely there couldn't be two?

The stranger knelt beside a granite stone, rising from the white foam. He brushed away a skift of snow, the better to read the inscription.

Sadness filled him. Petronella Simonescu had died, aged two weeks, and , from the part of the inscription not obscured, her mother had died at the same time. Poor Nate; all the time he had been worrying about leaving his loved ones behind, and they had died before him. The stranger looked about, and saw several headstones inscribed with the same date; as he looked around, the former squaddie noticed a memorial stone, raised in the centre of the graveyard, which offered an explanation. Apparently, an explosion, followed by a fire, had swept through the street where they had all once lived. That, he thought, explained why he hadn't been able to find it. Odd that there had been no trace of such a devastating explosion, either. These country folk must be quick workers, to repair all that damage so soon.

That was that, then. Carefully, the stranger placed Nate's letter on the grave, and stood there, head bowed, while the snow flakes obliterated the writing on the headstone again. The date - 1916 - soon disappeared, and the names rapidly followed.

'Job done, pal,' the stranger said, finally, turning his inadequate collar against the blast. 'Sorry it ended up this way.'

As he walked slowly away, dragging his game leg a little, the falling snow gradually filled in his tracks. Soon, it was as if he had never been.