‘Pity they do not serve bacon and cabbage,’ Evelyn said, widening her eyes in studied innocence. ‘I’m sure you would have preferred it.’ Even at times like this, or especially at times like this, when Quirke was in one of his dangerously petulant moods, she couldn’t resist the urge to tease him.

‘Very funny,’ he said, and she bent her face over her plate to hide her grin.

They ate in silence. Quirke had little appetite. His cut hand had sent his entire system into a state of low-key distress. All the same, he forced himself to eat, if only to spite himself. He felt foolish – who but a fool would attempt to open an oyster with a pair of scissors? – and dreaded the prospect of going about for days like a bear with a splinter in its paw. How was he to shave? – although he was right-handed in everything else, he used his left hand to wield the razor. And then there were all the other intimate procedures he would somehow have to negotiate. Of one thing he was certain – wherever else Evelyn might be allowed to minister to him, he would not suffer her to help him in the bathroom, even if it was only to trim his fingernails. He would gnaw them short, if necessary.

‘I didn’t like that doctor,’ he said, forking a square of steak into his mouth without relish.

‘But you noticed how pretty she was, I could see that.’

‘What?’ He stared at her, then shook his head. ‘I meant him, not her,’ he growled. ‘Geronimo of the Cross.’

‘It’s Jeronimo,’ Evelyn corrected him. ‘The J is like an H.’ She was determined that if he learned nothing else of the language, he should be able at least to pronounce the Spanish alphabet. ‘You seemed to be very interested in the young woman,’ she went on. ‘Despite how rude she was, walking away like that.’

Quirke made a face, in a show of exasperation.

‘I was interested in the fact that she was Irish. That’s all.’

‘Yes, when you heard her accent the tip of your nose sprang up like a – what do you call it? – like a retriever dog.’

‘That’s “what do you call it?”’ – he smiled with ferocity, showing his teeth – ‘laker-licker.’

She would not be provoked.

‘There is nothing ridiculous in responding to a familiar accent,’ she said. ‘We all miss our own place, when we are away from it.’ She paused. ‘You know, when I first heard the word “homesick” I thought that it meant being sick of home, of wanting to get away from where one lives. And I thought how strange it was that the English should have invented such a word, considering how much they like to be at home themselves.’