Carefully, he turned around, as if any movement might give him away. The sounds were coming from the other side of a thick, wooden door. What if someone discovered him, and called the police? The argument that he was only there to write a book probably wouldn’t cut it. I should get out, he thought feverishly, I should go back to the front gate and ring the bell, I could send a letter instead, like a normal person.

But none of that would work. There was no bell on the gate, and no postman in Tangier, no matter how experienced, would be able to find this place. He stopped, one foot out of the glass door, even as every sensible thought yelled for him to hurry.

But who was in the house? A man with dark glasses and an old-fashioned hat? A man who signed his name only A, but was truly Arthur Langham, the owner of a lost writing case, a forgotten suitcase? And if so, who on earth was del Potro? Before he lost courage, Sam crossed the room and opened the door.

Beyond was a long hallway, cool and dim and tiled. Sounds were coming from the other end: the rattle and clank of metal, the splutter of water, a scraping noise. As he stood there with every nerve bristling, a scent drifted to him, sharp above the must.

Onions. Someone was frying onions. The smell reached for his belly and dragged him forward, one step at a time. He passed a half-open door and glimpsed a book-lined room, but he didn’t stop, he kept walking towards the sound, towards the smell, towards whoever was there, cooking and clanging and whistling a tune from another era.

Noiselessly, he pushed open a door.

It was a kitchen. Although faded like the rest of the house, it seemed lived-in, welcoming. Copper pans glowed against the peeling walls, bunches of herbs stood in jam jars on the windowsill. In the centre of the room, an enormous wooden table was littered with baskets, plates and open books, and amongst it all a chopping board, where something oozed red.

He took a step further and a figure before the stove came into view; a tall, slim figure with messily cropped black hair, and cool olive skin, who tapped the pan with a wooden spoon and began to call out in Spanish—

‘I,’ he blurted, stepping forwards, ‘I’m sorry …’

The pan of onions clattered to the floor.

A young woman was staring at him, her eyes huge. A second later he held up his hands, because she had snatched a meat cleaver from the table.

‘Sorry,’ he stuttered again, ‘I didn’t mean – I didn’t know there was anyone here.’

‘What are you doing?’

She asked it in English, her voice rough with shock. She wore a stained apron, jeans, bare feet. She looked furious.