He watches the TV with the volume down, and when he hears the scrape of the French windows over the patio paving downstairs, he rises slowly and crosses to the door, taking his time, the negative feelings receding at the prospect of what’s to come.

For a moment he stands there, looking down on her as she reads, enjoying this stolen glance at her, before moving backwards with deliberate noise, attracting her attention.

‘Anton?’ she says, and a thrill goes through him at the sound of his name coming from her lips.

When she asks about the nocturnes, he cannot keep the smirk of satisfaction from rising. And when she steps past him into his house, he breathes in the scent of her, the movement of warm air as she passes, feels the weird impulse to gulp it in.

He keeps the door to the garden open so as not to alarm her. The last thing he needs is for her to feel trapped. She steps into the living room, and he hastily clears away his plate, switches off the telly.

‘Sorry about the mess,’ he calls, as he carries the plate into the kitchen.

When he comes back into the room, she is gazing around her, eyes drawn up to the lofty ceilings, the cornicing lacy with cobwebs. She runs her hands up and down her upper arms, a mindless gesture of comfort, and offers him a nervous smile.

‘I’ve been wondering about these rooms,’ she admits, ‘what they looked like. They’re very grand, aren’t they?’

Her eyes cast upwards again, and it is true that the dimensions are imposing, but he looks at the faded wallpaper, the pall of dust on the wall-sconces, and can think only of how shabby it must all seem.

‘I’m afraid I’ve rather let things go.’

She smiles but doesn’t contradict him.

‘It’s a bit too big for me, to be honest. A single man rattling around in this big old place. These houses were built for families with servants.’

She nods, and he feels awkward, as if suggesting that, living in the servants’ quarters, she’s beneath him in more ways than one. He could tell her the real truth – that the space makes him uneasy. That he cannot relax in it. Years spent in a cell, his whole life shrunk to an area less than half the size of this room, has made it impossible for him now to feel comfortable within his cavernous house. The way it catches sounds. The gloom of shadows that slide along the wall and clot in corners. And always Charlotte’s voice brushing against him. Even now, he can hear her: ‘Up to your old tricks again, Anton? Naughty boy!’