I knew little of France before the war, to be perfectly honest. Manchester's closer to Ireland than it is to France. Father had fought in Belgium, though. Not that he talked about it much. It's strange to think how we used to call it the Great War—the only one, as if there could never possibly be another like it. Perhaps it was naive to think so. The history of man is a history of war. And I knew that, when the time came—when the war came—I'd have my part to play in it. King, country, duty, honour—that's what I was brought up to believe in, and that's what I was taught to defend. At all costs.