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Although we had no need, and even less desire, to open the door, the window was a different matter. To escape from Banquo Manor we had to raise the sash, and I doubted that it had been opened since September’s milder weather. It would certainly make some sound. We stood and silently considered this for a few moments and had all but resolved to risk the noise and hope to be away before Catherine or, God forbid, her dead brother could investigate, when help arrived.

I say help, for the noise from upstairs would easily have drowned any sounds we might have made in opening the window, but what it signified froze us to the spot for a moment and my heart went out to Simpson, to Kreiner and, especially, to Susan, trapped in the bedroom upstairs.

The noise was that of shattering wood, of splintering panels. Of a door being smashed open.

It seemed that I had stood motionless for ever, as the house was slowly ripped apart around me. But I can only have paused for a split second as the implications settled in my mind and galvanised my hands into action. The Doctor was already undoing the window catch and with my help the window opened easily and, as far as I could discern, soundlessly. My hurried exit was less smooth, my already torn jacket catching on a sharp edge of wood and tearing further as I followed the Doctor’s enthusiastic dive through the opening space. But I had no fear of being heard – only for Susan’s safety.

I staggered slightly as I hit the snow-covered path outside the window, and as I rebalanced the sound of the shot reached me. The Doctor was already staring upwards, his hand over his eyes as if to shield them from a nonexistent sun. I too looked up at the window high above.

The image that even now remains sharply printed on my memory in crisp detail told the entire story of the fight for survival in the small room above. Again the universe seemed frozen for a moment until the explosion from the second barrel of the shotgun, closely followed by Simpson’s cry echoing across the space between the upper window and myself. A cry of terror and pain mixed.

Ten yards away, the rope of sheets and blankets tied to the rail at the base of the casement reached almost to the level of my head. At the bottom of this rope stood Fitz Kreiner, his arms open, as if ready to catch something. Or someone. Above him, Susan was about halfway down, but she had stopped climbing and, like me, was staring upwards in the direction of Simpson’s sudden cry. I tried to call out, to tell her to hurry, but my voice was as static as my body and no sound came. Susan began climbing down again, not because of my silent entreaty, but because of what she – and I – could see above.

I was running now, following the Doctor to join Kreiner as Susan continued her desperate journey.

And above her, Simpson was now framed in the light from the window. His back was to us, arcing over the sill as he tried desperately to find somewhere to escape from the monster in the room with him. He stumbled to one side, I guessed, as he tried to put weight on his broken leg. I wondered whether, realistically, he had ever had a chance of climbing down the rope of sheets. I wondered how Kreiner could have brought himself to abandon the man. But as I glanced at Kreiner’s anxious upturned face I knew that he had been given no choice. This was their best shot. He was waiting to catch Simpson when, inevitably, his grip failed and he fell. He was there to break the man’s fall. To save his life.

All this dawned on me in an instant. The instant it took for Simpson to turn towards us, desperation drawn across his face, then look back and scream again. Silhouetted, I saw the hands reach for him. I looked away as they pressed in on his face.

A moment later there was a scream. Not the frightened cry that we had heard before. This was a thing of complete and utter terror and pain. Despite myself, I looked upwards again, and saw Simpson’s face contorted with the fear and