Hard to imagine a psychiatric ward with bars on the windows, and little Gussie inside looking out like a confused rabbit in a hutch. Surely he never thought it would go that far, did he? Did he ever imagine that all those years behind closed doors, refusing to go out into the fresh air, could only lead to trouble and he’d end up walking around in a dressing gown, with everybody staring at their food or staring out the window or staring at each other? Of course it was only for a week. Doctor Gogarty said that. Or was it a month? Not long, in any event.

Gogarty was an odd fish. A dapper little man in a pinstripe suit with lizard’s eyes behind silver-rimmed glasses. He had no hair at all. Not even eyebrows. The surface of his bald head was as smooth as the bonnet of a car, and he had an amber ring on his index finger. A cloud of eau de cologne trailed along the corridor after him. When he gave Birdie his hand she shook it, and it felt like the callused paw of a wild animal. She was wondering how a doctor the size of a milk churn could have such hands. Maybe he does a lot of gardening.

‘So there you go.’

That’s what he kept saying. You’d think he’d have a more consoling phrase. You’d think they’d teach them something about talking to the relatives in their psychiatric school or wherever they go to become doctors.

At least Doctor Hilary had soft hands. She was in her early thirties and had short hair, like rusted leaves, and it was tossed about her white freckled face in a dishevelled manner that suggested meticulous arrangement.

Young professional women nowadays spend a lot of money trying to look like they just walked out of the shower. But she was kind. And she wore a white coat, like a normal doctor, and a stethoscope hung around her neck, and her fingers played with it as if it was a string of pearls.

Birdie met Doctor Hilary on the corridor, the first time she went to visit Gussie. The doctor was clip-clopping down the corridor, like a model on a catwalk as Birdie stared out the window. She stopped and stood there before her in her white starched rigour and her halo of rusty hair, and stared at Birdie for an eternity. Oh yes, that out-of-the-shower look. Smelling of shampoo. And sucking a pencil.

‘You must be Mrs Delaney,’ says she.

‘That’s correct, Miss. I mean Doctor.’

‘Right … OK … Right.’

And she just smiled and walked on. Clip-clopping out through the swing doors. Still, she was better than your man. What was he called? Fogarty or something. Gussie would like the lady doctor. Not so different from Louise. Especially around the haunches. Yes. That’s what Doctor Hilary had. It was a bit of Louise around the haunches. Leggy and feminine in a clear-headed way. Things Birdie had never quite mastered.