He has always been good at tracking down things that are hidden, like cockroaches in his mother’s kitchen cupboard, or tunnels in Gaza.

‘Back in the real world and its uncertain future, it’s hard to think about what has happened – I am alive. I survived cancer. I was saved from certain death. Here I am, thinking about it all when I should be dead and gone and not thinking about anything. That fifteen months walking in the Valley of the Shadow of Death is now fading like a dream . . . All I could do was stand there and dig it, the colours and the dragons. If only Irene could be with me by my side’