“Oh Abra, Abra.” He was shaking his head, sad. “I didn’t know. You’re right, I didn’t understand. But I might have, if you’d trusted me. We could have done something, we could have gotten help.” He was watching me closely, choosing his words cautiously. “Why don’t you come back with me now? Just pack a few things you need and we’ll drive back together, see the children. They’d like to see you. Stay a few days, see how you feel. Without the pressures. There’s a housekeeper now, you wouldn’t have to do anything. And maybe after you get rested a little, we could work together, you’d have all the time in the world and all the best help, you could put it together again, I know you could, and we’d help you this time, you wouldn’t have to be alone.”

He was so kind, he had always been so kind. But with his kindness he was humouring me, or the person he thought I was; he didn’t see it at all, but then how could he, it was not to be expected, I knew that, and I could not be angry.

“No, Stephen,” I said softly, firmly. “Give it up. I know you think I’m crazy and a little work with a psychiatrist will make everything all right again. But it’s not like that.”

I thought for a moment, how to ease it. “I know,” I went on, “that you always cared enough to want what was best for me. You were very kind and generous and always fair. I know that what’s happened doesn’t seem right to you. I have been unfair and unkind and ungenerous, and I accept that that’s true.

“But you must understand that I belong here. To you it’s some kind of delusion, but the life I had before would be madness to me now. I couldn’t go back to it ever, not after what I’ve seen here, not with any psychiatrist in the world. Why can’t we leave it at that?” I leaned forward, making him look at me.

“Stephen, you were my husband. I want you to live the best way you know. You have to go on with it, you must not imagine that I can come back. You have to make what you can, not live with something that isn’t real. That’s all we have.”

He was looking at me, without understanding, but also without hope, and that was the moment when it was clear that he knew he would leave alone.

“Tell me now,” I said briskly, assuming by a new tone that the subject was closed, “what’s been happening with the children and you?”

“Do you care?” He was sullen now.