‘Jesus,’ Rozalia muttered, gazing down at Wallace, who groaned as he tried, unsuccessfully, to sit back up. ‘He stinks even worse than usual.’

I looked down at him uncertainly. I wanted to say something to Rozalia. I knew I had been too harsh on our last encounter, especially now I knew the truth about the diary entries, but she was acting as if nothing had happened.

‘Maybe we should try and get him back home,’ I suggested.

She gave me a look of horror. ‘I don’t even want to touch him while he’s in that state.’

I looked down again at Wallace and, judging by the smell, suspected he had soiled himself. ‘We can’t just leave him like this.’

Rozalia gave a heavy sigh, and I could see from her expression that she was mentally resigning herself to Doing Something About Wallace. ‘You know, I only came here to get something to eat,’ she said. ‘This isn’t what I had in mind for how I was going to spend my evening.’

We managed to wrestle him more or less upright, but it proved harder than I thought it would be, particularly given his not inconsiderable girth. ‘I thought they made all of us work out,’ I gasped, standing up after we had got him in another chair. ‘How the hell did he end up like this?’

‘He’s a genius at logistics and networking,’ said Rozalia, her nose wrinkled in disgust. ‘That kind of work doesn’t require too much running around.’

‘C’mon,’ I said to Rozalia. ‘Let’s get this over with.’

Just as we reached down for Wallace, the door banged open and Casey walked in. ‘What the hell’s going on?’ he demanded, seeing Wallace slumped between us.

‘Your buddy’s in a mess,’ said Rozalia, standing upright again. ‘He’s going to wind up killing himself if he keeps drinking like this, you know that?’

Wallace made a snorting sound and his eyes flickered open. He waved one pudgy arm as if dismissing all of us.

‘Yeah, well, it’s none of your business anyway, is it?’ said Casey. He gestured towards the door with his head. ‘You leave him to me and I’ll get him home.’

I bit back my words as Casey reached down and tried to get Wallace to stand up. ‘C’mon, you sorry piece of crap,’ he said. ‘Get the hell up.’

‘No,’ Wallace mumbled, twisting away from Casey. ‘All your fault.’

‘We tried that already,’ I said. ‘There’s no way he’s going to be able to walk—’

‘I already said, it’s none of your goddam business,’ Casey snapped, glaring at me. He bent down, wrapping one of Wallace’s arms around his shoulder before trying to hoist him up and off the floor.

‘Hey,’ I said angrily. ‘Don’t talk to me like—’