‘See, easy,’ he said. ‘The car shit is no problem. There’s one level, it’s real tough, real hard. The sheep, they get … I don’t know how to say.’

Steffi felt a flicker of annoyance, that this guy who couldn’t even learn English was so much more advanced at this game than she was. ‘Like, a … tank? Army vehicles?’

‘No, er.’ Emil swished at the air, grasping for the phrase, which he knew was within reach because he’d discussed it on the fan groups. ‘Diplomatic immunity.’ With his free hand he continued to skim over the screen, dispatching the wolf on another murderous foray. ‘They go to the cops and give you a piece of paper says you aren’t allowed to eat them, you have to get lawyer. I didn’t finish that level for like a week. That was when I stopped.’

‘You stopped? You got bored?’

He laughed again, briefly. ‘Not bored. Too much I liked it. So, in the breaks I always played. And then one day, I’m watching one of the guys, my flat, the – what do you call it …’

He mimed the swing, pointing at the ceiling.

‘Hammock.’

‘Yeah, this guy trying to get out of hammock, cannot because too stoned, whole place smells weed and kebab, and I say – do I want to be here? No, I want to be sous, and after that the name.’

‘The name?’ Steffi repeated.

‘Name chef, like, you know, Marco Pierre, Tom Kerridge, whoever. You have ten restaurants, you have – a style of food, a way.’

Steffi glanced across at him. His eyes seemed to have got darker since she last looked properly at them. ‘I am better than Juno. I could totally be sous.’ She realized that watching him play the game reminded her of watching him in the kitchen: prepping a mountain of herbs with back-and-forth swishes of his tiny knife, like an orchestra conductor viewed on fast-forward. Planting them to obscure the overdone edge of a pork chop. He was like a different person when he was doing manual tasks. He was so fast, so focused.

‘So, yeah, I stop playing the game. In the break, or on bus, I listen podcasts. Podcasts podcasts podcasts. About food. Ideas of food, cooking. From the guys who do what I want to do.’

Steffi nodded. She watched him push the phone gently away. ‘That’s great. You should keep doing it.’

‘It’s the English.’ Emil’s brows knotted darkly. ‘Too much, I can’t learn. So, never get the big job, or I go back to San Sebastián, but there it’s like same four chefs since fucking Franco.’

‘Franco is a chef?’

‘What? No.’ Emil frowned. ‘Like, leader – dictator. Killed many.’