That is a justice deeper than any prison sentence, and it is the one I am proudest of, and it is the reason I gave the house away without a backward glance.

I did not want to own the room where it happened.

I wanted to convert it, permanently, into evidence that it would never be allowed to happen there again.

Dominic stood beside me on the front terrace as construction workers carried out the old ballroom doors.

I looked up, toward the place near the ceiling where a certain wooden beam had once been — the beam that belonged to the worst hour of my life.

It was gone.