‘We saw them more as the unsung heroes of the hibernatory revolution, unknowingly brave foot-soldiers, spearheading the fight against the horrors of the Winter to bring us victorious into the Spring. Those citizens, those nightwalkers, died honourably to make a better place for all of us.’

It was an understandable point, just not a very ethical one. The victims, the Nightwalkers, had no choice in the matter.

‘And Morphenox-B?’ I asked. ‘What about that?’

‘Much more exciting,’ said Aurora. ‘The expense in manufacture was predicated on drug purity so nightwalker numbers were kept to an absolute minimum. But we were seeing it arse about face. More nightwalkers actually works for us. Cut a few corners in the manufacturing process and instead of a one-in-two-thousand likelihood of walking, Morphenox-B will give us one in every five hundred.’

‘With those figures, the nightwalker economy could be worth 4.2 billion euros to us within five years,’ continued Goodnight, ‘and will also be socially transformative: tedious and repetitive tasks will be given to workers who don’t know or care what they do and can work sixteen uncomplaining hours a day. Productivity will rise, costs will fall, food production will increase. And once their year is done, they get to be parted out and add immeasurable quality of life to thousands. True vertical integration, Worthing – everything of use but the yawn. I made up that slogan,’ she added proudly. ‘Sums it up well, doesn’t it?’

‘Best of all,’ said Aurora, ‘is that when Winter wastage falls, places like your joyous St Granata’s will actually cease to exist; the burden of endless childbearing a thing of the past. It’s win-win all the way down the line. But,’ she continued, ‘there is a very small fly in our very large ointment. The venerable Don Hector discovered a way to retrieve nightwalkers. He’s dead now, thank goodness, but he encoded it all on a cylinder which he then gave to someone connected to RealSleep. While that cylinder is at large, we are exposed, and we don’t like being exposed.’

They fell silent and stared at me expectantly.

‘You want me to agree with you,’ I said, ‘but I can’t. Nightwalkers are alive. And while they are, you have to do what you can to bring them back. And you can’t murder them, nor part them out. Not for any reason, no matter how noble you think it is.’

‘It’s so easy to be judgemental,’ said Goodnight in a patronising tone, ‘but you must understand that we’ve done too much good for too long to have our work sacrificed on the altar of short-term, wishy-washy, woolly-headed egalitarianism. The benefits of Morphenox-B far, far outweigh the drawbacks and we are here to ensure the most—’

‘—favourable outcome is enjoyed by the majority,’ I said. ‘I know. I hear that a lot. What about this: “If you can’t have change without injustice, then there should be no change”.’

‘Who said that?’